Bedrock Floors transformed Bob Rumball Camp for the Deaf’s dusty old concrete floor into beautiful and functional Polished Concrete floor.
Bedrock Floors is an up and coming flooring applicator in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). We were pleased to provide the Camp for the Deaf in Parry Sound with a solution to an ongoing problem they have had in their cafeteria. The camp was struggling with repairs and refinishing their floor multiple times over just a few years. The combination of temperature fluctuations and poor adhesion had caused various flooring materials to delaminate before their expected lifespan.
The advanced Concrete Polishing process in a nut shell.
Bedrock’s solution was simple, if you have problems with delamination, bypass the problem all together. Polished Concrete was the obvious choice, as it is unique in having no surface lamination, or coating to peel, crack or fail. Polished Concrete is exactly as it sounds, we take a gnarly slab of concrete, grind, patch, hone, densify, refine, and polish the surface through the use of an orbital diamond grinder. The surface profile and imperfections are removed, the concrete matrix is hardened through a chemical procedure known as densification, and the pores of the concrete are smoothed and sealed by the steel and resin compound that the abrasive diamond tooling is suspended in.
Polished Concrete: an elegant solution to an ugly problem
Once this process is completed, the concrete itself has transformed. It ceases to be concrete and becomes Polished Concrete. All other flooring materials are placed on top of the concrete substrate. This layering system is simply not as tough as the integral transformation of Polished Concrete. Layered flooring is only ever as strong as the glue that sticks it down. The oldest structures built by mankind are carved from stone. Stone is known for its longevity, when all of our glued together modern building are reduced to rust and dust, those same stone structures will still be standing, who knows, possibly even a properly Polished Concrete floor.
Bedrock Floors involves the client in planning their future floors to add transparency and ultimately nurture an environment of trust
Bedrock and the Bob Rumball foundation discussed prior to starting the job the potential for a poor concrete slab to be lurking beneath the many layers of the existing flooring. Other than the areas where the floor had peeled up, we didn’t have an accurate idea of the condition of the substrate. The Camp knew the history of the slab however, they explained that it had been split into three sections, a core slab at one end, a section of the original floor surrounded the perimeter, and one room in the corner, and finally the bulk of the floor was a recently poured slab that had been installed due to some plumbing issues. Our expectations were low as to the slabs condition, but typically any scars and age marks in a Polished Concrete floor add character. As the Polish wears with foot traffic, it matures, and often is a topic of discussion over its intrinsic beauty. With this knowledge, and what little areas of the floor we could test for hardness and damage, Bedrock made a plan on how to undertake the Polish.
After the existing flooring had been removed and we ground the self leveling skim coat off we, were greeted with an unfortunate turn of events. The floor that we were hoping would be pristine turned out to have the core slab section, roughly 40% of the area, in extremely bad condition. The slab had sunk down a half inch in some places, and had been patched with a very soft overlayment. Large deep spalling was present in the overlayment which was well below the boundaries of proper hardness to polish. In order to polish the area, the sunken slab would have to be brought up with a self leveling overlayment that would take a proper polish, not a cheap fix. We then had another frank discussion with the Camp regarding their options and preferences. Due to budgetary constraints we had to come up with a fix to their original problem along with the newly uncovered issues.
Regardless how bad the floor is to start with, Bedrock is dedicated to providing unparalleled quality, and efficiency while still being easy on your wallet
Bedrock brainstormed a cost effective solution for an expensive problem. The client was still able to have most of their floor polished, while the entrance area was able to be coated with a high quality industrial 2 component epoxy coating to fill the voids, and provide extra protection from the elements. In the end we managed to provide the changes in procedure to the client for a small mobilization fee to cover the additional costs of returning to Parry Sound.
We are glad to have built a relationship with the Bob Rumball foundation and will strive to preserve what was formed. Regardless how bad the floor is to start with, Bedrock is dedicated to providing unparalleled quality, and efficiency while still being easy on your wallet.
We are very thankful to have been given the chance to work on such an exciting project.
– Luke Sutton
Vice-President
