A new house is being built near me. Both the ground and upper floor appear to be made from (reinforced) concrete joists with special breeze blocks in between. The spans are quite long.
Is this a common form of construction? I do wonder what they will cover the floor with, as I would have though that the blocks might move a little bit. In my house the ground floor ceiling is where all the central heating pipes and wiring live.
Yes. I have it here.
Groudn floor anyay.
I do wonder what they will cover
In my case DPM, insulation, UFH pipes and screed, in that order, then tiles and laminate.
as I would have though that the blocks might move a
The blocks are fist locked by brushing dry sand/cement over the top. That locks them. The screed is laid over the top post that.
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Sounds very Spanish, most of the ones I've seen there are like that. Each floor is of concrete / screed with conduit / pipework embedded. Perhaps yours is going to appear on Grand designs some time in the future
It's called "beam and block" construction.
Loads of hits on Google. e.g.:
That sounds like "beam and block" contruction.
It's easy, strong and no curing time cf: liquid concrete slabs. Also no formwork needed.
Its called block and beam. Common in multiple dwellings as it deadens sound a bit. AIUI you screed it to make a floor. I assume the ceiling is just done with rafters in wall hangers as you wouldn't want to couple the two together. Not that I have actually looked at any flats for years.
as others have said it's block and beam, quite common these days for the ground floor, but highly unusual for the upstairs floor to be built this way, except for flats / offices / hospitals etc. Never seen it used this way in a house before - are you sure it's not a couple of flats? - it's required for fireproofing in newly constructed flats nowadays
I've seen it in domestic use for both ground-floor-over-basement and first floor on large houses. It gives scope for flexibility in the position of internal supporting walls. It also gives a good base for inter-floor soundproofing, which some people are prepared to pay a premium for.
It aint that expensive either.
In germany it is almost the default way to do things I believe.
Works well with upstairs UFH.
Yes, - Unless the planning application is a complete lie!
The house has a floor area of about 400sqm, and I get the impression that the developer is not short of money. He knocked down a perfectly good house just so that he could replace it with a larger one.
Yup, that's what I was alluding to. I spoke to an architect about it once; He said that people would commission a house on the basis of the layout on paper without being able to imagine it in reality, and then when they saw the walls up, decide they want to change their minds.
If practically none of the internal dividing walls are load-bearing (entirely feasible with block and beam design), then they can be moved a couple-of-inches-this-way or a couple-of-feet-that-way with impunity.
Such people often go for v. expensive home automation and house-wide A.V. systems as well (which is where I used to get involved).
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