Resin flooring contractors Loughborough laboratories, technical manufacturers and food producers call on when the floor has to be measured rather than simply laid. Serving laboratory, technical manufacturing and industrial facilities in and around Loughborough, from Charnwood Campus and the science park to the Belton Road and Bishop Meadow industrial estates.
Working for national manufacturers, logistics operators and public sector estates since 1999.
At M1 Junction 23 on the A6 between Leicester and Nottingham, Loughborough carries an industrial identity shaped as much by research and technical manufacturing as by logistics. Science, innovation and engineering space sits alongside long-established estates on Belton Road and Bishop Meadow Road, with a significant food production presence behind both.
That produces a demand profile no other Leicestershire town matches. Here the question is rarely how much weight a floor will take. It is whether the finish is seamless and coved, whether it can be cleaned and validated, whether its electrical resistance can be measured, and whether it will survive the specific chemicals in use rather than chemicals in general.
The failure mode follows from that. Staining and blistering from solvents and cleaning chemicals, crazing where steam cleaning met a system never specified for it, and delamination where a previously coated substrate was not properly prepared. Very little of it is mechanical, and none of it is solved by a thicker floor.
Almost every failed industrial floor comes back to the same four variables: the condition of the substrate, the quality of the preparation, the temperature and contamination on site, and whether the system was matched to the traffic it actually carries.
Get those right and a resin floor runs for fifteen years and more. Get them wrong and it blisters, delaminates or dusts within a year or two, regardless of what the manufacturer’s datasheet claims.
We survey the substrate before we quote it. That means moisture testing, an assessment of what is already down, and a written specification naming the system, its FeRFA type and its thickness — so you know what you are buying and so does anyone who has to approve it.
Diamond grinding or shot blasting back to sound concrete, moisture testing to confirm the substrate is dry enough to coat, and repair of cracks, joints and spalled areas before any resin is mixed. Skipping this is why cheap floors blister and peel.
Substrate condition, preparation quality, temperature and contamination are the four variables that determine whether a resin floor lasts fifteen years or fifteen months. FeRFA guidance is explicit: resin flooring follows the substrate profile beneath it.
A science, innovation and technology campus with laboratory, cleanroom and technical manufacturing space.
Research, technical and spin-out facilities in a campus setting on the western edge of the town.
The principal industrial estate, with engineering, manufacturing and distribution units.
Established industrial and trade premises north-west of the town.
Mixed light industrial and workshop units, with kitchens and service routes behind the retail schemes.
Industrial and business premises linking the town to M1 Junction 23 and north-west towards Hathern.
Seamless, coved, chemical and disinfectant resistant finishes that tolerate constant castor traffic.
Particle control, joint-free detailing and a cleaning regime that can be validated.
ESD-controlled floors with measurable and maintainable electrical resistance.
Coolant, oil and solvent exposure with impact around machine bases.
Washdown, steam cleaning and thermal cycling with coving and falls to drainage.
Heavy point loads from equipment bases combined with chemical exposure.
EN 1081 gives the test basis for electrical resistance, but the floor is only one part of what makes an ESD area work. The earth points, the installed test result and the cleaning regime decide whether it performs. A system sold on a product name, with no earthing detailed and no measured reading at handover, is not an ESD floor. It is a coating with a claim attached.
We specify the earthing, test the installed floor and hand you the readings. If the figures do not meet what the area needs, that is our problem to put right before you sign anything.
Polishes and film-forming cleaners will insulate a conductive floor within weeks. The maintenance regime belongs in the specification, and we hand over what to use rather than leaving it to whoever cleans the building.
In a laboratory or process area the system is chosen against a list of what is actually spilled on the floor, at what concentration and for how long. “Chemically resistant” on its own is a claim, not a specification.
On a campus or research building the access window is usually set by somebody else and cannot be extended. We plan backwards from the date the area has to be handed back, agree what has to be stripped out and what stays, and say plainly at survey if a chosen system cannot cure and be validated inside the time available. Where the window is genuinely tight, rapid-cure options are discussed in terms of what each one needs rather than by quoting a timescale we have not tested on your substrate.
In controlled areas the cleaning and the handover matter as much as the application. Areas are screened and extracted, adjacent spaces protected, and a documented clean-down carried out before the area goes back into use. Where the space has to be revalidated afterwards we build that into the sequence rather than treating it as your problem after we leave.
Preparation runs under H-class extraction. Respirable crystalline silica is limited under EH40 to 0.1 mg per cubic metre over eight hours, and in a laboratory or cleanroom-adjacent space the dust control is protecting instruments and processes as well as people. Polyurethane systems require ISOPA and ALIPA diisocyanate training, which is a fair competence question to put to any contractor and one we are happy to answer.
EN 1081 provides the test basis for an ESD floor, which is presented as a system including earthing and maintenance rather than a coating chosen by name.
BS 8204-6 and the FeRFA Type classification explain why a laboratory or process floor is specified against an exposure schedule rather than a general durability claim, with EN 1504-2 covering protection of the concrete.
Polyurethane screeds belong in food production and steam-cleaned areas because of thermal cycling tolerance, with HACCP-driven coving and drainage falls part of the specification rather than extras.
EN 13501-1 with the fl suffix is a routine question in research and institutional buildings, and ISOPA and ALIPA diisocyanate training is a legitimate check on whoever is applying a polyurethane system.
FeRFA classifies resin flooring into eight types by build-up and thickness, and BS 8204-6 governs which one a floor actually needs, with EN 13813 for the screed and EN 1504-2 for protection of the concrete beneath. Polyaspartic and MMA sit outside that classification because they describe the resin chemistry rather than the build-up. In Loughborough the Type 5 self-smoothing and Type 4 multi-layer systems carry most laboratory and technical production work because they give a seamless, coved, cleanable surface, ESD build-ups are added where electrical resistance has to be measured, and the Type 8 polyurethane screed answers food production and steam-cleaned areas.
FeRFA Type 1. Two or more coats up to 150 microns, binding a dusting substrate and giving a cleanable surface. From £8 per square metre.
FeRFA Type 2. Dual component to 300 microns, solvent free, in gloss, matt or silk. Chemical resistance with a decorative finish.
FeRFA Type 3. Up to 1000 microns over prepared concrete and the system specified on most industrial jobs. Takes colour well for demarcation.
FeRFA Type 4. Multi-coat build at 1 to 3mm with aggregate broadcast between coats, for impact and constant wear.
FeRFA Type 5. Flow-applied at 2 to 3mm for a seamless finish where hygiene and cleaning matter more than impact resistance.
FeRFA Type 7. Three part filled system at 4 to 6mm thickness, giving a self-smoothing finish for heavy and very heavy duty areas.
FeRFA Types 7 and 8. Trowel-applied at 6 to 9mm to take thermal shock, steam cleaning and constant heavy forklift traffic.
Cures at temperatures down to −5°C and is ready in around two hours. Installed overnight or at a weekend it can remove the need to shutdown entirely.
Cures in hours, but the odour can taint food, fabrics and stock and the area must be cleared and ventilated. Better suited to new build and refurbishment projects.
Rates run from £8 per square metre for a floor seal to £45 for MMA, inclusive of preparation, labour and materials. On technical and controlled areas the coving, the junction detailing, the earthing where ESD is required and the testing at handover are measured separately from the area, because that is where the specification is actually satisfied.
| System | FeRFA | Thickness | Per m² |
|---|---|---|---|
| Floor Seal | Type 1 | Up to 150µm | From £8 |
| Epoxy and PU Coating | Type 2 | 150 – 300µm | £8 – £12 |
| High Build Coating | Type 3 | 300 – 1000µm | £8 – £12 |
| Multi-Layer Flooring | Type 4 | 1 – 3mm | £12 – £16 |
| Self-Smoothing | Type 5 | 2 – 4mm | £20 – £30 |
| Heavy Duty Flowable | Type 7 | 4 – 6mm | £25 – £35 |
| Heavy Duty PU Screed | Type 8 | 6 – 9mm | £30 – £40 |
| Polyaspartic | Chemistry | 300 – 500µm | £38 |
| MMA | Chemistry | 2 – 6mm | £45 |
Inclusive of preparation, labour and materials. Rates assume a sound, accessible substrate and are indicative until the floor has been surveyed. Polyaspartic and MMA sit outside the FeRFA type classification because they describe the resin chemistry rather than the build-up.
A three day shutdown at a plant turning over £2,000 an hour is £120,000 of lost output. On most sites that is several times the price of the floor.
Five contractors quoted one timber processing plant. All five proposed the same system and a three to four day closure. None of them costed the closure.
We proposed a faster-curing system installed across a weekend. A higher rate per square metre, and no shutdown at all. On the client’s own figures the avoided losses exceeded the price of the floor.
We install evenings, weekends and one bay at a time.
Whether a shutdown costs you thousands an hour or simply gets in the way, you do not always have to close your site for a resin flooring installation.
Patch repair, crack filling and making good on multi-layered and previously patched floors.
Walkways, crossings and exclusion zones designed to the space that actually exists.
Damp proof membrane where a substrate fails moisture testing, as a standalone package.
Abrasion resistant floors and joint repairs phased around continuous shed operations.
Hygienic coved systems with falls to drain, installed overnight between services.
Confined workshop floors prepared under extraction with neighbours still trading.
We work across the area regularly, from Charnwood Campus and the science park through to Belton Road, Bishop Meadow and Meadow Lane and along the A512 towards M1 Junction 23. We are Cheshire based rather than Loughborough based, so a survey usually happens within days and there is no mobilisation charge for attending.
Ask what resistance range the area actually requires, how the floor will be earthed, whether it will be tested to EN 1081 after installation and what the readings were, and what cleaning products are permitted afterwards. If a quotation names a product but answers none of those, it is not offering you an ESD floor.
Sometimes, but more often it is a specification failure. A floor chosen on a general chemical resistance claim will fail against a particular reagent at a particular concentration, and blistering usually points to preparation or moisture rather than the resin. We survey what is actually used in the area, test the substrate, and tell you which of the two it is before quoting.
Yes, and we plan backwards from the handback date rather than forwards from the start. We will tell you at survey if a chosen system cannot cure and be validated inside the window, and offer one that can instead of hoping. Where revalidation is required afterwards we build it into the sequence.
Almost certainly the system rather than the cleaning. Rigid epoxy does not tolerate repeated thermal cycling, and crazing is what it does when hot water or steam hits it and it cools again. A polyurethane screed handles that movement, which is why it is specified for washdown areas even where the chemistry is mild.
From £8 per square metre for a floor seal up to £45 for MMA, inclusive of preparation, labour and materials. Coving, junction detailing, earthing and testing are priced separately on controlled areas. The full table by system is on the cost page.
Tell us what the area is used for, what gets spilled on the floor and whether electrical resistance or validation is part of the brief. We attend, test the substrate, write the exposure schedule with you, and put a written specification and a fixed price in front of you at no cost.
