ICP has a long-running legacy of innovation in the concrete accessories industry. Starting in 1966, George Hartzheim founded our first concrete company, manufacturing dobies for the rebar fabricators and placers. Since the inception of the company, the rebar fabricator and placer was our primary product for concrete reinforcement.

Concrete Slabs

A concrete slab is a rectangular, flat and strong structure made up of concrete. Concrete slabs are 10-50 cm thick. Mainly, these are used in the construction process. These are used in floors, roofs, bridge deck, homes and different buildings to make them strong.

Designs and Shapes

These are available in different shapes and designs. Suspended slabs are created to produce and maintain the strength and weight. If any change is necessary in the design, it is brought in the bottom side of the concrete slab; whereas the upper or top side is left unchanged. Below some types are written:

Corrugated concrete slabs: These slabs are made by the combination of steel and concrete. Usually, concrete is released in a strong steel tray to make it stronger for buildings and construction purposes. It also enhances the length of the slab and makes it very hard. Such concrete slabs are very hard to get bend. So, these slabs provide more power to buildings and enhance their ability to withstand against the variations of the climate and environment. These slabs can be very heavy as well.

Ribbed concrete slabs: Special concrete slabs, which are made to enhance the strength of the buildings. These slabs have special additional strength and power on one direction. So, such strong side is used to prevent the harmful shakes to buildings.

This act helps the buildings and houses to get more strength from these slabs. It is up to conditions that slab will be pre-stressed or post-stressed. Both versions have various features. These slabs may be unstressed according to a situation; it is also used in various buildings. These slabs have many drawbacks along with advantages. If these slabs are not designed according to the need, and they have flaws like wrong dimensions then these slabs won't get fit in given slot, this situation might be harmful to buildings.

Get your house plumbing system statically tested. Assure your drain system (and domestic water supply, irrigation system, etc.) is leak free. Should plumbing leaks be present, get a flow test done to determine the leak discharge water volume.

Check your foundation drainage. Assure that the surface water drains away from the foundation along its perimeter, and no low areas allow water to pond for longer than a day or so after a heavy rain.

Understand how your foundation system works. The basic purpose of your house foundation system is to safely separate habitable areas from the exterior environment and limit damage or distress to interior/exterior brittle building materials.

One of the crucial underlying design principles of shallow bearing slab on grade foundation systems is its "single unit" behavior. To do their job, slab-on-grade foundation systems act as single structural elements with uniform stiffness. These foundation systems are designed to respond uniformly to resist upward or downward movement caused by soil pressure from below, and heavy structural loads from above. In doing so, these slab-on-grade foundation systems are stiff enough to buffer potentially damaging soil and subgrade material movement, yet flexible enough to protect the supported structural elements from unsafe or excessive planar tilting.

This most often occurs in areas where the ground is not subject to freezing and therefore not likely to heave. There are derivations of this where frost underneath the structure is controlled with foam insulation or hydronic (hot-water) heating systems incorporated into the slab to prevent the ground below from freezing. However, it is usually not typically economically favorable to use the slab-on-grade in very cold climates. There is at type called a Frost protected Slab that is standard in Sweden and is gaining acceptance here.

The advantages of slab-on-grade are that it is a relative inexpensive form of residential foundation, they are very sturdy when properly designed and constructed and helps obstruct termites from entering the house. When properly constructed they offer very few spaces in the foundation itself for termites to intrude into the structure from below. This assumes that all pipe penetrations are properly sealed with stainless steel wool or adequate caulk to prevent their passage. It also reduces the amount of perimeter crack that is vulnerable to infestation making treatment easier in the event that termites do get into the house.

You must plan carefully for utility penetrations through the slab for water, electric, gas, telecommunications and any other utilities. This is often times overlooked, especially because we fail to account for changes in technology.

When planning a slab-on-grade foundation, you must bring a conduit from underneath to an accessible place outside for water. Most plumbers will direct bury the line or embed the copper lines directly in the slab. This is not a good practice because it makes repair costly and difficult if something goes wrong with the water line. If you install a 2' PVC conduit for the water line, a new one can be pulled in later if you need to. This will also prevent the copper or galvanized water line from degrading from contact with bare concrete.

The same procedure needs to be followed for cable and telephone. You can put both services in the same conduit in this case so one 2' conduit should adequately suffice in this case. Electrical services must enter a disconnect on the exterior of the house so it is not typical that you will need to provide a conduit under the slab for this. In all these cases, the conduit should terminate in one central location in the house such as a utility closet or garage.

The Usages and Types of Wire Ties

Without a doubt, wire ties are particularly useful today. These are made of nylon straps combined with gear back on one edge as well as a ratcheted casing on the other edge to easily secure and snug it when needed. They are designed having this feature to tighten them in one direction to prevent slipping; still there are other designs available as well. These ties are utilized almost all parts of the world having countless of usages and similar usages also.

Wire ties are commonly recognized in different terms, suchlike cable ties, zip straps, zip ties, rat belts and quick draws. At present, these are utilized in countless dissimilar usages like in the government, law enforcement and construction jobs. You can also discover particularized wire ties like the blue type containing metallic substance to easily detected using a metal detectors, which are often seen in food businesses. For Ultraviolent rays protection, there are available types containing black carbon and are very useful. In addition, there are ties designed for radiation exposure areas.

Did you know that these kinds of ties are developed by an electronic firm to be used as wire harness for aircraft? These kinds utilized metal gear rather of nylon. Still, wire ties are used all across the globe with different purposes and are also inexpensive. Remember, these ties are likewise reusable although others thought that they are not. For instance, you may insert a sewing needle between the gear as well as box at the same time pulling them freely to use them for your next job. Still, there are purchasable reusable ties designed with tab to release the tightness. Velcro types are also purchasable these days.

The jumping jack, or "wacker" is more effective at compacting the stone base. This is even more important than the strength of the base so special attention should be used to accurately level and compact the base. The old adage about the only guarantee with concrete is that it will crack, but following this information will minimize the likelihood.

For garage and shed cement slabs there is typically only one size gravel for a base. This depends on the soil conditions and any engineered design requirements. In cold climates a 24' x 24' garage slab on solid ground that is quite level may only require leveling with a Bobcat or mini-excavator and then adding one dump truck load of 3/4" gravel.

Compaction is achieved with a jumping jack tamper or plate tamper. Several passes over the entire base is required to reach maximum compaction to reduce the chances of cement slab cracks cause by future settling. This equipment can be rented from any local tool rental location.

In warm climates it may be acceptable to place the cement slab on top of the natural ground if it is stump-free and compactable. One complication of this method is efficient drainage. Gravel is porous and therefore excellent for drainage. Special attention to grading away from the cement slab is important to prevent water from entering the garage or shed and also to prevent slab floating. Floating occurs when the water level under the slab pushed up on the slab due to poor drainage or a high water table. Poor drainage will also complicate construction with a constantly web jobsite, base compaction reduction, and base leveling.