What we need on site: power, water, access, timing
Last updated:
What we need on site comes down to 5 things: power, water, a way to get the machines to the floor, a place for the waste, and a few hours when the floor is ours alone. None of it is unusual. But each one costs you money if we find out about it the morning of. It’s cheap to settle on the phone weeks ahead.
Power the crew can tie into
More than a house outlet, and less than most people fear. Small jobs usually run off 2 dedicated circuits. Or we need panel access so we can tie in. If a building has no dedicated service, we carry gear that joins 2 ordinary circuits into 1 heavier feed. That covers most older houses, and no electrician has to get involved.
Big commercial floors are a different story. Several machines run at once, some of them heavier 3-phase gear. And the tie-in point needs to sit fairly close to the work.
Exact voltage and amps depend on the machines your job needs. So we check it for your site instead of reading a number off a spec sheet. Rather not be the go-between? Give us your electrician’s number and we’ll settle it with them. The first contractor we made that offer to in writing took us up on it the next morning.
No power on site is a real cost
If a site can't supply power, we bring a generator and fuel. That lands on your bill as its own line. One phone call weeks ahead tells you if temporary power will be live in time.
Water within hose reach
A working spigot we can reach with a hose. An outside tap is fine. Wet grinding and honing use water the whole time, but there’s no big volume need and no special hookup.
No water at all is the problem. On one logged job, the crew hauled it in 5 gallon buckets, 35 gallons at a time, and every one of those hours came out of the floor instead of going into it. On another job, the customer couldn’t supply water. So they dropped 2 outside areas from the scope rather than pay to haul it. That was the right call. It just would’ve been a better one three weeks sooner.
Getting the machines to the floor
A truck and trailer have to reach the work. We unload machines that run 600 pounds and more. They need a flat path from the trailer to the floor, because no crew has the muscle to carry that up a flight of stairs.
On commercial work, access also means getting in and out. A key or an entry code for early and late hours changes what the crew gets done in a week. And the building has to lock, because our equipment stays on site between work days.
Where do the slurry and the waste go?
Wet polishing makes mud. That’s just how the process works. The crew catches the slurry in a fiber-sieve bag, so the water drains out while we work. Once the bag dries, it goes in the waste container. One logged session made 25 gallons of mud.
So the site needs a dumpster. Set it on concrete, as close to a roll-up door as the layout allows. Every extra step between the machine and the dumpster is a step somebody takes fifty times a day.
One warning beats everything else here. Coating that gets into a floor drain cures inside the pipe and won’t flush out. Our crews have standing orders to cover drains and pipe openings before work starts. Skip that, and a mop-up turns into a plumber’s bill.
What should the floor look like when we pull up?
Before the crew rolls, we send commercial clients a short list of what to have ready:
- Equipment, supplies, tools, and trash out of the work area by 1 p.m. the afternoon before, not the morning of.
- Loose items off the floor. Wall-mounted plumbing fixtures can stay right where they are.
- Control joints and cracks DRY before joint fill goes in. Yes, we write it in capitals, and we mean it.
- Door braces, shims, and temporary steel bracing welded, grouted, and removed, so heavy machines can move between rooms.
Rain stops outside work. We plan for that from the start, not as an excuse after.
The most common problem isn’t on the list, though. It’s extension cords and tools left lying around by whoever worked last. They turn clean full-length passes into short, broken ones all day long.
Where does the floor fit in your build schedule?
The best window opens once the building is dried in. That means it’s framed, the roof’s on, the windows and insulation are in, and the electrical and plumbing rough-in is done. But the drywall isn’t up yet. Coming in after drywall works too. We settle that with the builder around everybody else’s dates.
The hard deadline is trim. We have to reach the wall edge before cabinets and trim go in. Miss that, and you lose the clean reveal at the floor for good. A typical home job runs about 2 weeks start to finish, so that’s the block to find on the calendar.
Once the floor’s done, it stays under cardboard, Ram Board, or heavy construction paper for the rest of the build.
Sorting this out as a builder for the first time? How we fit into a build lays out the whole handoff. If your client hasn’t picked a finish yet, send them how to choose a concrete floor before the selections meeting, not after.
Can other trades work while we’re working?
During some stages, yes, no problem. During others the floor is ours, and sealing is the clearest case. Light foot traffic during wet stages is fine as long as nobody tracks in mud, gravel, or sand and other trades keep their tools off the floor. The stages that need an empty floor are short, often 3 to 4 hours, not days. We name them for your job so they get scheduled instead of discovered.
Picture your plumber trying to rough in PEX lines while the drywall guys hang rock ahead of him. It slows the plumber down. THEN the drywall guy has to come back and hang that drywall again. Now do that 5 times. It costs EVERYBODY time and money. You wouldn’t run a job that way, right?
A roofer can work on the roof while electricians pull wire. A plumber can set fixtures while trim guys put in cabinets. It’s not cozy, but it works. A floor guy can’t put sealer down while plumbers walk back and forth across the floor, the same way your painters couldn’t paint the walls while the customer hung pictures.
Put real numbers on it. Say an 8,000 square foot floor needs 2 coats of sealer. If the floor is ours for the day, we have the people and the gear to finish it in 1 day. Now load cabinets into half the building and start electricians setting fixtures in the back. We work partial days for 3 days instead.
The floor’s in-service date slips at least 2 days, and probably 3. Cabinet install drags out. Every trade on site works short, slow days. The whole project usually grows 3 to 4 days, and nobody gets anything for that time.
Who pays when the schedule slips?
Don’t ask us for the most efficient schedule, do something else, and then complain about the lost time.
Whoever made the scheduling call owns its cost, not the floor crew. In practice we soak up a fair amount of that slack instead of billing for lost time. That’s how you stay on somebody’s call list for the next building.
What changes things is getting blamed for a delay we didn’t cause. That’s why the crew keeps daily time logs, photos, and notes on every job. Not to build a case. To have one if somebody else starts building theirs.
Five questions to have ready when you call
- What power is there, and when does it go live?
- Is there a working water spigot within hose reach?
- Can a truck and trailer reach the floor without stairs or a tight hallway?
- Where does a dumpster sit?
- Which trades are scheduled around the floor work, and who controls that schedule?
Answer those 5, and we can tell you where the floor fits in your build. We’ll also tell you what it takes to get it right, and what it costs to put it there.
