Category Archives: Concrete Repair

Concrete Repair, MatchCrete

Making Cracks Disappear

One question we get asked all the time is if we can make a crack disappear.  For the most part the answer has always been no. We can make a good repair and finish it as close as we can to the original color and surface texture. That was before Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear came along.  The photos below were sent in by a concrete polishing contractor. By using MatchCrete™ clear and sand that matches the surrounding concrete, the polished repair blends in very nicely with the concrete slab. When the floor is in service, you will have to look very carefully to find the repairs.  Try some Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear on your next polishing job. With a little technique and experimentation, you can get results like this.

dalton.008
Polished concrete repair with Concrete Mender™ Off-white.
Polished concrete repair with Concrete Mender™ Off-white.
 Did the crack disappear? If you don’t notice it anymore, what’s the difference?
Concrete Repair, MatchCrete

Roadware compared to look-alikes.

Recently a customer sent me several cut sheets from other manufactures of look-alike concrete repair products and asked me to compare them with Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™.  Here is how it played out.

Dear Dave,
 
We here at Roadware are familiar with the knock-off and look-alike products you submitted for our review. These products fall into the category of a low viscosity polyurea. Basically, what they have done is modify a standard polyurea joint filler and added a solvent to make it appear as a high-penetration Concrete Mender™-like product. They are all missing the key property and process that makes Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ unique and superior in overall performance. This process is called Microdoweling™.
 
Roadware’s Microdoweling™ process uses a proprietary formula of polyurethanes and additives to achieve a measured surface tension of 0.026 N/m. (1/3 of water) Surface tension is a measurement of a liquids ability to break free of its own molecular friction and flow into something else. Microdoweling™ is why Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ can penetrate easily into a concrete surface under adverse conditions, as is the case in distressed, broken and cracked concrete.
Other advantages for Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ are:
 
  • The lowest viscosity for easier mixing and blending.
  • Easy, one-step polishing and grinding. This material will not melt, smear, or gum up diamond polishing pads. An excellent parging compound.
  • Experienced and advanced packaging. Roadware cartridge packaging is reliable and works well in the field.
  • End-user color blending. New MatchCrete™ Concrete Mender can easily be manipulated into many colors by modifying the sand or adding pigments.
  • A modulus of elasticity that is slightly less then the concrete so repairs will move with the concrete and not against it.
  • Needle tip application. A complete system of needle-tip cartridge mixers for pin-point application and hairline crack repair.
It’s all in the data. Roadware backs up the Microdoweling™ process with independent testing data and publishes it on our website, www.roadware.us.
Thank you for continued support and please call us any time if you have any questions.
Best regards,
 
 
Kelton Glewwe
Vice President of Operations

 

Concrete Repair

Rebuild of a Damaged Step Corner

A common concrete repair problem is broken steps. Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ is a good choice for repairing steps and curbs. Here is a repair sent in by Roadware distributor Minitman Supply in Colorado.

Rebuild of a Damaged Step Corner
A repair like this one starts with cleaning the concrete with a wire brush or diamond blade. Use blue Dow board to make a form and hold it in place with duct tape.

Fill the repair area with Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ combined with silica sand. Pull the form after the material sets in about 10 – 20 minutes depending on temperature.

After you remove the forms, you will see something like this.

Use a finishing stone to bland and contour the repair into the rest of the steps.  A finish coat of a latex cement finishing coat over the entire stairway will have your steps looking good as new.

Finish all surfaces for a uniform look.
Be sure to finish the sides as will.
Concrete Repair, MatchCrete

Emergency Concrete Repair at Wal-Mart Garden Center

1 Comment

Recently Dave Wilson, of Roadware Distributor Fowler Supply received this email on behalf of a East Tennessee Construction Services.

From: Retail Facilities Maintenance Call Center
 
Subject: concrete repair
 
Possible safety hazard in garden center patio. Please dispatch concrete repair specialist to evaluate and remedy the situation as soon as possible. Customer safety is a top priority.
Store Manager 
Store #XXX
Georgia

 

Emergency repairs are common for Roadware contractors.  When safety is on the line and a store needs something repaired quickly and permanently, Roadware Concrete Repair Products are the clear choice due to minimal down time and minimal intrusion to facility operations.

When Dave Wilson arrived on site, this is the trip hazard condition he found.

Plan of Action:

  1. Repair bottom portion of spalled joint with Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™.
  2. Repair top portion of spalled joint using new Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear (MCC) colored with Davis Colors pigment to match the surrounding concrete. MCC is used because it will not change color when exposed to UV sunlight as is the case in a garden center.
  3. Finish to grade.

Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ and silica sand is added to the bottom of the repair. This provides a tough  Microdoweling™ repair and seals off and moisture in the substrate.

Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear and a mixture of silica sand blended with about one teaspoon of powdered Davis Color is added to the repair.

The Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear and sand mixture is troweled in place and allowed to cure for about 45 minutes.

After curing, the surface is ground smooth and the control joint is re-sawn with a diamond blade.

 

Traffic is restored immediately.  Danny, the associate who requested the work order was, “Amazed.”

When the job has to be done quickly and correctly. Roadware Concrete Repair products are always at the ready.

Special thanks to Dave Wilson at PatchMyConcrete.com for sending this in!

concrete mender, Concrete Repair

Concrete slab under wood floor crack repair.

Today I received several photographs of a large crack that developed under a hardwood floor in a slab-on-grade application. The crack buckled the hardwood flooring. The home owner consulted several contractors and engineers to solve the problem. No cost-effective solution could be found until Roadware contractor, Clay Kenny, (Manderville, Lousiana) arrived on the scene.

Using Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ and silica sand, Clay repaired the crack to full depth and re-bonded the slabs back together using Roadware’s Microdoweling™technology.

The repairs cured in just 10 minutes and Clay was on and off the job in just 3 hours. The home owner was amazed. Clay and 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ did what couldn’t be done. The hard wood flooring was re-installed and the floor was put back in service faster then anyone could imagine. This repair took nine 600ml cartridges of #80300 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ and a 40 lbs bag of silica sand to complete. The Concrete Mender™ turned a flooring disaster into an opportunity.
Anyone in the concrete business knows that concrete can be unpredictable and even a well thought-out project can develop cracks. Some are minor, and some can cause a real problem. Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ can help make the problems manageable.

 

Concrete Repair

Concrete Polishing: Crack, Joint and Spall Repair Are Critical To Lasting, Quality Jobs

1 Comment



By: Joe Noble

The days of super-sized everything arrived about a decade ago, making large concrete-floored buildings common in a sea of commercial applications, including box-retailing, airports, malls, convention halls, and more. It also created demand for concrete polishing unlike anytime in the past. Today, professionally polished or decorated concrete floors are coveted for their clean, low maintenance finish, their dust-free, smooth feel, and for their aesthetically pleasing look. Managers report how polished floors boost morale among employees, improve light reflectivity (reducing light usage) and garner positive customer comments.

Polishing concrete floor to be repaired with Concrete Mender™.
The market for concrete polishing and design continues to flourish and evolve. What hasn’t changed is the need to repair cracks, chips, joints and spalls in the floor prior to polishing. Without the proper repair material, the repair will fail, sometimes quickly costing time and money.

Curtis Venable is president of C&C Construction Co., a concrete repair and polishing services provider. Venable said that cracks, spalls and other deformities in the concrete must be properly repaired before polishing. Use of an inadequate repair product, or improper use of a repair product can cause more problems than they solve.
“I don’t want to get a call from a client at midnight wondering why a chip repair popped out in the middle of his floor,” said Venable. “Improper or poor repair prior to polishing is bad service and undermines my credibility with my clients.”
While Venable utilizes various repair products depending on the job, he often relies on 10-Minute Concrete Mender™ by Roadware, Inc (www.concretemender.com). Concrete Mender combines with sand to form a tough instant polymer concrete.

Control joint filled with Concrete Mender™ and polished.
Reliability
Venable uses Concrete Mender for several reasons. First, he said, Concrete Mender penetrates deep into concrete to establish a permanent bond with the host concrete, producing repairs that absorb the shock and transfers the load of heavy traffic without cracking or disbonding. Its chemical resistance means it can be applied in a wide range of temperatures.

“I know that it won’t melt, smear or come out of a repair when my polishing machines are run over it,” he said. “And I can apply it in cold temps found in freezers.”
Concrete Mender accomplishes its unbreakable bond through a process called Microdowling™. Microdowling drives the repair deep into the micro-fissures of the crack, joint or spall, where it forms an unbreakable bond with the existing concrete.

“The Microdowling capabilities eliminate the anxiety caused by the liability that I and all contractors must carry for each job,” he said. “I know of jobs that are going on six and seven years without Concrete Mender failing in any way.”

Polished concrete joint and crack repair in a commercial floor with Concrete Mender™.

Application Efficiency
Besides performing for years, it cures in only 10 minutes. At a recent job in which Venable repaired and then polished an 110,000-square-foot concrete floor for a national grocery retailer, he used Concrete Mender for efficiency reasons.
Venable inspected every chip, crack and spall before the job began, looking for joints where the filler has come out, anchor bolt holes, corner chips and spalls. He assessed each repair, and then made recommendations that clients repair each one.

“I put six people on polishing machines to work at the site for almost three weeks,” he recounted. “It becomes expensive if I have to wait for the repair material to set. Concrete Mender takes only 10 minutes.”
Polished warehouse floor repaired with Concrete Mender™.

Blending
Finally, Venable said his customers require that the shade of the repair material match the existing concrete for aesthetic reasons. Large retailers, such as Home Depot and Sam’s Club, understand that today women are making many of the purchasing decisions for the home, including home repair. Because women prefer shopping in light and well-kept stores, shiny, clean floors are important to a retailer’s image. A patchwork of different repair shades and colors has become unacceptable among peer retailers.

After hardening, Concrete Mender blends flawlessly with surrounding concrete, resulting in a near perfect color match. After polishing or coloring, a repair made with Concrete Mender is indistinguishable from the original floor.
“Having various shades and colors of repairs on the floor is unacceptable in the concrete polishing industry,” said Venable. “Today, to meet the expectation of women shoppers, repairs must blend to give the appearance of a single, neat and clean finish.”

Concrete Mender can serve many demands in the concrete polishing industry. It hardens within 10 minutes, after which it can be treated like the surrounding concrete. It can be cut and polished, and won’t smear or come out in the process. It’s efficient for use on large jobs, including where heavy machinery is operated, airport hangers, freezers, retailers and more.
“Concrete polishing is an expanding market and becoming more competitive,” said Venable. “I have confidence in Concrete Mender to help me meet customer expectations of looks, performance and efficiency.”
For more information 10-Minute Concrete Mender, contact Roadware, Inc. at www.concremender.com.  For more information about C&C Construction, visit www.candcconst.com.

Contact Information:
Richard E. King 800-522-7623 or 651-457-6122
Kelton E Glewwe 800-522-7623 or 651-457-6122
Roadware Incorporated
381 Bridgepoint Way
South Saint Paul, MN 55075

Microdoweling™, Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™, and respective logos are trademarks of Roadware, Inc. Copyright 2008.

Products used in this application:

80020 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Two-Gallon Kit
80020 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Two-Gallon Kit

80020 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Two-Gallon Kit

80050 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Ten-Gallon Kit
80050 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Ten-Gallon Kit

80050 Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender Ten-Gallon Kit

Concrete Repair

Introducing Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear

 

Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear (MCC) is a two component aliphatic polyurethane for repairing cracks, spalls, and joints in concrete subject to UV exposure from sunlight. This material is clear in appearance when applied and cured. Colored sand and pigments may be added to create color stable repairs that match most any decorative or shade of concrete surface. MCC will not significantly change color with exposure to sunlight over time.

Use Roadware MatchCrete™ Clear (MCC)  to quickly repair cracks and spalls in concrete that is exposed to sunlight and where a color compatible appearance is desired.

Who would want a “clear” concrete repair product? What could you use it for?

For over 15 years, Roadware manufactured 10  Minute Concrete Mender™ in one standard concrete grey color. It was simple and straight forward. Concrete is grey! The repairs should be grey.  Then everything changed. In the past five years, decorative concrete has exploded into the marketplace.  Now you can have your concrete in nearly limitless color choices and textures. We developed MatchCrete™ Clear to give you endless color possibilities as well. So, what can you do with MatchCrete™ Clear?

Cracks and Saw-cut Control Joints:

  • Clear- Use MCC without sand to create an eye pleasing joint that will not distract from the overall look.
  • Colored and Clear – Stain the sidewalls of a crack or joint  and fill with MCC to create a colored joint effect.
  • Colored Sand- Use MCC with colored sand or colored quartz to make nearly any color repair.
  • Colored Aggregate- Use MCC and colored aggregate to make a granite or stone effect.
  • Concrete Dust- Use MCC and concrete dust to make a portland concrete look.
  • Dry Pigment- Use MCC, sand, and some dry concrete pigment to create most any matching color.
  • Dry Shake- Add a bit of dry shake color to your MCC repair for matching color effects.

Decorative Use:

  • Joints and Cracks- Fill joints and cracks around concrete, stone, tile, or terrazzo without becoming an eyesore.
  • Exposed Aggregate- Repair cracks, spalls, and knock-outs.
  • Pool Decks- Repair coatings and de-laminations.

Polishing:

  • Joints- Use MCC for polished joints that match the concrete and look good.
  • Design- Use MCC to embed items into the concrete and polish the surface flush.
  • Lighting- Use MCC to embed LED lighting into concrete walkways and decks for dramatic effects.

Exterior Use:

  • Use MCC in areas exposed to sunlight where color stable repairs are necessary such as driveways, sidewalks and entryways.

Architectural  Use:

  • Use MCC to repair cracks, joints and spalls in high profile building entrances, courtyards, and common areas. Repairs with MCC will not distract from the overall appearance and design.
Roadware MatchCtete™ Clear #71300 600ml cartridge.
Roadware MatchCtete™ Clear #71300 600ml cartridge.
Concrete Repair

Concrete repair for freezer and cold storage warehouse floors

 
If your business is refrigerated warehousing or grocery distribution, Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™ is the premier concrete repair product for keeping your floors in top condition. The unique Microdoweling™ polyurethanes in Concrete Mender™ will cure at temperatures well below -20 degrees F. ( -28 C) in just a few hours. You can repair cracks, spalls, slabs, joints, and surfaces while the warehouse is in service.
Features:
  • Easy to mix one-to-one ratio polyurethane.
  • Add manufactured sand to extend the material over to two times. Two gallons of Concrete Mender™ will make 4.4 gallons of repair material.
  • Ultra low viscosity for easy application and workability.
  • Microdoweling™ penetration into the concrete for load transfer bonding.
  • Cures only has hard as the concrete. Will not become brittle like epoxy.
  • Tough repairs that can take industrial levels of punishment.
Benefits:
  • Smooth and safe floors.
  • Less damage to forklifts and equipment.
  • Clean floors. Meets FSIS and USDA guidelines.
  • Less tipped loads and damaged product.
  • Reduced cleaning and floor maintenance costs.
  • Reduced workers comp claims attributed to accidents.
Cold environments such as walk-in freezers and refrigerated warehousing pose difficult challenges for repairing concrete. In temperatures less than 0° F, most repair materials become unworkable and may take many hours to set and cure. Most epoxies are not usable below 32° F. Roadware Polyurethanes have been used in temperatures as low as -20°F below freezing. Listed below are some problems and solutions for working in cold environments.
Cold Environment Challenges
Frost: Frozen moisture in the concrete will act as a barrier between the repair material and the pours of the concrete. Most repair materials will try to bond to the frost coated concrete. When the temperature increases, the frost melts and so does the bond.
Working Conditions: Working with materials in the cold is challenging to both man and materials. Mixing epoxies or mortars in the cold is especially challenging. As the temperature decreases, the viscosity and flow rate of these materials increase making them harder to mix and much more difficult to work with.
Curing: With most materials, cure times in cold environments are extended significantly. A product that normally cures in an hour at room temperature may take as much as 12 hours in a cold environment. Some materials may not cure at all before actually freezing solid.
ROADWARE Solutions
The extremely low viscosity and rapid cure times of Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Repair products make them excellent for cold environment application. Successful repairs are routinely made at temperatures below -20°F in freezer floors.
Preparation: Prepare cracks, joints, and spalls according to standard recommended methods. Make every effort to remove any moisture from the repair area. A propane torch or heat gun is very helpful in removing frost and moisture. In extreme cold, it is necessary to heat up the concrete prior to application.
Application: Keep material and sand or aggregate warm. Place materials in a warm area (between 70°F and 90°F) prior to application. Warm cartridges mix better, flow easier, and cure faster. Apply material as directed. It is a good practice to pre-wet all concrete surfaces with material before the introduction of sand. This insures full penetration and a strong bond.
Curing: Roadware materials are designed to cure in approximately 10 minutes when all components involved are at 70° F. In cold environment, the cure time depends on the temperature of the material, the temperature of the sand or aggregate if used, the volume of the repair, and the temperature of the concrete. Below is a chart of approximate cure times at various temperatures and conditions.
Storage: Roadware material should be stored between 60°F and 80°F. Material stored in extremely cold environments should be slowly brought up to room temperature before use. It may be necessary to agitate material subject to extreme cold prior to mixing. Call Roadware Technical Services for further instructions (800-522-7623).
Real life examples:
Freezer threshold repair with Roadware 10 Minute Concrete Mender™.