Gulf Construction Online - Radcon keeps leisure hotspots waterproof

Leisure Facilities

A project in Bahrain ... being waterproofed.

Radcon keeps leisure hotspots waterproof

01 August 2009

AUSTRALIA’S Radcrete Pacific has been using its waterproofing product, Radcon Formula # 7, to waterproof and protect sporting facilities for many years.
In some cases, the usage is obvious. In the Wahooo! Water Park at Bahrain City Centre, Radcon was used to waterproof all the water features such as the wave pools and stop a million litres of water from leaking into the mall below.
The possibility of a million litres of water leaking into the building directly below it would give a lot of waterproofing companies some cause for concern. However Michael Rorke, executive director, Radcrete, says he was not in the least bit worried about it: “Radcon has been used for many years in all sorts of swimming pools, water tanks, chemical plants and so on. We knew without doubt that it would do the job so we never had a moment’s concern. We have been waterproofing shopping centre roofs in tropical countries like Singapore and Thailand for nearly 20 years and during the wet season they might be half a metre deep in water, so for us there was nothing to worry about.”
He says that when thinking of leisure activities, the normal focus is on the exciting factors such as the swimming pools, the theming and so on. Not quite so exciting are the mechanics of how these facilities are built to survive in the long term.
Rorke says Radcon # 7 actually performs better in a high water environment: “Radcon stays permanently reactive in the concrete and so if new cracks occur in the future, it is the water that causes Radcon to reactivate and seal those new cracks. It is perfect for that sort of environment.”
It is the reactivation of Radcon that makes it a lifetime product: according to Rorke, it will never need replacement whilst the structure remains standing.
Radcon # 7 has also been used to waterproof and protect facilities at the Olympic Villages in Moscow (Russia) and Sydney (Australia). Likewise, it has been used on sporting stadiums across the world, from Australia to Spain and Portugal.
The spectacular Caja Magica is the new venue of the Madrid Open tennis, played as one of the lead-up events to the French Open and this was waterproofed with Radcon earlier in the year.
In these cases, Radcon is being used not so much for waterproofing but is applied in order to prevent corrosion of the steel caused by water or salt ingress.
“Investors building these projects obviously want them to last as long as possible and the relatively small cost of waterproofing compared to the cost of repairing corrosion-affected concrete is an investment that most consider to be worthwhile,” he points out.
Radcrete Pacific was formed in 1987 with the goal of globalising the sophisticated yet simple-to-apply concrete waterproofing technology.
The original bio-chemical process to achieve lifetime concrete waterproofing was first developed by Dr A W Smith in 1975, a scientist nominated for the Nobel Prize. Dr Smith utilised his knowledge in the medical field to produce a silicate-based waterproofing technology that could react in the matrix and cracks of concrete in a similar fashion to how cuts heal in human skin.
Radcon #7 has been used extensively throughout Asia, Europe and the Americas on projects as varied as the Denmark-to-Sweden rail bridge and the Sultan of Brunei's personal mosque. It has also been widely utilised for water-holding structures such as potable water tanks and water treatment plants as well as shopping centres, car parks and hundreds of bridges throughout the world.
The global distributor, Radcrete Pacific, is a quality-assured company complying to ISO 9001:2000 quality standards.