×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

(OP)
Good Day
I have a special challenge
See attached photos of a very old slab-soffit of a underground tunnel.
Into this tunnel shall a bar build in. The challenge is now that the Architect wishes to keep this rough old structure as an feature. All the old bricks and the exposed rusted rebar’s shall remain.
Is there something like a transparent material which we could apple on the soffit of this slab and protect it from falling apart?
In some cases I will obviously need to prop the slab, but the places between should show the rusted beams and rebar’s and broken off concrete.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

Nothing will save that ceiling. A better solution might be to block off the ends of the tunnel with the Architect inside.

Seriously, is that a structural slab or just a ceiling? I hope the actual tunnel structure is in better condition.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

That's a danger to patrons. Do not leave as it is and do not try to coat with a sealer...that won't help. This is a liability waiting to happen.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

(OP)
i like hokie66´s idea smile

this tunnel is just one meter below ground and on top is only a 1m soil backfill
i mean I also like the appearance of this old rough structure. I would definitely like to site in such an bar. it has some personality, some character but only ja the danger. I mean I want anyway to provide two steel beams under the slab which will be propped lets say every 5m. So the entire slab will not collapse but the problem are the smaller peace’s between.

what about a epoxy coating with mesh between or kind of a fiber?

Lolobau

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

I also like hokie's idea...solves a lot of problems.

"only 1m of soil backfill"....that's more than 300 psf.

You can use an epoxy with mesh or fiber, but you'll lose the character of the rough look. If you want to do something like that, consider using shotcrete to encapsulate the loose stuff and leave the shotcrete rough. Can be made to look more like a "natural" tunnel.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

Something transparent? Yes. Debris netting. I too am concerned that 1m of soil which presumably will be saturated and will eventually leak through the waterproofing membrane will eventually further deteriorate the slab. All it takes is for one piece of concrete to break loose and hit someone on the head, or for a piece of concrete to break loose and fall into someone's drink (and then they drink their beverage and perhaps break a tooth thinking the concrete is an ice cube) - and you'll have a lawsuit.

This reminds me of a project that I worked on twenty years ago. It was a theme restaurant and the architect wanted the new slab-on-grade to look like the floor of an old abandoned factory building. They gave us explicit instructions that they wanted the slab to be randomly cracked throughout. So usually we get in trouble if we have random cracks in our floor slabs. Now we were going to get in trouble if we didn't have random cracks. I forget what direction we gave the contractor to cause the slab to crack. Perhaps we told them to do what they usually do. The restaurant is no longer in business, otherwise I'd drive over tonight and have dinner there - and check out the slab.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

I have some attorney friends who would love for this project to move forward as is....

Agree with Ron et al, fix the problem and then make it look old like they do at Disney and other theme parks.

RE: transparent protection and sealiing of an old concrete slab?

If they want it to look worn down, have them save the rusted material, rebuild the thing so it's actually safe, roughen the concrete surface, embed or adhere the rusted stuff so it looks authentic and then paint it to look distressed.

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources