Expert Tips Tag

While the weather stays in the high 40s and low 50s here in Reno, we Northern Nevadans know better than to expect it to stay that way the rest of the winter season. To gear up for another impending cold front, let’s reveal another cold weather construction tip from Superintendent Nick Crawford.

According to Nick, a more extraordinary solution for extreme weather issues is to lime treat soil/base to keep it from getting too wet. He decided to look into this option on a previous industrial project he worked on. He found a company to do cement treatment to the soil and found that the price point for this treatment was well worth the result, as it saved the project in the long run. In the end, Nick and his team treated more than 1 million square feet of building slab. The pad was now, as he says, “bulletproof!”

Superintendent Nick Crawford is back with another cold weather construction tip – the first one of 2022. According to Nick, “Protecting soils from freezing can be a challenge. While using concrete blankets can help, it’s not a foolproof solution. Instead, try using hydronic ground heaters to warm up the soil.”

Another solution Nick has used is temporarily tenting slab pours and panel pours. This way, he is able to apply heat within the tent to get temperatures where they need to be in order to place concrete or bond breaker on the slab.
Stay tuned for more winter construction tips from us throughout the season!

Up here in our HQ city of Reno, we not only celebrated a true “White Christmas” with the snowy conditions on Christmas Day – we also welcomed more than two feet of snow in some parts of town over the weekend! As such, now is the perfect time to discuss some of our tips for cold weather construction.

Holding about 25 years of experience, Superintendent Nick Crawford has some expert pieces of advice for navigating construction projects during inclement weather, such as snowstorms, that we will be sharing with you periodically during the winter. Here is his first tip:

“Knowing the weather patterns for your specific jobsite – including having a game plan for protecting the site by making sure you have positive drainage on the site – is a must. Snow can be easy to deal with, as it can be plowed and removed from the site, but if left to melt before removal, it poses risks to work already in place. You could end up with melted snow saturating soil that is already over the optimum moisture content. The best solution? 9 times out of 10, plowing the snow is the way to go!”

Stay tuned for more cold weather construction tips from United Construction throughout the season!