G. D. Searle Laboratories

The G. D. Sear­le Lab­o­ra­to­ries is a large cam­pus con­sist­ing of sev­er­al build­ings in Skok­ie, Illi­nois. Ren­o­va­tion projects often occur simul­ta­ne­ous­ly, involv­ing mul­ti­ple con­trac­tors. U.S. Water­proof­ing Co. has suc­cess­ful­ly com­plet­ed sev­er­al jobs for both the gen­er­al con­trac­tors and the own­er over a peri­od of more than ten years.

Recent­ly a con­trac­tor, Novak Con­struc­tion, called us to help them with a prob­lem in the Metrol­o­gy Lab. This lab­o­ra­to­ry has a con­trolled atmos­phere and the humid­i­ty lev­el at times was so high as to force clos­ing down the oper­a­tion. Mois­ture, not water, was com­ing up through the con­crete slab to such an extent that it raised the vinyl floor tile. The own­er want­ed to reduce mois­ture and to make some plumb­ing changes as part of the project.

After our con­sul­ta­tion, Novak Con­struc­tion saw-cut a rec­tan­gle in the slab and removed the con­crete. The new pip­ing was installed and the con­crete replaced. U.S. Water­proof­ing Co. then drilled a series of holes through the new con­crete and inject­ed a hydropho­bic polyurethane into the soil below it to a depth of one foot. This cre­at­ed an imper­me­able mass, which would not per­mit water to pass through. After the holes were patched, the new slab edges were sealed by injec­tion under high pres­sure to make absolute­ly cer­tain that there would be no moisture.

The project has been a com­plete suc­cess and we have recent­ly been asked to bid on some addi­tion­al work.