Anti-skid floors

Most floor specifiers are so focused on eliminating the risk of slip-falls to their workers and the public that it doesn't even occur to them that they can gain valuable add-on benefits at the same time for very little, if any, extra outlay.

To this end, Dynamic Flooring Australia has formulated a checklist of opportunities to put before customers in the form of its 'Floor Audit' or condition assessment, which is part of its approach to even the simplest re-flooring task.

The audit asks the question "Would you gain from..."

Added life. Clearly the floor coating material must suit the duty, including any foreseeable change of duty throughout its life. Is it to tolerate solely foot traffic? And if machine or vehicular traffic, does that include steel-wheeled? And what loads? And how often? And will the duty perhaps change next year? Without choosing a flooring material to suit, even occasional peak duty could do more damage once than year of regular walk-on use.

Added wear resistance. In a car park, for example, you must factor in that tyres scrub the surface as they make tight turns and have been known to push 'folds' into lesser coating materials.

"Bumps, potholes and crumbling expansion joints damage cleaning and handling machines and injure workers. Fix these now. And it will certainly cost a whole lot less now than later to fix holes where racking or machinery have been ripped out, walls or columns removed, pits or drains cut in, levels built up for machine mounting."

Added impact resistance. Do workers occasionally drop hard loads? Now's the chance to make your floor more resilient to such impacts.

Higher resistance to attack from various agents, oils, fuels and chemicals, noting that for car parks, brake fluid can be especially aggressive towards some flooring systems.

Improved UV stability, which does more than prevent the colour fading from your floor when exposed to sunlight. It also serves to harden the floor. And it makes for easier cleaning.

Elimination of trip zones and machine obstacles. Bumps, potholes and crumbling expansion joints damage cleaning and handling machines and injure workers. Fix these now. And it will certainly cost a whole lot less now than later to fix holes where racking or machinery have been ripped out, walls or columns removed, pits or drains cut in, levels built up for machine mounting.

Improved aesthetics through the use of colour and patterns to delight the eye of workers and customers. The extra reflectivity could even save on lighting and certainly makes for a brighter working environment.

Line-marking and zone-painting sealed into the floor to ensure that they too remain anti-skid. Painting them on afterwards might reintroduce slip zones, spoiling what you set out to do in the first place.

Faster drying times after wet cleaning. Unlike concrete, which absorbs water, modern flooring materials such as epoxies and polyurethanes seal the floor, lessening drying times. Too, they make for faster cleaning with less wear on cleaner machine brushes. They also make the floors impervious to oils and contaminants.

Improved hygiene and cleanability through a coving (a curved floor-to-wall join). It is not only very attractive but also very practical for some operations, particularly where hygiene is imperative, eliminating a natural trap for contaminants, which can be stubborn to dislodge.

Addition of special functions. For institutional use like schools, it might be wise to add anti-graffiti properties. Or, for special processing areas such as electronics: anti-static properties. There is even a food-grade flooring material with built-in microbe-inhibitors that actively prevent bacteria, fungi, moulds and mildew from flourishing.

Lower insurance premiums and discouraging lawsuits. The resulting test documentation could well forestall or deflect frivolous claims by its very existence. It can also be used to negotiate lower premiums with insurance companies in the same way as proving that you have installed approved fire protection or security systems does.