New Sortation Warehouse Floor Surveyed in Yorkshire for Compliance with FM2 Standards
April 11, 2022
Face Consultants have recently been working on a new £65 million sortation warehouse with a floor area of 360,000 sq. ft in Yorkshire. The construction site covers approximately 55 acres and is forecast to be completed in 2022.
Face Consultants were commissioned by specialist flooring contractor ABS Brymar Floors Ltd to check the warehouse floor’s compliance with the FM2 classification found in the Concrete Society’s Technical Report No 34 (TR34) 4th edition.
Face Consultants completed all surveying over four visits as the floor construction progressed.
Essential Checks for Free Movement Floors
Well designed and constructed floors are essential for the safe and smooth operation of Materials Handling Equipment, especially in warehouses of this size and importance. Floors constructed to FM2 specifications can help warehouse operators achieve increased productivity, enhance equipment life by preventing unnecessary wear and tear, and reduce maintenance of the building.
Guidance for the Design and Construction of Industrial Concrete Floors
The Concrete Society’s Technical Report 34 is a guide to the design and construction of concrete industrial ground floors. It is viewed as an all-encompassing guidance document which specifies the required surface regularity for the slab for different uses.
In this case, free movement (random traffic) operations, with definitions of how the floor should be sampled and analysed clearly stated. It controls Property F which is the short wavelength (Flatness) characteristic and Property E which is the long wavelength (Levelness) characteristic.
A check to Datum is also carried out.
Properties E and F
Property E
The elevational difference in millimetres directly between fixed points 3m apart (not across diagonals).
Property F
To control flatness, the change in elevational difference between two consecutive measurements of elevational difference each measured over 300mm.
Surveying Video
Our video below shows Face surveyors (on another site) checking compliance with Property E (Levelness) on a 3-meter grid, as well as checking all levels to a datum point. Later in the video, our surveyor is using a state-of-the-art Property II meter to check the Property F (Flatness) element of the TR34 standard.
Watch The Face Team Surveying The Floor
Floor Surface Regularity Surveying
Face Consultants can test the surface regularity to all current (Free Movement) specifications including FM1, FM2, FM3 and FM4 found in TR34 (UK), as well as ASTM F Numbers from the USA and the German DIN 18202 standards.
We can also carry out (Defined Movement) surveys, to check floors that are to be used for Very Narrow Aisle (VNA) racking installations, as well as specialised surface regularity surveys on floors that are to be used by automated systems like Goods to Person (G2P) Robotics, Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMR), and Automated Storage and Retrieval Systems (ASRS).
Your warehouse floor is the essential base for all your operations. Contact us today for expert advice on your next project.
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