Whats the best way to help screed dry, had a few jobs this year when it was not fully dry the following day.
ideally as Jay has suggested .... leave another day. What we have to remember is, if a screed manufacturer says it needs 24hrs to dry. Well this will be in a ideal situation. Sadly this does not happen most days. The manufactures can easily make there products dry quicker but again we will then face compounds setting in the bucket on warm days. So, my advice would be to leave all screed jobs with 48hrs to dry. This obviously cant happen every time tho. Again this is something that customers need to be educated on. How come if they have a room plastered the customer knows they should leave it for a week or so before painting, but when you lay a new layer of concrete the customer thinks you can fit the floor a couple of hours later? random !
I find if it goes down in an ideal concrete slab at 2-3mm thickness there's no problem but if any deeper spots I leave a bit longer.
Ask the client to ventilate the room sufficiently after the screed has been applied to help the excess moist escape to the outside world. A few windows opened can make a big difference. Often they've got everything closed up, which does not help the screed to dry.
I used one last year to dry a concrete slab that had been exposed to rain while a conservatory was built over it and it dried it all out over about three days and drew out a lot of water in that it had to be emptied three times a day. I still reckon screed shouldn't really need it unless the damp is in the concrete underneath.
The one I did the other month took 3 days. No ventilation at all in house cause had to close the windows as no one in the house. I put heating on but didnt help.
Start taking subfloor temperatures. You will soon learn if you will have drying issues or not. When using a compound like 'Renovation' compound you mix with less water when the subfloor is cold and add more water when the subfloor is hot. Hence that product has different ratios of mixing on the bag.
If needed, in winter normally only (although, looking at this week's weather you would think we're already in Autumn!). Wouldn't use dehumidifiers too quickly. In Winter the humidity outside is much lower, so a bit of ventilating will remove the excess moist inside much quicker in a natural way by opening some windows for 15 - 20 minutes at a time.
I don't believe this. Laid a screed yesterday with no deep areas and went today to fit flooring and it was still wet. It's never happened before. I'm blaming Daz
whats the details of the job sandy? every job we can get to the bottom of, helps us understand it better so it wont happen again
