Magnesite Mayhem

Magnesite was all the rage from the 60's through to the 80's. Covering tens of thousands of residential building floors was this durable, oil resistant, lightweight and non-combustible material. It was too good to be true. Unfortunately, time was soon to tell the negative affects of magnesite. 

"Magnesite, which was commonly used as a floor topping or levelling product, contains glue. When magnesite absorbs water, the glue can leach into concrete floors and corrode steel reinforcement bars, causing the concrete to expand." - Australian Financial Review, 2019.

The property below suffered the ramifications of magnesite flooring. Read for more.

Suburb: DRUMMOYNE
Date: 20/1/2020
Project: Bellmont Façade Engineering undertook a visual inspection of the condition of the floor slab after the recent removal of magnesite flooring at a property in Drummoyne. 

​​Recommendation: We saw that the magnesite affected concrete was identified in several locations and excessive within two locations including the living room, kitchen, dining areas and bedroom.
It is our recommendation that the further exposure of several sections within the floor slab shall be conducted revealing the condition of reinforcement placed within the bottom layer of the concrete slab, this is due to severe corrosion of the existing top reinforcement within those allocated sections.
It will be also necessary that the other spalled concrete sections identified are also exposed to allow for structural assessment – destructive investigation to uncover the underlying reinforcing steel so that its condition can be assessed.

Measures to be taken include:
 
-      Magnesite Repairs including & floor levelling
 
-      Balcony Waterproofing Membrane, Tiling & New Doors
 
-       Balcony Cavity Flashing