The Dangers of Cutting Concrete without an Engineer [Update 2022]

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Cutting into concrete can be dangerous and costly to repair if mistakes are made.

If you are worried about cutting into your concrete, for whatever reason, keep the old saying “prevention is often better (and cheaper) than the cure” in mind.

We will walk you through a scenario where a contractor called us out to investigate a concrete slab before pluming was installed. 

Complete Building Solutions was recently called out to inspect the concrete slab on a 36 story building in Minneapolis. A contractor working on the site was looking to install new plumbing and would need to cut into the concrete to do this. After X-raying the floor he became concerned that the slab was structural. He noticed that some of the slab was poured 7-12 inches thick, the footings were 20 feet deep, and some of the existing rebar was placed only 2-3” apart from each other.

Because of this, he no longer felt comfortable to proceed without an engineer’s opinion.

 

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X-Raying the Concrete Slab

 

The Concrete Slab Inspection by our Structural Engineering Team

The video below shows our team and the contractor working together to examine the floor.

Complete Building Solutions determined that the slab was NOT structural and that it was safe to proceed with the plumbing installation.  

 Our engineer’s then provided a scope of work to the contractor on how best to fill the voids under the concrete floor and place the new concrete floor with the proper rebar installation.

 

structural engineers

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