How Does Industrial Flooring Solve Safety Challenges?

If you man­age a man­u­fac­tur­ing plant or any facil­i­ty, you know that work­place acci­dents can cost your com­pa­ny dear­ly. Installing and main­tain­ing indus­tri­al floor­ing can help pre­vent acci­dents and improve facil­i­ty safe­ty in many ways.

What Is Indus­tri­al Flooring?

Indus­tri­al build­ings often car­ry heavy loads and deal with con­stant foot and vehi­cle traf­fic. Some get exposed to strong chem­i­cals and harsh con­di­tions, requir­ing floor­ing sys­tems that meet the demand­ing require­ments of such envi­ron­ments. Pol­ished con­crete floor­ing is one good option.

Ways Indus­tri­al Floor­ing Solves Safe­ty Challenges

Unkempt and low-qual­i­ty floor­ing can cause many safe­ty issues. Wet and dirty sur­faces can increase the risk of slips and falls; cracks and gaps in the floor can trip peo­ple; floors that lack prop­er visu­al cues cre­ate trans­porta­tion haz­ards and con­fu­sion. Invest­ing in durable indus­tri­al floor­ing and tak­ing care of it rou­tine­ly can mit­i­gate all these poten­tial safe­ty issues.

Struc­tur­al Integrity

Struc­tur­al integri­ty refers to a structure’s abil­i­ty to sup­port and with­stand its intend­ed use. If com­pro­mised, struc­tur­al dam­age can seri­ous­ly harm facil­i­ty per­son­nel and oth­er assets. Struc­tur­al integri­ty is crit­i­cal to all build­ings. How­ev­er, it is par­tic­u­lar­ly vital for struc­tures exposed to envi­ron­men­tal and load changes.

In con­crete floor­ing, slab thick­ness is one fac­tor deter­min­ing the structure’s integri­ty. So, how thick is indus­tri­al floor­ing? It gen­er­al­ly depends on the expect­ed occu­pan­cy load, equip­ment and fur­ni­ture weight to be placed on the floor, and the weight of the building. 

Maneu­ver­abil­i­ty

Maneu­ver­abil­i­ty is crit­i­cal, espe­cial­ly in ware­hous­es and facil­i­ties like hos­pi­tals where occu­pants move wheel­chairs, trol­leys, and oth­er objects around. High-qual­i­ty ware­house floor­ing ensures that mate­r­i­al han­dling equip­ment, like pal­let jacks and fork­lifts, can nav­i­gate safe­ly and smoothly.

Indus­tri­al floor­ing can be coat­ed or sealed to achieve a smooth, even sur­face, which can solve maneu­ver­abil­i­ty issues that could put employ­ees at risk. Fur­ther­more, increased maneu­ver­abil­i­ty can improve your team’s pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. The faster peo­ple can move around, the more tasks they finish.

Vis­i­bil­i­ty

Poor vis­i­bil­i­ty makes it easy to miss obsta­cles and trip­ping haz­ards on the floor. You can increase vis­i­bil­i­ty in the work­place by adding more light­ing or installing reflec­tive indus­tri­al floor­ing, which improves light­ing with­out hav­ing to install more elec­tri­cal features.

Indus­tri­al floor­ing comes in mul­ti­ple gloss lev­els such as semi-gloss or glossy. Fin­ish­es with a high sheen lev­el reflect light sources bet­ter, improv­ing floor safe­ty.

Clean­li­ness

Dirt, dust, and aller­gens can be brought in by dai­ly foot and vehi­cle traf­fic and can pose seri­ous health risks to indi­vid­u­als inside the build­ing. Addi­tion­al­ly, floors worn down by grit and grime are more like­ly to cause slips and acci­dents. As a result, busi­ness­es may face cost­ly lit­i­ga­tion if injuries sus­tained from slip­ping and falling are serious.

Floors near entrances will see high­er foot traf­fic, and clean­ing these areas while peo­ple con­stant­ly come in and out of the prop­er­ty can be chal­leng­ing. Addi­tion­al­ly, tile and tex­tured floors can be chal­leng­ing to clean because of grout lines and dimples.

Indus­tri­al safe­ty floor­ing using a non-per­me­able floor­ing mate­r­i­al can resist spills and stains. You need only sweep dai­ly, mop liq­uid spills, and deep clean the floor peri­od­i­cal­ly to keep it spotless.

Antimi­cro­bial Properties

Health and safe­ty risks in your facil­i­ty aren’t always vis­i­ble. Some risks that can wreak hav­oc in your busi­ness are micro­scop­ic, like bac­te­ria and virus­es. They can cause ill­ness­es and com­pro­mise prod­uct safe­ty. Microor­gan­isms are par­tic­u­lar­ly dan­ger­ous in med­ical facil­i­ties, lab­o­ra­to­ries, and food and bev­er­age plants. 

Harm­ful microor­gan­isms grow in hard-to-clean seams, depres­sions in the floor, or any­where the fin­ish has been breached. These unwel­come microor­gan­isms also hide under­neath the floor­ing, where it’s damp and dark.

Indus­tri­al floor­ing with antimi­cro­bial prop­er­ties can help solve prob­lems with germs and bac­te­ria. These floor­ing solu­tions grad­u­al­ly release antimi­cro­bial agents that kill microor­gan­isms on the floor. They are non-porous and seam­less, so microbes have nowhere to hide and multiply. 

Antimi­cro­bial floor­ing solu­tions come in many forms. How­ev­er, the most com­mon are ure­thane, polyurethane, and epoxy. These antimi­cro­bial coat­ings meet USDA and FDA require­ments. So, besides keep­ing harm­ful microbes at bay, installing antimi­cro­bial floor­ing will keep your facil­i­ty compliant.

ESD

Elec­tro­sta­t­ic dis­charge (ESD) is anoth­er safe­ty con­cern, par­tic­u­lar­ly in facil­i­ties that man­u­fac­ture or use sophis­ti­cat­ed elec­tron­ic equip­ment. ESD can dam­age elec­tri­cal com­po­nents beyond repair and com­pro­mise valu­able data. It can even cause fires or explo­sions in com­bustible environments. 

One of the ways to con­trol ESD is to install indus­tri­al floor­ing with anti-sta­t­ic prop­er­ties. ESD floor­ing con­sists of con­duc­tive ele­ments, such as car­bon and graphite. These cre­ate an elec­tri­cal path­way from the walk­ing sur­face to the ground. There­fore, sta­t­ic does­n’t accu­mu­late on peo­ple as they walk.

Main­tain a Safe, Com­pli­ant Facil­i­ty With Kaloutas’ Indus­tri­al Floor­ing Services

Floor­ing plays a cru­cial role in any facil­i­ty. It can impact work­place safe­ty and busi­ness com­pli­ance. Whether you’re seek­ing to fix your exist­ing facil­i­ty floor or install a new one, Kaloutas’ expert floor installers are here to help. We’ve already suc­cess­ful­ly installed more than 10 mil­lion square feet of indus­tri­al floor coat­ings and pol­ished con­crete floors in the greater New Eng­land area.

The Kaloutas team brings decades of exper­tise to the table. With it, you can ensure your facil­i­ty floor stays safe and com­pli­ant with rel­e­vant rules and reg­u­la­tions. Each installer is cer­ti­fied in all con­crete floor­ing prepa­ra­tion and repair phas­es. They can install a vari­ety of floor­ing sys­tems effec­tive­ly and successfully.

If your facil­i­ty is deal­ing with safe­ty chal­lenges relat­ed to floor­ing, don’t hes­i­tate to con­tact the Kaloutas team. Let’s boost safe­ty in floor­ing with a solu­tion that match­es your building’s require­ments and your budget.