In houses without basements, the floor of the first floor can be made according to two schemes:
Which of the two options will be better and easier?
In houses without a basement, floors on the ground are a popular solution for all rooms on the first floor. Floors on the ground are cheap, simple and easy to implement; they are also beneficial to install in the basement, garage, bathhouse and other utility rooms. Simple design, application modern materials, placement of a heating circuit in the floor (warm floor), such floors are made comfortable and attractively priced.
In winter, the backfill under the floor always has a positive temperature. For this reason, the soil at the base of the foundation freezes less - the risk of frost heaving of the soil is reduced. In addition, the thickness of the thermal insulation of a floor on the ground may be less than that of a floor above a ventilated underground.
It is better to abandon the floor on the ground if backfilling with soil is required to a height that is too high, more than 0.6-1 m. The costs of backfilling and soil compaction in this case may be too high.
A floor on the ground is not suitable for buildings on piles or columnar foundation with a grillage located above the ground surface.
In the first version concrete monolithic reinforced floor slab rests on load-bearing walls, Fig.1.
After the concrete hardens, the entire load is transferred to the walls. In this option, a monolithic reinforced concrete floor slab plays the role of a floor slab and must be designed for the standard load of the floors, have the appropriate strength and reinforcement.
The soil is actually used here only as temporary formwork when constructing a reinforced concrete floor slab. This type of floor is often called a “suspended floor on the ground”.
A suspended floor on the ground has to be made if there is a high risk of shrinkage of the soil under the floor. For example, when building a house on peat bogs or when the height of the bulk soil is more than 600 mm. The thicker the backfill layer, the higher the risk of significant subsidence of the fill soil over time.
Second option - this is a floor on a foundation - a slab, when reinforced concrete monolithic slab, poured onto the ground over the entire area of the building, serves as a support for the walls and a base for the floor, Fig.2.
Third option provides for the installation of a monolithic concrete slab or laying wooden logs in between load-bearing walls supported on bulk soil.
Here the slab or floor joists are not connected to the walls. The load of the floor is completely transferred to the bulk soil, Fig.3.
Exactly last option it is correct to call it a floor on the ground, which is what our story will be about.
Ground floors must provide:
The surface of the future floor is raised to the required height by installing a cushion of non-heaving soil.
Before starting work on backfilling, be sure to remove the top soil layer with vegetation. If this is not done, the floor will begin to settle over time.
Any soil that can be easily compacted can be used as a material for constructing a cushion: sand, fine crushed stone, sand and gravel mixture, and with low groundwater levels - sandy loam and loam. It is beneficial to use the soil remaining on the site from the well and (except for peat and black soil).
The cushion soil is carefully compacted layer by layer (no thicker than 15 cm.) by compacting and pouring water onto the soil. The degree of soil compaction will be higher if mechanical compaction is used.
Do not place large crushed stones, broken bricks, or pieces of concrete into the cushion. There will still be voids between large fragments.
The thickness of the bulk soil cushion is recommended to be in the range of 300-600 mm. Compact the fill soil until natural soil still fails. Therefore, the soil will settle over time. A thick layer of fill soil can cause the floor to settle too much and unevenly.
To protect against ground gases - radioactive radon, it is recommended to make a layer of compacted crushed stone or expanded clay in the cushion. This underlying captage layer is made 20 cm thick. The content of particles smaller than 4 mm this layer should contain no more than 10% by weight. The filtration layer must be ventilated.
The top layer of expanded clay, in addition to protecting against gases, will serve as additional thermal insulation for the floor. For example, a layer of expanded clay 18 cm. corresponds to 50 in terms of heat-saving ability mm. polystyrene foam To protect against crushing of insulation boards and waterproofing films, which in some floor designs are laid directly on the backfill, a leveling layer of sand is poured on top of the compacted layer of crushed stone or expanded clay, the thickness of which is twice the size of the backfill fraction.
Before filling the soil cushion, it is necessary to lay water supply and sewerage pipes at the entrance to the house, as well as pipes for the ground ventilation heat exchanger. Or lay cases for installing pipes in them in the future.
In private housing construction, the floor on the ground is arranged according to one of three options:
A concrete floor on the ground is noticeably more expensive to construct, but is more reliable and durable than other structures.
Floors on the ground are a multi-layer structure, Fig.4. Let's go through these layers from bottom to top:
This is a classic ground floor. On its basis it is possible various options execution - both in design and in the materials used, both with and without insulation.
Using modern building materials, concrete floors on the ground are often made without a layer of concrete preparation. A layer of concrete preparation is needed as a base for the sticker roll waterproofing on a paper or fabric base impregnated with a polymer-bitumen composition.
In floors without concrete preparation As waterproofing, a more durable polymer membrane specially designed for this purpose is used, a profiled film, which is laid directly on the ground cushion.
A profiled membrane is a fabric made of high-density polyethylene (HDP) with protrusions molded on the surface (usually spherical or truncated cone-shaped) with a height of 7 to 20 mm. The material is produced with a density from 400 to 1000 g/m 2 and is supplied in rolls with widths ranging from 0.5 to 3.0 m, length 20 m.
Due to the textured surface, the profiled membrane is securely fixed in sandy base without deforming or moving during installation.
Fixed in a sand base, the profiled membrane provides hard surface, suitable for laying thermal insulation and concrete.
The surface of the membranes can withstand the movement of workers and machines for transporting concrete mixtures and solutions (excluding crawler-mounted machines) without breaking.
The service life of the profiled membrane is more than 60 years.
The profiled membrane is laid on a well-compacted sand bed with the spikes facing down. The membrane spikes will be fixed in the pillow.
The seams between the overlapping rolls are carefully sealed with mastic.
The studded surface of the membrane gives it the necessary rigidity, which allows you to lay insulation boards directly on it and concrete the floor screed.
If slabs made of extruded polystyrene foam with profiled joints are used to construct a thermal insulation layer, then such slabs can be laid directly on the ground backfill.
Backfill of crushed stone or gravel with a thickness of at least 10 cm neutralizes the capillary rise of moisture from the soil.
In this embodiment, the polymer waterproofing film is laid on top of the insulation layer.
If upper layer If the ground cushion is filled with expanded clay, then you can dispense with the insulation layer under the screed.
The thermal insulation properties of expanded clay depend on its bulk density. Made of expanded clay with a bulk density of 250–300 kg/m 3 it is enough to do thermal insulation layer thickness 25 cm. Expanded clay with bulk density 400–500 kg/m 3 to achieve the same thermal insulation ability, you will have to lay it in a layer 45 thick cm. Expanded clay is poured in layers 15 thick cm and compacted using a manual or mechanical tamper. The easiest to compact is multi-fraction expanded clay, which contains granules of different sizes.
Expanded clay is quite easily saturated with moisture from the underlying soil. Wet expanded clay has reduced thermal insulation properties. For this reason, it is recommended to install a moisture barrier between the base soil and the expanded clay layer. A thick waterproofing film can serve as such a barrier.
Large-porous expanded clay concrete without sand, encapsulated. Each expanded clay granule is enclosed in a cement waterproof capsule. The base for the floor, made of large-porous sand-free expanded clay concrete, will be durable, warm and with low water absorption.
In ground floors, instead of a concrete screed as the top load-bearing layer, in some cases it is advantageous to make a dry prefabricated screed from gypsum fiber sheets, from sheets of waterproof plywood, as well as from prefabricated floor elements from different manufacturers.
For residential premises on the first floor of the house more than simple and cheap option There will be a floor on the ground with a dry prefabricated floor screed, Fig. 5.
A floor with a prefabricated screed is afraid of flooding. Therefore, it should not be done in the basement, as well as in wet rooms - bathroom, boiler room.
The ground floor with a prefabricated screed consists of the following elements (positions in Fig. 5):
1 - Flooring - parquet, laminate or linoleum.
2 - Glue for joints of parquet and laminate.
3 - Standard underlay for flooring.
4 - Prefabricated screed made of ready-made elements or gypsum fiber sheets, plywood, particle boards, OSB.
5 - Glue for assembling the screed.
6 - Leveling backfill - quartz or expanded clay sand.
7 - Communications pipe (water supply, heating, electrical wiring, etc.).
8 - Insulation of the pipe with porous fiber mats or polyethylene foam sleeves.
9 - Protective metal casing.
10 — Expanding dowel.
11 - Waterproofing - polyethylene film.
12 - Reinforced concrete base made of class B15 concrete.
13 - Foundation soil.
The connection between the floor and the outer wall is shown in Fig. 6.
The positions in Fig. 6 are as follows:
1-2. Varnish coating parquet, parquet, or laminate or linoleum.
3-4. Parquet adhesive and primer, or standard underlay.
5. Prefabricated screed from ready-made elements or gypsum fiber sheets, plywood, particle boards, OSB.
6. Water-dispersed adhesive for screed assembly.
7. Moisture insulation - polyethylene film.
8. Quartz sand.
9. Concrete base - reinforced concrete screed of class B15.
10. Separating gasket made of waterproofing roll material.
11. Thermal insulation made of polystyrene foam PSB 35 or extruded polystyrene foam, thickness as calculated.
12. Foundation soil.
13. Plinth.
14. Self-tapping screw.
15. External wall.
As mentioned above, the soil cushion at the base of the floor always has a positive temperature and in itself has certain heat-insulating properties. In many cases, it is enough to additionally lay insulation in a strip along the external walls (pos. 11 in Fig. 6.) in order to obtain the required thermal insulation parameters for a floor without underfloor heating (without heated floors).
Fig.7. Be sure to lay insulation tape in the floor, along the perimeter of the external walls, with a width of at least 0.8 m. From the outside, the foundation (basement) is insulated to a depth of 1 m.
The temperature of the soil under the floor, in the area adjacent to the plinth along the perimeter of the external walls, depends quite strongly on the temperature of the outside air. A cold bridge forms in this zone. Heat leaves the house through the floor, soil and basement.
The ground temperature closer to the center of the house is always positive and depends little on the temperature outside. The soil is heated by the heat of the Earth.
Building regulations require that the area through which heat escapes be insulated. For this, It is recommended to install thermal protection at two levels (Fig. 7):
The thickness of the thermal insulation is calculated from the condition that the overall resistance to heat transfer in the floor-soil-basement area must be no less than the same parameter for the outer wall.
Simply put, the total thickness of the insulation of the base plus the floor should be no less than the thickness of the insulation of the outer wall. For the climatic zone in the Moscow region, the total thickness of foam insulation is at least 150 mm. For example, vertical thermal insulation on a plinth 100 mm., plus 50 mm. horizontal tape in the floor along the perimeter of the external walls.
When choosing the size of the thermal insulation layer, it is also taken into account that insulating the foundation helps reduce the depth of freezing of the soil under its base.
These are the minimum requirements for ground floor insulation. It is clear that the larger the size of the thermal insulation layer, the higher the energy saving effect.
Install thermal insulation under the entire floor surface for the purpose of energy saving, it is only necessary in the case of installing heated floors in the premises or building an energy-passive house.
In addition, a continuous layer of thermal insulation in the floor of the room can be useful and necessary to improve the parameter heat absorption of the floor covering surface. Heat absorption of the floor surface is the property of the floor surface to absorb heat in contact with any objects (for example, the feet). This is especially important if the finished floor is made of ceramic or stone tiles, or other material with high thermal conductivity. Such a floor with insulation will feel warmer.
The heat absorption index of the floor surface for residential buildings should not be higher than 12 W/(m 2 °C). A calculator for calculating this indicator can be found
Base slab made of concrete class B 12.5, thickness 80 mm. over a layer of crushed stone compacted into the ground to a depth of at least 40 mm.
Wooden blocks - logs with a minimum cross-section, width 80 mm. and height 40 mm., It is recommended to lay on a layer of waterproofing in increments of 400-500 mm. For vertical alignment, they are placed on plastic pads in the form of two triangular wedges. By moving or spreading the pads, the height of the lags is adjusted. The span between adjacent support points of the log is no more than 900 mm. A gap of 20-30 mm wide should be left between the joists and the walls. mm.
The logs lie freely without attachment to the base. During the installation of the subfloor, they can be fastened together with temporary connections.
For the construction of the subfloor, wood boards are usually used - OSB, chipboard, DSP. The thickness of the slabs is at least 24 mm. All slab joints must be supported by joists. Wooden lintels are installed under the joints of the slabs between adjacent logs.
The subfloor can be made from tongue-and-groove floorboards. Such a floor made from high-quality boards can be used without floor covering. The permissible moisture content of wood flooring materials is 12-18%.
If necessary, insulation can be laid in the space between the joists. Mineral wool slabs must be covered with a vapor-permeable film on top, which prevents microparticles of insulation from penetrating into the room.
Rolled waterproofing made of bitumen or bitumen-polymer materials glued in two layers onto the concrete underlying layer using the melting method (for fused rolled materials) or by sticking on bitumen-polymer mastics. When installing adhesive waterproofing, it is necessary to ensure a longitudinal and transverse overlap of the panels of at least 85 mm.
To ventilate the underground space of floors on the ground along the joists, the rooms must have slots in the baseboards. Holes with an area of 20-30 are left in at least two opposite corners of the room. cm 2 .
There is another structural floor scheme - this wooden floor on the ground on joists, laid on posts, Fig.5.
Positions in Fig.5:
1-4 - Elements of the finished floor.
5 —
6-7 - Glue and screws for assembling the screed.
8 - Wooden joist.
9 — Wooden leveling gasket.
10 - Waterproofing.
11 - Brick or concrete column.
12 - Foundation soil.
Arranging the floor on joists along columns allows you to reduce the height of the ground cushion or completely abandon its construction.
Ground floors are not connected to the foundation and rest directly on the ground under the house. If it is heaving, then the floor can “go on a spree” under the influence of forces in winter and spring.
To prevent this from happening, the heaving soil under the house must be made not to heave. The easiest way to do this is the underground part
Design of pile foundations on bored (including TISE) and screw piles involves the installation of a cold base. Insulating the soil under a house with such foundations is a rather problematic and expensive task. Floors on the ground in the house pile foundation can be recommended only for non-heaving or slightly heaving soils on the site.
When building a house on heaving soils, it is necessary to have an underground part of the foundation to a depth of 0.5 - 1 m.
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| In a house with external multilayer walls with insulation on the outside, a cold bridge is formed through the base and load-bearing part of the wall, bypassing the insulation of the wall and floor. |
Floors on the ground are a universal way to create a warm and reliable foundation in the house. And they can be done at any groundwater level and type of foundation. The only limitation is the house is on stilts. In this article we will describe in detail all the layers of the “floor pie” and show how to organize it with your own hands.
Concrete floors on the ground imply the absence of basements or gaps for ventilation in the underground.
At its core, it is a multi-layer cake. Where the bottommost layer is soil, and the topmost layer is flooring. At the same time, the layers have their own purpose and strict sequence.
There are no objective restrictions for organizing the floor on the ground. High groundwater is not an obstacle to this. Their only weak point is production time and financial costs. But on such floors you can put brick or block walls, and even heavy equipment.
The classic floor pie on the ground implies the presence of 9 layers:
We deliberately did not indicate the thickness of each layer, so as not to set any strict restrictions. Below, approximate values and influencing factors will be indicated. But first we would like to point out a very important point: The groundwater level can change very seriously in a fairly short period of time.
In our practice, there have been cases when, within 5-7 years, dry semi-basements and cellars in private houses had to be filled up, because groundwater completely flooded the underground premises. Moreover, this phenomenon was observed not in one individual house, but in an entire block of private buildings (40-60 houses).
Experts explain such phenomena by improper drilling of water wells. Such actions lead to mixing of aquifer lenses, rupture of layers and changes in aquifers. Moreover, they can drill a well quite far from your home. So pay close attention to the purpose of each layer of the floor pie on the ground and do not think that there are unnecessary elements here.
These three layers are responsible for cutting off the capillary rise of water. A layer of clay cuts off the main access, sand weakens the capillary rise of water and weakens the pressure of the upper layers, and crushed stone does not allow water to rise at all. At the same time, each layer must be compacted. The thickness of each layer is at least 10 cm. Otherwise, there is no point in filling it up. But according to maximum height needs to be explained in more detail. The fact is that tamping is most often done homemade devices. The weight of such instruments is 3-5 pounds.
It has already been empirically proven that compacting a layer of crushed stone, sand or clay more than 20 cm. hand tools impossible. Therefore, the thickness of one of the first three layers is maximum 20 cm. But, if you need to make the floor pie higher, then tamping can be carried out in two stages. First, 15-20 cm of sand is poured and compacted well. Then another layer of the same thickness is poured and compacted again.
The order of occurrence of the clay-sand-crushed stone layers cannot be changed. The reason here lies in the fact that if sand is poured on top of crushed stone, then after some time it will seep through it. Which in turn will lead to subsidence and destruction of the concrete layer, and then deformation of the entire floor.
Before starting work, calculate the excavation depth. The calculation is carried out in reverse order. That is, the threshold is taken as zero front door. Then they begin to add up the thickness of each layer. For example:
The total depth turned out to be 60 cm. But keep in mind that we took the minimum values. And each building is individual. Important: add 5 cm of depth to the result obtained for you.
Excavation is carried out to the calculated depth. Of course, the fertile layer will be removed, but clay may not always be below. Therefore, we will describe the process of organizing a floor pie on the ground in full.
Before filling the layers, draw level marks with chalk in 5 cm increments on all corners of the foundation. They will make the task of leveling each layer easier.
Any clay will do for these purposes. It is scattered in an even layer, and before compacting it is generously moistened with an aqueous solution of liquid glass. The proportions of the solution are 1 part liquid glass and 4 parts water.
To compact the first three layers, you can use a one and a half meter piece of timber 200x200. But the process will be of better quality if you make a special device. To do this, to a one and a half meter segment metal pipe, A piece of channel is welded in a T-shape. The lower part of the channel should not have an area of more than 600 cm2 (20 by 30 cm). To make the tamper heavier, sand is poured into the pipe.
The compacted layer of prepared clay is well moistened with cement laitance. To prepare it, 2 kg of cement is dissolved in 10 liters of water. Make sure that no puddles form on the surface of the clay. That is, it should be fairly even.
Almost immediately after the cement comes into contact with liquid glass, the chemical process of crystallization begins. It goes away quite quickly, but during the day you should not disturb the crystal formation in any way. Therefore, do not walk on clay, but rather leave the work for a day for a technological break.
Sand. After a day, you should start filling the sand. At the same time, try not to walk on the first layer. Pour sand and step on it. Chemical processes Between liquid glass and cement there will be another week and a half. But air access is no longer needed for this, and water is present in the clay. Having poured a layer of 15 cm, feel free to step on it and compact it.
Crushed stone. It is scattered in an even layer over the surface of the sand and also compacted. Pay attention to the corners. It is very important that after compacting the surface is as smooth as possible.
Polyethylene film. It is laid with a 10 cm overlap and taped. A small, 2-3 cm bend on the walls is allowed. You can walk on the film in soft shoes with extreme caution. Remember that polyethylene film is not, but only a technological layer to prevent laitance from flowing into crushed stone.
Rough concreting.“Lean concrete” is prepared in the following proportion: M500 cement – 1 hour + sand 3 hours + crushed stone 4 hours. For dispersed reinforcement, steel fiber should be added at the rate of 1 kg. fiber per 1 cubic meter of concrete. Try to level the freshly poured solution, following the corner marks. On a flatter surface, it will subsequently be more convenient to lay layers of waterproofing and insulation.
48 hours after pouring, the concrete must be reinforced. To do this, you will need a solution of liquid glass in water (1:10) and cement. First, the solution is passed over the entire surface. You can use a roller, or you can use a spray bottle. Then they dust the concrete with a thin layer and immediately begin to rub the cement into the surface. The most convenient way to do this is by grouting.
This procedure increases the strength of concrete by an order of magnitude, and in combination with liquid glass makes it as waterproof as possible. The concrete will mature within a month and a half, but work can begin on the next stage in just a week.
To create a waterproofing layer, the floor surface is cleaned and treated with liquid bitumen. Ruberoid is laid overlapping, with an allowance of 3-5 cm. The joints are carefully soldered using a construction hair dryer. Wall allowance 5 cm. IMPORTANT: Make sure that the roofing material fits into the corners and do not leave any voids. The second layer of roofing felt is laid offset by half the width of the roll. During waterproofing work, it is best to walk on the surface in shoes with soft soles (sneakers, galoshes).
For thermal insulation, the best option is extruded polystyrene foam. A 5 cm thick EPS layer replaces 70 cm of expanded clay. And in addition, EPS has a practically zero water absorption coefficient and quite high compressive strength. We recommend laying 3 cm thick EPS in two layers. In this case, the top layer is laid with an offset. This method guarantees the absence of cold bridges and increases the thermal insulation properties of the floor pie. The joints between the EPS boards are glued with special tape.
Proper thermal insulation of the floor pie is an extremely important component for the energy efficiency of the entire house as a whole. Up to 35% of heat escapes through the floors! Even if the floors do not produce heat themselves (warm floors), they should be thermally insulated as much as possible. This will allow you to save quite impressive amounts on heating in the future.
Glue along the room, 15-20 mm thick. In this case, the lower part must be glued to the EPS boards. To reinforce the floor on the ground in residential premises, use a masonry mesh with cells of 100x100 mm. Wire thickness 3 mm. The mesh must be placed on supports so that it is approximately in the middle of the screed layer. To do this, it is placed on special stands. But you can use regular PET bottle caps.
Installation of beacons is possible, but in combination with reinforcing mesh, this will create a rather bulky and extremely fragile structure. After all, if you rigidly fasten the mesh, this will require additional costs for fastening and will require violating the integrity of the EPS. And if the fittings are not fixed, then it can easily change the levels of the beacons. Therefore, it will be more convenient to fill this layer and then level it with a self-leveling screed.
For the finishing screed, the solution is diluted in the proportion of 1 part M500 cement + 3 parts river sand. The work is carried out promptly. To roughly level the surface, you can focus on the corner marks.
After pouring the finishing screed, it should be allowed to gain strength for 3-5 days. With a thickness of 5 cm, the ripening period of this layer will be 4-5 weeks. During this time, regular wetting of the surface with water is required.
Acceleration of the cement hydration process is unacceptable! After about a month, you can check the degree of readiness. To do this, in the evening, take a roll of dry toilet paper, place it on the floor and cover it with a saucepan on top. If in the morning toilet paper will be dry or slightly damp, then the layer is ready. You can level the floor with a self-leveling screed.
The self-leveling screed is diluted according to the manufacturer's instructions and poured onto the surface of the concrete floor. When the work is carried out scrupulously, height differences do not exceed 8-10 mm. Therefore, a minimal amount of self-leveling screed is required. It dries quite quickly. And after 1-2 days the floor pie on the ground will be completely ready for laying the floor covering.
Construction of a private house implies the possibility of laying the floor directly on the ground. This is a popular installation method that does not require large financial expenses from the property owner - only spending on clay, cement or concrete. In buildings with strip foundations, a concrete floor is often installed on the ground - its material is available for purchase, has a wide variety of types and is strong enough to perform load-bearing functions. The installation work can be done with your own hands, but for a high-quality result you will need the recommendations of professional builders.
Before you begin installing the floor system, you need to check the soil for compliance with technical standards. The soil at the construction site must be dry and motionless, and groundwater must not approach the surface closer than 4-5 meters.
Concrete floors are best made for buildings with basements or basement floors. The final quality of the work performed also depends on the degree of heating of the home.
In poorly heated private houses, the soil under the floor freezes strongly, which leads to deformations and increased load on the foundation.
The concrete floor surface matches the bottom doorways. It should maintain a uniform thickness over the entire area of the room. Marks on the walls made a meter from the bottom of the door will help achieve this. After placing the first marker in such a place and distributing the marks along all the walls of the room, meter-long lines are again measured down from them.
By connecting these lines with perpendicular segments, you can determine the boundary up to which you need to pour the concrete mixture. For ease of orientation, nails are driven into the corners of the room, along which the cord is pulled.
Before removing the top layer of soil, you need to clean the room, getting rid of construction debris and large items. Since the concrete floor consists of several layers with a total thickness of about 40 centimeters, a similar volume of soil will need to be removed to lay it.
Finishing work is carried out only on a flat surface, and therefore the soil after excavation must be compacted with a special vibrating plate. In case of absence necessary equipment you can use a simple log, nailing handles to its upper part, and to the lower part - wooden board suitable size. To prevent the base from being washed away by groundwater, the treated soil can be covered with clay.
The previously prepared soil is covered with a layer of gravel 5 to 10 centimeters thick, watered and compacted. Sand is placed on top of it in the same amount. The next layer is crushed stone 4-5 cm in size, which also needs to be compacted and sprinkled with sand. Stone fragments with sharp edges that come to the surface will need to be removed or placed on their side, otherwise it will interfere with the future screed.
Thickness control is ensured using several rows of pegs driven into the base soil and leveled. At the end of the work they can be removed.
After making sure that each layer of material is backfilled and leveled, the future concrete floor will need to be waterproofed. A 200 micron thick polyethylene film or similar waterproof membrane is suitable for this.
The laying technology involves placing it along the entire perimeter of the building with the edges raised 10-20 centimeters above the zero level. They will be trimmed after the finishing screed is completed. Separate sheets are laid overlapping, gluing along the joints with mounting tape. If waterproofing works impossible to carry out on at this stage, water protection is carried out by coating the rough floor screed.
Laying a concrete floor on the ground involves strengthening it with a mesh of metal or plastic, reinforcing rods or thick wire. The reinforcement frame is placed on wooden stands with a height of 2 to 4 centimeters. If you pour it there building mixture, it will pass through the mesh, coat it and harden to form a durable surface.
If a plastic base is used for reinforcement, it must be pulled over pegs driven into the base. To save money, you can make frames from reinforcement or wire yourself.
After installing the frame, guide bars are laid to create a layer of reinforcement to facilitate pouring. They divide the entire space of the house into equal parts two meters wide. The material for them is identical pieces of boards or construction timber, aligned horizontally to the zero mark. They are fixed using a cement-sand mortar with the addition of clay.
Formwork is also installed between the guides, dividing the floor in the room into separate cells, where concrete will need to be poured in the future. It is easy to make from thick plywood, impregnated with special oil for ease of removal from the frozen mixture.
To create a durable and uniform surface, all concrete must be used in one go. High quality mortar You can order it at the factory, but if this is not possible, you will have to prepare it yourself. Optimal composition for the subfloor of a private house there will be a solution lightweight concrete B7.5 (M100) or B10 (M150) with the addition of crushed stone of fraction 5-20.
If a waterproof bedding was used for compaction, concrete grade M50-M75 can be used. It must be thoroughly mixed in a concrete mixer and kept until installation begins.
Coating liquid concrete starts from the side opposite the entrance opening. Several cells are filled with the mixture at a time, after which the solution is smoothed with a shovel and leveled with a special rule that is installed on the guides and pulls towards itself. The removed excess concrete, in turn, fills the free cells.
The resulting rough screed should be five centimeters thick. The permissible horizontal difference is 4 millimeters. To make a floor with tight shrinkage, you will also need to use a construction vibrator. It will compact the concrete and ensure its solidity.
Further technology for the work being carried out requires the removal of guides and individual parts formwork from areas that have been leveled. The voids created during this process are also filled with the building mixture.
After the concrete is evenly distributed over the entire area of the future floor, you need to check its slope bubble level and cover with a layer of polyethylene. The period for complete hardening of the rough screed is about a month, and during this period the concrete must be constantly moistened.
To prevent the screed from being exposed to the harmful effects of moisture, the concrete floor will need to be protected from steam and condensation. A polymer-bitumen membrane, polyester or fiberglass film is well suited for this. PVC sheets will be more expensive, but their cost is justified by their high durability and resistance to rotting. Insulation can be done using polyethylene, but under a layer of insulation and finishing screed it will be subject to heavy loads and may lose its integrity.
Covering concrete with a layer of high-quality insulation will reduce the cost of heating a house by a quarter. Popular insulators are polystyrene foam derivatives. To give the material additional strength, it is covered with layers of polyethylene, laid overlapping.
You can make high-quality installation using extruded polystyrene foam. It has low compressive deformation and can be freely used in rooms where the floor is subject to heavy loads.
Another insulation option could be mineral wool. Due to its vulnerability to water, such an insulator will need to be protected with a polymer film and laid in a pre-created frame.
Finish concrete screed is performed after all concrete works. It is used to level the floor surface, improve heat absorption in a private home, and also create the desired slope on the floors. Before you begin reinforcing and pouring concrete, you will need to clean the subfloors from dirt and construction debris. Cracks in the supporting layer are covered cement mortar, and large cracks at the joints of surfaces are isolated with damper tape.
To strengthen the structure, it is necessary to reinforce it by installing a metal mesh 3 mm thick and 10x10 cm in diameter at the bottom of the floor. This mesh is installed from below with a rise of 2.5 cm on the walls. When the reinforcement is completed, you need to prepare guides for pouring concrete. They are seated on the plaster and checked with a bubble level. The final slope of the floor depends on the correctness of their fastening.
A popular method of finishing concrete screed is monolithic pouring. A mortar is prepared for it from one part of cement (usually Portland cement M400 is used) and three parts of sifted quartz sand. The amount of water is determined as the kneading progresses. Its volume should be slightly more than half the volume of cement used (1 to 0.55). The mixture should not be too fluid.
To ensure that the mixture sets well and is homogeneous, it is better to pour it into a concrete mixer rather than knead it by hand. Having ensured that the reinforcement and floor preparation processes are correct, you can proceed to the main concrete work.
The pouring process is similar to installing subfloors, but for maximum effectiveness, the cement must be used within two hours. The period of complete hardening is about thirty days. You cannot force it to accelerate - the internal connections may be broken, and the drying composition will lose its strength.
In private housing construction, the technology of installing a concrete floor on the ground is widely used. This type of floor is the most popular due to its ease of execution, strength, low cost and general availability of concrete. Concrete flooring on the ground is usually done in utility rooms, less often in residential ones. In order to cope with this task with your own hands, you need to understand what layers the pie of a given building structure consists of.
Layers of concrete floor construction on the ground:
In order for a concrete floor on the ground to serve in a house for many years, you need to use it correctly - make sure that the air in the building is warm. If there is no heating in the house for a long time, the floor structure may become deformed, with cracks and tears appearing due to the heavy load from frozen soils on the floor pie.
First you need to set the zero level in the room. To do this, marks are placed along the perimeter of the walls in the lower part of the entire room, focusing on the bottom of the doorways. Thus, by lowering or raising this line, it will be possible to make required thickness pirogue. The thickness of the concrete pour is controlled by a rope stretched over nails, which serves as a level.
To prepare the soil base, we remove the plant layer of soil, clean it with our own hands of debris and compact it. Level the surface as much as possible.
Typically the concrete floor pie is about 350mm thick. Therefore, from zero line it is necessary to excavate soil to this thickness. If the ground level is below 350mm, then it is necessary to remove a layer of fertile soil, compact it and fill it with dry sand to the required level and then compact it. After this, tamping and leveling of the surface are performed. The best tool for this is a special vibrating plate. If it is not available, tamping is done with your own hands and for this you can get by with a simple log or a flat board, to which handles are attached for ease of work. Concrete flooring on the ground is a technology that requires a maximally leveled surface at the stage of laying each layer.
For additional waterproofing of the future structure, you can first make a layer of clay. If the clay is dry, you need to spill it with water, compact it with your own hands, cover it with sand and then compact it. In addition, clay makes the base warmer.
Advice! To indicate the required backfill height, you can drive several pegs of the required length into the ground. The main thing is that they are clearly marked according to the level. Once all the dry layers have been placed, the pegs will need to be removed before pouring the concrete.
The first layer (thickness 50-100 mm) is filled with gravel, followed by pouring with water and compacting. The second layer (about 100mm) is filled with sand, also followed by compaction. As a result, we will have a warm cushion for the concrete base of the floor pie in the house.
Used to create waterproofing various technologies, where filling with heated bitumen and polymer membranes are often used). We recommend making waterproofing using a special waterproofing polymer membrane, but if you want to save money, you can lay your own ordinary polyethylene pie film with a thickness of 200 microns or more. The film is laid with an overlap of 10-15 cm, and the joints must be made airtight and taped.
Important! Waterproofing must be carried out over the entire area of the house; the edges adjacent to the walls must be folded along the wall a few centimeters above the zero line.
The modern construction market offers a huge number of various types thermal insulation materials, For example:
Each type of insulation has its own installation technology, compliance with which will make it possible to obtain a warm floor in the house.
In order to give the floor structure strength and protect it from destruction during operation, it is necessary to reinforce it. For this purpose, you can use plastic or metal reinforcing mesh or reinforcing bars. If we use rods, then they must first be fastened with flexible steel wire into a mesh with a mesh size of 100 to 200 mm (the higher the load on the floor, the smaller the mesh cell size should be). In order for the reinforcement to work effectively, it is necessary that the reinforcement on both sides be protected by a layer of concrete - for this, the reinforcing mesh must be laid on supports with a height of about 20-30 mm. It’s not difficult to do this with your own hands, just place bars under the mesh and raise it to the desired height.
Boards, timber, metal profiles, reinforcement rods, etc. can be used as guides. Using guides, we divide the surface into several areas about 2 m wide. It is important that the guides are laid at the same level. We fix the guides with lime-cement mortar or another method.
To make formwork, you can use boards or moisture-resistant plywood. We place the formwork for pouring concrete between the guides. As a result, cells are formed - the so-called “cards”, which must be filled with concrete. These same guides can serve as beacons for leveling cement when pouring. Throughout the entire process of installing a concrete floor, it is important to ensure that the surface is level; the guides and formwork also need to be checked using a building level before starting pouring. Irregularities in the formwork are eliminated either by chipping off the upper part of the boards or by placing remnants of bars, plywood, etc. under them.
Before pouring concrete, do not forget to treat the formwork with oil - this will allow you to easily remove wooden elements from hardened concrete.
Pouring concrete followed by installation of a rough concrete screed. To prepare the concrete solution, we use the following ratio of components:
We mix all the components using a concrete mixer, or manually, and pour a concrete solution of homogeneous consistency simultaneously into several “cards” in 1 step, in extreme cases 2, helping ourselves with a shovel in a more uniform distribution over the surface.
Advice! Pouring the concrete mixture should be done from the corner of the wall opposite the front door so that you do not have to walk on the concrete.
After filling out a few maps, you can begin rough alignment. To do this, we use a rule about two meters long. By moving the rule towards you along the guides as if on rails, we distribute the concrete into “cards”, thus removing excess concrete mass and filling the voids.
When the entire area of the room has been treated in this way, you need to give the concrete time to harden (about a month), covering it with plastic wrap. To prevent concrete from cracking, be sure to spray it with water periodically.
The video clearly illustrates the technology of the rough screed device:
The installation of a concrete floor on the ground ends with the stage of creating a finishing concrete screed. The most effective option is to use self-leveling screeds based on gypsum or cement and special additives.
An important parameter of the screed is its weight. Therefore, if you need to reduce the load on the floor, use lightweight screeds - self-leveling floors. A special feature of this coating is the speed of installation - it can be done in 1 day, it is well suited for hidden communications and installation of heated floors.
In the process of construction and arrangement basements, garages, various outbuildings, and sometimes even residential premises (of course, in regions with a warm, mild climate), developers often prefer technology that involves installing a concrete floor on the ground.
After reading the information below, you will receive all the necessary information to independently carry out the event in question, refusing to involve third-party craftsmen in this work and significantly saving on the construction of the floor.
Before giving preference to the construction technology of the design in question, familiarize yourself with the key soil requirements given in the following table.
Table. Soil requirements for constructing a reliable concrete floor
Additionally, requirements are imposed directly on the building itself. It is important that the house is used for permanent residence or at least heated during the cold season. Otherwise, the ground will freeze, causing the concrete structure to deform.
Scheme of floors on the ground for a private house, garage, utility room
We make the floor after completing the construction of the walls and arranging the roof/floor. The actual work on constructing the structure under consideration on the ground consists of several technological stages, the sequence of which is given below.
First we need to set the zero level of the future floor. To do this we do the following:
We move on to the stage of preliminary soil preparation. First we need to get rid of construction waste if there is any. Next we remove the top ball of soil. Traditionally, the multilayer structure of the concrete floor has a thickness of about 30-35 cm. We dig until the distance between the previously laid zero level line and the bottom of the pit reaches the specified value.
After this, we need to compact and level the surface. Best tool To perform this work, use a special vibrating plate for compacting soil. If there is no such thing, we take a simple log, nail strong handles on top of it, nail a board underneath and use the resulting device to compact the soil. We work until we get a fairly dense and even base. No special checks are required: just walk on the ground and, if there are no depressions left in it from the feet, we proceed to the next stage of work.
Hand digging is never perfectly accurate. If the depth of the pit is greater than the required thickness of the future concrete structure, fill the difference with a layer of sand and compact it thoroughly.
Helpful advice! You can use another solution to the above problem by first laying a layer of clay, pouring it with water, compacting it, filling it with sand and further compacting it. Such a system will provide additional waterproofing of the future concrete structure, preventing groundwater from penetrating into its structure.
We fill in a 5-10 cm layer of gravel. We spill the backfill with water and compact it thoroughly. For greater convenience, we can first drive several rows of scraps of reinforcement or other similar material of the required length into the ground - this will make it easier for us to ensure the required backfill height. It is important that the trimmings are strictly level. After arranging each planned layer, the pegs can be removed.
Place about a 10cm layer of sand on top of the gravel. The pegs from the previous stage will help us control the thickness of the backfill. To carry out this activity, it is not necessary to use sifted material - even gully sand with minor impurities will do. We also compact the sand thoroughly.
Place a layer of crushed stone on top of the sand. A material with a fraction of 4-5 cm is optimal. We compact the crushed stone. Pour a thin layer of sand on top, carefully level it and compact it thoroughly. If you find crushed stone with sharp protruding edges, remove it or rearrange it so that sharp corners were absent throughout the entire plane.
Important! Each layer of backfill must be level. Similar requirements apply to the layers of the “pie” that are further arranged.
To protect concrete from the harmful effects of moisture, we use a special waterproofing membrane or ordinary polyethylene film. A material with a thickness of 200 microns is optimal. The work is carried out in an extremely simple sequence: we lay out the film on the base, bringing its edges a couple of centimeters above the zero level indicated in the previous stages, lay the insulation sheets directly with a 10-15-centimeter overlap, and fix the joints with tape.
The structure can be insulated using a wide variety of materials, here is just a short list:
We lay the selected material, following the provisions of the appropriate technology, and proceed to further work.
A multilayer concrete structure is subject to mandatory reinforcement. We reinforce the floor with PVC or metal mesh to choose from. Metal wire and reinforcement bars are also well suited for solving this problem. They must first be tied into a mesh (we select the size of the cells in accordance with the expected loads: for high ones we take 10x10 cm, for medium ones - 15x15 cm, for low ones 20x20 cm will be enough), using flexible steel wire to fasten the joints.
We lay the reinforcing frame on pre-installed supports having a height of about 20-30 mm.
Important note! In the case of strengthening using a plastic mesh, the material is stretched over pegs previously driven into the base.
Correct filling concrete mixture By zero level impossible without the use of guides. We do the following:
Important! Before proceeding with the next stage of work, be sure to check the correct installation of the guides and formwork using a level. If there are differences, you simply cannot make a flat floor. To eliminate irregularities, it is enough to trim off the protruding places. Raise the guides to in the right places it is possible by placing bars of suitable size or the same plywood under them.
Before pouring, be sure to treat the wooden elements with special oil. Thanks to this, in the future we will be able to remove the boards from the solution without any difficulty.
Fill in the previously created “maps” concrete mortar. If possible, we try to fill the entire mass at once - this way we will get the most durable monolithic structure. If there is no opportunity or desire to order ready-made concrete, we make it ourselves.
Pouring concrete along beacons (option without maps)
To do this, we will need a concrete mixer or a large suitable container for manual mixing, cement (we use material grades M400-500), a shovel, crushed stone, sand. We work according to the following recipe: 1 share of cement, 2 shares of sand, 4 shares of crushed stone and about 0.5 shares of water (may vary, we will guide you as you work). Thoroughly mix the ingredients until a homogeneous mixture and proceed to further work.
It is most convenient to pour from the corner opposite to the front door - in in this case no need to walk on concrete. Fill several cards in 1, maximum 2 steps, level the solution and stretch the mixture. If you have a special vibrator, use it to compact the mixture.
Formwork around pipelines
Having filled out several “cards”, we begin to level the base. The two-meter (or longer) rule will help us with this. We install the tool on the previously mounted guides and pull it towards ourselves. This way we get rid of excess concrete.
We take out the guides and formwork from the processed “cards” (specialists usually do this a day after pouring, some do it earlier, we focus on the situation). In a similar sequence, fill the entire site with concrete. After this, cover the base with plastic wrap and leave it to gain strength for a month. During the drying process, the concrete structure must be regularly moistened with water to prevent it from cracking.
Finally, all we have to do is fill the screed. To do this, we use a special self-leveling mixture - the most convenient option, the arrangement of which does not require special knowledge and effort.
The leveling mixture will eliminate minor surface imperfections and allow you to obtain a perfectly level base. We traditionally start working from the corner opposite to the entrance to the room.
We prepare the solution according to the manufacturer's instructions, pour it onto the floor and distribute it evenly over the surface using a long rule or other suitable tool. We specify the drying time of the mixture in the instructions, usually it is 2-3 days.
The concrete floor on the ground is ready. All we have to do is lay the selected floor covering. Thanks to a properly equipped flat base the finish will look beautiful and last as long as possible.
Now you know everything about installing a concrete floor on the ground and will be able to carry out the necessary measures yourself. You just need to follow the guide and everything will definitely work out.
Good luck!
