3 Reasons Your Industrial Floors Need Protection

Indus­tri­al floor­ing is strong, durable, and resilient. It is designed to hold up to years of wear and tear from foot traf­fic, as well as equip­ment like fork­lifts and hand trucks. It is tempt­ing to think that indus­tri­al floor­ing is vir­tu­al­ly inde­struc­tible. How­ev­er, there are quite a few things that can dam­age your floors, lead­ing to a need for repair or even demo­li­tion and replace­ment in seri­ous cas­es. Let’s look at three of the most dan­ger­ous threats your con­crete floor­ing faces and how com­mer­cial paint­ing con­trac­tors and indus­tri­al floor­ing con­trac­tors can help you avoid them.

Why You Need to Pro­tect Indus­tri­al Floors

1. Impact Damage

Per­haps the sin­gle most com­mon type of dam­age to indus­tri­al floors and the most eas­i­ly under­stood threat is impact dam­age. Falling machin­ery or dropped parts hit the floor, poten­tial­ly caus­ing dam­age to parts or equip­ment pieces. How­ev­er, there’s a very real chance that dam­age can also be done to the floor. Some­thing as sim­ple as a chip or even a ding in indus­tri­al floor coat­ing can mean real issues down the line as it can com­pro­mise the con­crete pol­ish­ing. Even epoxy over­lay sys­tems can be dam­aged by impact.

Impacts can also lead to oth­er issues. For instance, a sin­gle chip from the con­crete sur­face weak­ens the entire area. Even­tu­al­ly, that chip will begin to widen, send­ing cracks like a spi­der­web through the con­crete, sim­i­lar to how cracks in a car’s wind­shield can grow. What starts as a small issue even­tu­al­ly grows into a major prob­lem requir­ing sig­nif­i­cant repair.

2. Chem­i­cal Degradation

Your facility’s com­mer­cial floor­ing comes into con­tact with a very wide range of chem­i­cals on a con­stant basis. Most of those are com­plete­ly harm­less. How­ev­er, there is a hid­den dan­ger here. Chem­i­cals such as chlo­rine and chlo­ride lurk­ing in some­thing as seem­ing­ly benign as tap water can cause dam­age over time. There are numer­ous oth­er types of chem­i­cal attacks that can cause degra­da­tion, includ­ing acid attacks, car­bon­a­tion, alka­li aggre­gate reac­tion, and sul­fate attacks.

In these sit­u­a­tions, degra­da­tion caus­es the con­crete to weak­en, crum­bling away and expos­ing the iron rein­force­ment sys­tem, which then begins to rust and cor­rode itself. Even­tu­al­ly, this can lead to cat­a­stroph­ic dam­age and the need for demo­li­tion and replace­ment of your flooring.

3. Phys­i­cal Dam­age to Joints and Spalling

Con­crete expands and con­tracts as it heats up and cools down. Joints are cre­at­ed to allow this ther­mal cycle with­out caus­ing dam­age to the con­crete floor. With­out joints, indus­tri­al floors will even­tu­al­ly buck­le and crum­ble. How­ev­er, joints can be sub­ject to dam­age. This can lead to dam­age to the rest of the floor or could com­pro­mise the floor’s expansion/​contraction ability.

Spalling is anoth­er threat. A crack may form in the con­crete floor through any num­ber of meth­ods, includ­ing dam­age to con­trac­tion joints. Once in the con­crete floor, mois­ture expands and push­es through the mate­r­i­al. This results in dam­age that shows up as flak­ing, peel­ing, or raised areas on the sur­face of the concrete.

Pro­tect­ing Your Indus­tri­al Con­crete Floors

The three threats we cov­ered above are only a few of the issues that could wreak hav­oc on your facility’s floors. Con­crete is strong and durable, but it can be sur­pris­ing­ly easy to dam­age. Some types of dam­age can start small, but leave you with a need for major repairs. So, what are your options? Actu­al­ly, there are sev­er­al choic­es, depend­ing on your situation.

If you have not yet com­plet­ed con­struc­tion of your facil­i­ty, you can choose to use a dif­fer­ent type of floor­ing sys­tem from the begin­ning. For instance, you could make use of a seam­less epoxy sys­tem to help ensure that mois­ture, chlo­rides, and oth­er threats can­not eas­i­ly pen­e­trate the under­ly­ing concrete.

There are options for exist­ing con­crete floors, too. Work­ing with a rep­utable com­mer­cial painter and indus­tri­al floor­ing con­trac­tors who offers mois­ture mit­i­ga­tion and con­crete expan­sion joint repair, com­bined with con­crete pol­ish­ing and floor demo­li­tion and replace­ment, ensures that you have a strong, durable floor that will stand the test of time.

At Kaloutas, we have years of expe­ri­ence work­ing with indus­tri­al con­crete floors, and we’re proud to offer a very wide range of ser­vices and floor­ing sys­tems. Call us today at 978−532−1414 for more information.

Kaloutas is New Eng­land’s pre­mier con­trac­tor for com­mer­cial & indus­tri­al paint­ing, floor­ing, and relat­ed ser­vices. Estab­lished in 1987, Kaloutas has become a trust­ed resource for gen­er­al con­trac­tors, facil­i­ties man­agers, and build­ing own­ers from Con­necti­cut to Maine. Our team prides itself on high qual­i­ty work­man­ship, jobs done on time & bud­get, and tack­ling com­plex projects that oth­er con­trac­tors don’t have the expe­ri­ence or resources to han­dle. Con­tact us today for a paint­ing or floor­ing esti­mate, or give us a call at 978−532−1414 to learn more.