“I would not have believed a fiber could replace rebar and do it so efficiently, until I saw it with my own eyes”
-Contractor with Private Family Estate
Background: The driveway in question serves the estate of a private family that, further to the personal use to connect the homes on the property, it also serves as the main link to a barn that requires the use of heavy machinery for its operation. The contractor required a solution that would return the driveway in service as fast as possible, and possibly reduce the inconvenience they historically had in operating this driveway in an environment prone to corrosion. What they received went far beyond their initial objectives!
Project Location: St. Martinsville, LA / Contractor: Private Family Estate
Value Proposition: Time and Cost
Specifications: The driveway is to be poured on a very bad pump able soil, often having to stand wet conditions with outside undesirable agents affecting the quality and durability of the driveway. The driveway is 1,000 feet long poured at a 4 inch thickness. Conventionally the job was specified with 14,700 linear feet of rebar, requiring approximately 735 sticks of rebar (20 ft. each) for a total cost of $ 15,000. Due to the daunting tasks of preparing the area for the four 250 ft. pours by placing the rebar, the total estimated time for this job was 3 weeks weather conditions permitting.
The Solution: ICF Concrete Additive’s engineers were approached by the owner and asked to propose a solution that would reduce the time and be able to increase durability of the driveway. ICF proposed replacing all the structural rebar with HiperLon™ macro fiber and directly pour the concrete onto the soil. This solution required $ 6,000 worth of HiperLon™ fiber, 40% the cost of the rebar alone necessary to complete the project. Further to the savings in materials, the time to complete the project was cut by two thirds and the job was completed in only one week! The driveway was easily broom finished with no arising issues and no conventional thickened edges arose from pouring on poor soil conditions.
The speediness and ease that the revolutionary solution presented gave the contractor the opportunity to complete the job at the most convenient moment, even giving the possibility to choose the week that presented the ideal weather conditions for the job.
Conclusion: What seemed to be a value proposition restricted to time, turned out to be a far cheaper project primarily due to the labor cost cut by three (without counting unpleasant weather conditions), and total material savings of $ 9,000. Two weeks upon completion the owner was able to drive a fully loaded concrete truck the length of the driveway without any cracks appearing. Furthermore, we expect the driveway to be durable and require less maintenance as we provided a solution not subject to corrosion or spalling problems. At ICF Concrete additives we thank the contractor for believing in our technology and proposal to his project.