What we do · Post-Tensioned Repair
Where the Stakes Are Higher
Many Florida garages are post-tensioned, where steel tendons are held in permanent tension inside the concrete. Repair there is a different discipline.
The structure, its age, and what you have noticed. If there is an engineer's report, send that instead — we will price what it identifies.
Exposed
A garage is a structure left outside for fifty years
Unit rates
Repair quantity is unknowable until it is opened
Parking
Where displaced cars go decides the whole program
Licensed
General contractor, licensed in the state of Florida
You cannot cut into it without knowing where the tendons are
A tendon under tension carries enormous stored energy. Cutting into a post-tensioned slab without knowing exactly where the tendons run is genuinely dangerous, and corrosion within a tendon is invisible from the surface until it fails. Both facts make this specialist work rather than ordinary concrete repair.
The other reason this is specialist work is that a damaged tendon changes how load moves through the structure around it. Repairing one is not a local operation — the engineer has to establish what the structure is doing without it before anybody decides how to put it back.
What it requires
- Locating tendons before any cutting, without exception.
- An engineer's design for any repair affecting a tendon.
- Specialist contractors for tendon repair or replacement.
- Investigation of anchorages, where corrosion concentrates.
- Sequencing that never leaves the structure under-supported.
How tendon problems are found
Corrosion inside a tendon is invisible from the surface. It is found by investigating the anchorages, by looking for the characteristic staining and cracking that a corroding tendon produces, and in some cases by opening up to inspect directly.
Because it is invisible, a garage can be structurally compromised while presenting far less surface damage than a conventionally reinforced one. That is worth understanding when comparing two garages that look similar from the deck.
How we handle it
- 01Locate tendons before any cutting, every time.
- 02Work to the engineer's repair design without deviation.
- 03Engage specialist tendon contractors where required.
- 04Shore and support to the engineer's requirements.
- 05Document every repair for the structural record.
Anchorages are where post-tension corrosion concentrates, because that is where the tendon meets the outside world. They are frequently at the slab edge, exposed to exactly the conditions that cause corrosion, and they are the first place a competent investigation looks.
Said plainly
Where we stop
We will not cut into a post-tensioned slab without locating tendons first, whatever the schedule pressure. There is no version of that we will agree to.
FAQ
Common questions
- Is post-tensioned repair different?
- Substantially. Tendons carry stored energy and cutting blind is dangerous.
- Where does corrosion concentrate?
- At the anchorages, frequently at the slab edge.
- Can you see tendon corrosion?
- Not from the surface. It requires investigation.
- Will you cut without locating tendons?
- Never.
The practical side
Displaced Parking
A garage under repair has fewer spaces. Where the displaced cars go is the question that decides whether the project happens at all.
Read more →
Phasing
How the work is divided determines how users experience it and how long the whole thing takes.
Read more →
Inspection
A garage assessment should be done by a structural engineer who is not going to do the repairs.
Read more →
Budgeting
Garage restoration is predictable in kind and unpredictable in quantity, which makes it a reserve item that almost nobody reserves for.
Read more →
The Cost of Deferring
Concrete deterioration is not linear. Once corrosion starts it accelerates, which makes deferral more expensive than it looks.
Read more →
More what we do
Concrete Restoration
Salt reaches the reinforcement, the steel corrodes, the corrosion expands, and the concrete breaks away. In a Florida garage it is a matter of when.
Read more →
Expansion Joints
Joints allow the structure to move, and they are the most heavily worked and shortest-lived element in a garage.
Read more →
Traffic Coatings
A traffic coating keeps water and chlorides off the concrete. Applied correctly it extends structural life substantially; applied over damage it hides it.
Read more →
Next step
Find out what is actually wrong with it.
An inspection, photographs of what we found, and a written scope. If the honest answer is that it can wait another season, that is the answer you will get.