There is no rule that says that when constructing a building you have to install a floor screed in Beaconsfield, or anywhere else for that matter. However, if you want your final flooring to be as flat and level as possible, which most people do, then you will need to lay a floor screed. This provides as flat and level a surface as possible on which to fix the final flooring, whatever it may be.
A floor screed is particularly useful when you are laying tile or stone flooring. This is because if the underfloor is not flat it is very likely that the tiles or stones will begin to crack when they start to get traffic on them, and that could prove extremely expensive to fix. In those conditions, using a floor screed is just plain common sense.
Of course, if you are installing underfloor heating, then you will have to use a screed in order to cover up the heating pipes. All things considered, whatever type of floor you are going to lay, it is best to install a screed before you do anything else.
Traditionally a floor screed has been made up of a mixture of sand and cement in a ratio of one part cement to three or four and a half parts of sand. However, over the last 20 years or so there has been a considerable switch to a new type of screed which is made using calcium sulphate as the binder instead of cement.
Several Advantages
This type of screed, known under various names such as gypsum screed (calcium sulphate becomes gypsum when mixed with water), liquid screed, flowing screed, anhydrite screed, and more, is poured on to the substrate in liquid form, and it has several advantages over and above sand and cement.
One of these is the speed of laying the screed. A sand and cement screed is mixed either on site, or delivered ready mixed, and then barrowed on to the substrate and laid by a worker on hands and knees using a trowel. A liquid screed, such as the type we use at UK Screeds, is delivered to site ready mixed.
We then attach a pump and a long hose to the delivery truck and the screed is pumped into place. Bingo! Before you know it, the screed is laid and then all we need to do is to go over it with a dappling bar to remove any air bubbles and leave it to dry. It is reckoned that pouring and laying a liquid screed is around 20 times as fast as laying a sand and cement screed by hand.
Another big advantage of our liquid screed is the drying time. On any construction site, time is money, and the liquid screed we use will be dry enough to walk upon within as little as 24 hours and certainly within 48. This means that there is no undue delay to other tradesmen who need to work on the site.
