Night Owl Paul Keeps An Eye On Ground-Breaking Technology!

As HBPW supply chain partner, Nationwide Engineering, laid claim to a world first, little did the construction sector realise that Senior Partner, Paul Withers had been called on to ‘babysit’ their newly poured, pioneering concrete floor for eight hours!

With flask in one hand and coffee in the other Paul, a Non Executive Director of Concretene, the company formed by Nationwide Engineering joint MDs, Robin Hibberd and Alex McDermott to develop ground-breaking concrete technology, patiently kept watch over the floor at the new Southern Quarter gym in Amesbury’s Solstice Park until 6am.

The Wiltshire based firm made history when it laid the world’s first graphene enhanced concrete slab engineered for sustainability in a commercial setting last week.

But as Paul, a key component in the development of the ground-breaking technology, explained, it required a night owl to ensure that everything went smoothly, including the floor itself!

He said: “Effectively what we have done is form a concrete ground floor to the building measuring, approximately, 40x20m without using any reinforcements or stress relieving saw cuts.

“Had we used conventional technology, the floor would have been reinforced and sawn up into small ‘bays’ to reduce the thermal shrinkage stresses. However, by using concretene, the objective was simple: no cracks, no cuts and no steel or fibre reinforcements. Just the addition of graphene.

“We were even able to reduce the slab thickness by 25% and, therefore, reduce the carbon footprint.”

The floor in question was the result of a laser-controlled pour which began at 8am, finishing just eight hours later; power floating and trowelling of the surface continued until 9pm when a curing membrane was sprayed on to the surface.

“At 10pm I decided that someone needed to keep an eye on this ground-breaking material so I volunteered to be locked in the building along with my flask, and proceeded to keep a watchful eye on the 150mm surface until 6am the following morning!

“Subsequent observation of the slab has potentially indicated an enhanced rate of set and a series of technological advancements, which we will reserve judgement on until there has been further testing. However, I am confident that we have witnessed some major breakthroughs which will be evident very soon.”