what to use to clean out control joints
Repair Concrete Expansion Joints Early to Save Time and Money
Cheers to a botched install (not one of our crews), we had the pleasure of restoring concrete expansion joints at a local church building. If you lot're not certain how to repair concrete expansion joints or you're looking for an easier way to become it done, you've come to the correct place. Nosotros'll prove you what went incorrect on this install and give you some tips to repair it before it becomes a really expensive prepare.
Annotation: Many people, including the professionals nosotros consulted with on this article, employ control joint and expansion joint interchangeably. Technically, an expansion joint is a complete separation that allows expcted motility. A control joint is a partial cut that allows for natural cracking in predicatable locations where the crack can be hidden on the joint line. Because so many people apply the term expansion joint when they hateful control articulation (call back Kleenex vs tissue), nosotros're mirroring that in this article.
Why You lot Should Repair Concrete Expansion Joints Before It'south Also Late
On our project, the original installer used a combination of foam capitalist rod and a physical expansion joint filler that was also rigid for the application. With only the two joint sides to bond with and not the bottom, the contractor got paid for sub-par work that left unsightly cracks in the filler less than a year later as the building settled.
Without going through a repair cycle, the edges would somewhen first to expose. That would atomic number 82 to a slow erosion of the expansion joint sides. As this "K Coulee" event erodes the sides over time, information technology eventually gets to a point where the repair becomes prohibitively expensive.
In a small church building, the erosion is very slow. But in a warehouse, store, or other heavy-traffic environments, equipment crushes down the sides and corners much faster. Nosotros've heard stories of $one million annual forklift maintenance costs due solely to severe impacts from constantly running over damaged expansion joints.
You lot tin do a standard expansion joint repair up to effectually ane″ or then. Once you go beyond that, the procedure is much more painful to your wallet. You need to kickoff by cutting out a gap some four″ wide, rebuild a concrete layer, and cut a new expansion joint. That kind of expansion joint repair runs virtually $20 per linear human foot.
Hopefully, your facility isn't to that point still.
Restoring Physical Expansion Joints the Hard Way
I of the common ways to repair concrete expansion joints involves some bones tools and a lot of time.
- Use a scraping tool, like a five-in-ane, to scrape out the former concrete expansion joint filler.
- Vacuum out the concrete expansion joints.
- Employ a caulk gun with your filler of choice and refill the joints.
- Scrape the sides and height of the joints to leave a clean finish.
Fifty-fifty in a small expanse, it takes a lot of time and you lot're on your knees for most of information technology.
Restoring Concrete Expansion Joints the Easy Manner
Pace 1: Sawing and Cleaning Out the Joints
To remove the erstwhile concrete expansion joint filler, we started with the United states Saws Grit Buggy Marking 3. This saw takes an 8″ diamond bract that cuts up to two″ deep. We only needed to cut down 1″ and the 1/four″ broad blade we used was able to clear the joint in a single pass.
With Objective Information in hand, the saw is an OSHA-compliant solution that doesn't need any water and runs on a standard 120V, 20A outlet. You demand 25 CFM for every 1″ of blade diameter, so you need a vac with at least 200 CFM. We used a US Saws model with 220 CFM, leaving our surfaces equally clean as yous tin hope for.
It'due south not only fast (you can embrace upward to 10,000 linear anxiety on an viii-hour shift), it'south also designed to let you work standing up and with much greater precision than other options out there.
Compared to manual scraping or a handheld power tool, it'due south incredibly fast, clean, and easier on your back.
Stride 2: Vacuuming Out the Joints
There'southward no change in this stride. Just run your grit extractor across the joints to pick upward any heavier particles it missed when you were sawing.
Pace 3: Physical Expansion Joint Filler
Choosing the right physical expansion articulation filler is fundamental to getting the best results. While our church doesn't have the kind of traffic you lot run into in a warehouse, nosotros went with Metzger McGuire Spal-Pro RS 88 – an industrial level ii-function polyurea. It'southward a great fit for environments that stay in the 32°F to 120°F range.
This physical expansion joint filler is sparse plenty to get down into the cracks from the building's settling, withal sets upwardly quickly enough to stop in 10 – xv minutes. You can match or contrast your flooring in a wide range of colors.
Before mixing, we put down painter'southward record on both sides of the joints.
We turned to US Saws' One Man Polymer Pump to use the filler. It gives one person the ability to correctly mix and apply the filler. Similar the Dust Buggy, you get to stay off your knees instead of crawling around on the floor. Information technology'due south easy to apply and fast to fill your joints.
We used a two-pass system to apply our Spal-Pro RS 88. The first allows the physical expansion joint filler to settle into the articulation and fill any cracks below it. The 2d pass fills the articulation and overfills it slightly with the tape protecting the floor. Even with the two passes, a couple of spots needed a lilliputian more than to eliminate low spots.
Step 4: Finishing Your Physical Expansion Articulation Repair
For the concluding step, we used a homemade scraper. It's intentionally long and heavy to let us become some mass behind information technology from a standing position. To finish off the procedure, just take your scraper and cut under the record. It cuts the superlative of the concrete expansion joint filler flush with the top of the floor and removes your tape at the same time.
For our Spal-Pro RS 88, we gave it 15 minutes to set before scraping it. Check the documentation on your filler to know for sure how long you should wait.
One time yous're done with the scraping process, follow the manufacturer's curing guidelines earlier letting traffic dorsum on it over again.
Equipment Listing
- US Saws Dust Buddy Mark III Concrete Joint Saw – $1650
- US Saws One Human being Polymer Pump – $7250
- Metzger McGuire Spal-Pro RS 88 – $450 (10 gallons)
- Scraper
- Painter'southward Record
- Chemical-resistant gloves
Source: https://www.protoolreviews.com/how-to-repair-concrete-expansion-joints/
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