PRO FLOORING
Why a floor needs a DPM
Concrete holds and passes moisture. A ground-bearing slab sits on damp earth, and a new slab is still giving up its own construction water for months after it is poured. Left to it, that moisture rises into whatever you bond on top.
The results are predictable and expensive: adhesive that never properly cures, LVT that lifts at the edges, wood that cups, carpet that stays cold and eventually smells. By the time it shows, the fix is to take the whole floor up.
A surface damp proof membrane stops it. It is a small part of the cost of a floor and the single cheapest insurance you can buy against having to lay it twice.
When you need one
- New-build slabs that have not dried to the moisture level the floor finish requires — which, on a realistic construction programme, is most of them.
- Older ground floors with no membrane at all, or with one that has failed or been breached.
- Conversions and extensions where a new slab meets an old floor and the two behave completely differently.
- Any solid floor that has previously had a moisture-related failure.
How we do it
We test rather than guess. If the readings say a membrane is needed, we prepare the surface, prime where the system requires it, and apply a liquid-applied surface DPM to the manufacturer's specification — coverage rate, number of coats, cure time between them. Then we let it cure properly before anything goes on top.
The temptation on a tight programme is always to skip the second coat or to lay early. We do not, because the failure it causes does not appear until long after everyone has moved on.
On developments
For developers, DPM is usually the difference between a handover and a callback. We install membranes as part of our new-build packages across the East Midlands, sequenced into the programme so the cure time is planned for rather than lost.
Because we do the membrane, the preparation and the flooring, there is no argument about whose responsibility a damp failure was — it is ours, and so it is done properly.
Talk to us
If you have a slab you are unsure about, or a floor that has failed once already, call 07969 675553 or email Info@pro-flooring.co.uk. We cover Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Leicestershire.
