Posted by Vanja Landeck - 06 July, 2021
Ucrete floors from Master Builders Solutions can be found all over the world – even high up in the Austrian Alps! Discover how one Austrian dairy with a reputation for excellence expanded its cheese production to a brand new automated facility, complete with Ucrete - demonstrably the World’s Toughest Floor since more than 50 years!
Obersteirische Molkerei is an Austrian dairy renowned for the finest specialty cheeses and dairy products. Based in the northwest of Austria, the company uses raw milk from this picturesque mountainous area, where cows enjoy an unspoilt environment, quality feed and long months of pasture grazing across the grasslands of the Mur and Mürz valleys.
Obersteirische Molkerei prides itself on combining traditional quality with innovation in meeting new standards with a strong focus on sustainable manufacture processes. To realise its ambitions to expand production, its cheese-aging rooms and packaging logistics needed to be relocated from its headquarters in Knittelfeld. The new logistics and aging center was designed to create the ideal environment for fully automated cheese maturation in an extremely hygienic environment.
A demanding dairy environment
Sensitive food-processing areas have to meet stringent hygienic requirements in particular. Due to their continuous contact with product spillings and residue, floors at the dairy must undergo thorough cleaning and disinfection. This is why the decision makers were looking for a highly durable floor that withstands heavy usage and cleaning while providing fast-drying and slip-resistant properties when the surface is wet. High robustness, mechanical resistance and electrostatic conductivity were important factors as well, not least because of the sensitive electronics of the automated forklifts used across the dairy’s production and logistics areas. Finally, the ideal floor must be non-tainting to protect the quality of the food being produced – thus, a major challenge to combine all these features in one sustainable solution!
Developing the specification
Ucrete MF40AS and Ucrete HF60RT systems were the products of choice to meet all of this state-of-the-art cheese production facility’s requirements. Both are based on a unique, innovative heavy-duty polyurethane concrete technology with exceptional resistance to aggressive chemicals, high temperatures and strong mechanical impact, which gives the floor high sustainable value due to incomparable long-term durability. Ucrete systems are non-tainting and can accommodate the highly humid, cool environment necessary for a successful cheese aging space. All these benefits convinced our customer to opt for our Ucrete flooring systems.
Ucrete MF40AS provides a smooth surface at R10 slip-resistance level, making it a great fit for creating a safe, antistatic floor in the dairy's hallway and cheese-maturing areas. Importantly, it could support the reliable operation of the dairy’ automated forklifts.
- Ucrete HF60RT was used across the cheese-processing areas – with its slightly textured surface and slip-resistance level of R11, the system provides safe work conditions in wet environments. Thanks to its closed surface, it dries off particularly quickly, without leaving any contact surfaces, niches or puddles where germs and potential pathogens can multiply.
Two high-performance systems, quickly installed
The liquid application of our Ucrete systems meant that any unevenness in the substrate could be easily compensated for, and concave moldings could be created. Used in combination, both systems offered an optimal solution for the newly constructed dairy facility and Obersteirische Molkerei ongoing needs.
An exceptional final result was achieved with these high-performance flooring systems. Here, quick and comprehensive assistance from our technical support team made a vital contribution, from concept through to design revisions and installation of the electrostatically conductive system.
In total, 2,050 m2 of Ucrete HF60RT was installed in the cheese-processing and tank-storage areas, while about 450 m2 of Ucrete MF40AS covered the hallways and aging rooms.
Find out more about our Ucrete flooring solutions for food production here.
Ucrete – more than 50 Years of Excellence in Flooring
Our customers know that they can rely on the performance and the durability of our Ucrete flooring systems. Innovation has been our key driver since 1960, and the strong investments made over the years on R&D activities brought us to reach several milestones such as:
- 1982: The first antistatic hygienic terrazzo floor for the pharmaceutical industry;
- 1993: The first flow applied heavy duty screed with thermal shock resistance for ergonomic application;
- 2003: The first systems with specifiable slip resistance profiles as key safety requirement for the food-and-beverage industry;
- 2011: The first non-tainting, rapid curing systems, to minimize downtime even at chill temperatures;
- 2018: Monolithic, thermal shock resistant antistatic flooring;
- 2020: Ucrete CS – color stability for enhanced aesthetics.
Ucrete’s extremely low VOC content, as recognized by third parties like Eurofins, which awarded Ucrete with the Indoor Air Comfort Gold Certificate, together with its versatility and specific properties – resistance to extreme chemical, mechanical and thermal impact; low-maintenance long-term durability for decades; hygiene; skid-resistance and electrostatic conductivity, if required – make Ucrete the perfect flooring solution throughout the food-and-beverage, chemical, and pharmaceutical industries as well as in the aerospace, electronics, engineering, textile and the mining industries – wherever resistance to aggressive service conditions is required.
