Trowelling

Summary

Trowelling - is the process of squeezing water out of a concrete surface to form a smooth, dense crust.

Technical Information

Trowelling is used to finish virtually all internal industrial floors. This is because it provides a hard, durable wearing surface, increasing damage resistance from both loading and chemical attack.

It can be carried out by hand or, more commonly in an industrial floor, by a machine called a power trowel.

The process involves scraping a blade over the surface of the concrete. Multiple passes are usually made and the blade is increasingly inclined each time to apply more pressure as the surface hardens.

Trowelling before bleeding has mostly finished can cause delamination, as the bleed water will not be able to pass through the crust that is formed by trowelling. Trowelling air entrained concrete significantly increases the risk of delamination.

Trowelling is rarely used on external floors because it provides poor slip resistance and it doesn’t work with the use of air entraining agents, which are often necessary for an external slab.