Concrete slab floors provide great thermal comfort and lifestyle advantages. They can be insulated, both underneath and on the edges. Conventional concrete has high embodied energy. It has been the most common material used in slabs.
We cater for two types of house slab – Conventional slabs with deep excavated beams and waffle pod slabs, which sit near ground level and have a grid of expanded polystyrene foam pods as void formers creating a maze of beams in between.
Conventional slabs can be insulated beneath the broad floor panels; waffle pods are by definition insulated beneath.
Comparing a concrete slab to a suspended floor of other materials? The benefits are simple. A conventional house slab can be ground coupled (uninsulated) or insulated. An uninsulated slab in a good well house has a surface temperature approximately the same as the stable ground temperature at about 3m depth.
Ground coupling in mild climate zones such as Perth, Brisbane or coastal NSW allows the floor slab of a well insulated house to achieve the stable temperature of the earth: cooler in summer, warmer in winter. In winter, added solar gain boosts the surface temperature of the slab to a very comfortable level.
Concrete has extremely long life potential. If reinforcement is correctly designed and placed, and if the concrete is placed and compacted well so there are no voids or porous areas, concrete slabs can have an almost unlimited life span.
To ensure longevity of the slab, we control cracking with: