Flooring Types and Materials
What is Floor?
Floors are load-bearing structural elements that are considered to be two-dimensional planar elements and whose thickness is considerably lower than the other two dimensions. The main task of the slabs is to meet the vertical loads and to transfer these vertical loads to the beams, columns and shear walls they are supported. The floors carry their own loads and the live loads that come on them perpendicular to their planes and transfer them to the carriers such as columns and / or curtain walls by means of beams or by means of beams.
Floorings are important elements on which all kinds of functions are seen. One of the main functions of the floors is to transmit the loads on them to the carrier elements on which they sit, and the other is to create a floor suitable for the functions on them. Therefore, floors consist of a carrier and a covering part.
As a rule, it is assumed that the loads act properly on the slab, considering that the live load on them varies greatly and the difficulties in its calculation. The openings that the floors pass through differ according to the amount of load they are exposed to. Simpler systems and flooring types are used to pass small openings, while more complex systems and flooring types are used to pass large openings.
Slabs are assumed to be rigid to the effects in their own plane, and in-plane deformations are neglected. In this case, the transmission of the horizontal loads due to the earthquake to the vertical bearing elements depends on the horizontal rigidity of the floors. In reinforced concrete calculations, it is accepted that the floorless floors behave as a rigid diaphragm that does not change shape and that it is rigidly displaced for its own plane. A sufficiently thick slab has three movements in its own plane: horizontal displacement ux, uye, and rotation θz about the vertical axis. During the earthquake exposure of the building, the floors also change shape, but relatively little compared to other load-bearing elements (curtain, column).
Floorings are classified as beamed slab floors, non-beam slab floors, toothed floors according to their working principles and support features. The term floor refers to only floor slab in beams and non-beam floors, and floor slab with teeth in toothed floors.
Flooring Types
Slabs can be classified in the following ways.
Flooring Types According to Function and Position
Interior and exterior furnishings,
Flooring and non-sitting floors,
Unheated or unheated floors,
Low floors,
Raised floors,
Flooring Types According to Materials
Reinforced concrete floors,
Wooden floors,
Steel floors,
Stone floors,
Mixed floors (Stone, brick, steel, wood, concrete)
Flooring According to Application Methods
On-site floors
Reinforced concrete floors
Flooring with reinforced concrete + filling material (asmolen flooring, aerated concrete)
Mixed floors (Stone, brick, steel, wood, concrete)
On-site floors (with wooden or steel beams)
Installation floors
Floor boards
Flat panels (reinforced concrete, aerated concrete, metal trapezoidal plate)
Self-beamed panels (reinforced concrete)
Floor beams and boards
Floor beams and infill elements (concrete, steel, terracotta)
Floor Types According to Load Transfer System
Beamed Plate Slabs
Threaded Flooring
Beamless Floors
The most commonly used flooring type in our country is reinforced concrete flooring. The reason for this is that reinforced concrete skeleton structure system is preferred and besides, this type of flooring is thought to be more robust in masonry structures. However, in a masonry structure with correctly built load-bearing walls, since the load-bearing walls will resist the lateral forces that will occur during an earthquake, wooden floors with a lower density than that of reinforced concrete may be more suitable.
Functions of Flooring
Carrier
The bearing structure of the floors varies according to the size of the area they pass through and the amount of load on this area. Areas such as large entrance halls, conference or meeting rooms are covered with cassette flooring, as well as residential floors that can be passed with simple reinforced concrete slabs or wooden floors. Reinforced concrete offers the architect a large area. Wooden floors, on the other hand, can exceed the lengths of 3.5-4 meters with the dimensions found in our country.
Water ınsulation
Waterproofing in floors; It should be done on roofs, where it is directly related to the ground and in wet areas. In all three cases, the insulation is solved not in the floor itself, but in the coating or its surroundings. The waterproofing of the floor is provided with the drop installed on inclined roofs and the layers laid on the flat roofs. In cases related to the ground, rigid insulation is made on lean concrete against capillary water, and special precautions are taken with raft foundations for pressurized water. In either case, the flooring will get wet. In order for these floors to be long-lasting, attention should be paid to the fact that the substances added to the concrete mortar are not damaged by water and special additives should be added to the mortar if necessary.
Heat and Steam Control
Especially in flat roof flooring, heat and vapor permeability of the flooring material (as it will affect the calculation of the overlying protective layers) gains importance. Although it is not considered important in our country, heat and steam flows must be calculated absolutely in floors that are directly related to the floor and especially in floors with open bottoms of cantilevers and tube passages and floors that are not heated.
Volume Control
One of the places where sound control is most important in buildings is the floors. Most of the movements people make are transmitted from the floors to the lower floors. The easiest way to prevent the passage of these sounds that can be space or impact sounds is to cover the floor with sound absorbing materials such as carpet or some plastics. In places where the sound level is high and control is important, a floor system called floating flooring is used. The essence of the floating floor is that a secondary floor is placed on the main bearing floor by bundling it with a sound and vibration absorbing material. This technique is applied in wooden and steel floors as well as reinforced concrete.
Fire Control
Reinforced concrete slabs collapse when the reinforcement inside them starts to melt due to the high temperature, and the timbers collapse after a certain period of time when the beams burn to an insufficient amount of time. In order to delay the collapse, the coating materials that give excessive heat while burning should be avoided and a sprinkler system should be installed if necessary.