Soil Stabilisation Sites Are Busy

No sign of recession on soil stabilisation sites.

Foundation work is proceeding at full speed on the lot of the multi-purpose building of Folkhälsan in Pargas, Finland. According to plan the building will be ready to move in by fall 2010. The multi-purpose building will house e.g. group apartments for seniors and day care services for children.

At the moment one can see three high machines working on the lot: two of them are stabilising the soil, i.e. strengthening the foundation for the future parking places and roads; the third machine drives piles into the soil where the actual building will stand. The soil stabilisation is carried out by Piippo & Pakarinen Oy, RPP, one of the four leading stabilisations companies in Finland.

- This is quite an easy job, the ground is dry and bearing, and underground there are no cables to watch out for. The clay layer is 7-12.5 meters deep and during two months time about 30 000 meters of stabilisation columns will be driven into the ground, tells Managing Director Heikki Pakarinen.

The stabilisation product is Nordkalk Terra^TM GTC. It consists of gypsum, hydrated lime and cement. The mixture reacts in the ground with fines of the soil, resulting in a unique property: the soil is stabilised and it will gain a new structure with improved geo-technical qualities.

Driver Pentti Martikainen starts the day by filling the two containers of the stabilisation machine with the stabilisation mixture. Then the 15 meter long rig of the machine is driven down to the lower edge of the clay layer and the stabilisation mixture is fed to the rig by compressed air and through a blender into the soil. A computer monitors the feeding, which is about 34 kg of stabilisation mixture per meter. The lime columns are about 600 mm in diameter.

The construction company Piippo & Pakarinen was started in 1985. During two decades the stabilisation market has grown remarkably: the methods have been developed; more research is done and there are new products and actors on the market. RPP employs currently 15 people and according to the Managing Director the prospects are good, at least during 2009.

- If the work opportunities decrease in Finland, we will take a look at the other Nordic countries. We have a company in Norway and Sweden, where we worked a lot during the previous recession in early 1990´s, tells Heikki Pakarinen. This explains why the word "markstabilisering" appears on the sides of the stabilisation machines that the company has had to build for itself.

Many Projects Going on
Product Manager Kari Kuusipuro, who is responsible for the sales of Nordkalk Terra stabilisation products, is pleased. In Finland soil is stabilised at record speed. There are large infrastructure projects going on, such as Suurpelto in Espoo by the highway Kehä II, and a number of smaller projects.

- Despite the recession the prospects are good on the stabilisation market. Some private projects have been postponed, but the public sector is busy. The state's stimulation package should bring about some new projects in the fall. There even seems to be more stabilisation entrepreneurs and equipment than ever before, says Kari Kuusipuro.

Nordkalk Terra^TM  Products are manufactured in Lohja at the Tytyri plant. Nordkalk is the leading producer of deep stabilisation products in Finland. Nordkalk Terra GTC has been on the market since fall 2007. It has proved to be a suitable product in areas that are difficult to stabilise, e.g. clayey soil with lot of humus or mud. Also in mass stabilisation projects Nordkalk Terra GTC has worked well.

Read more about stabilisation.