Food Factory Flooring: How to Maintain Exceptional Hygiene
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Food Factory Flooring: How to Maintain Exceptional Hygiene
It’s no secret that any food processing facility needs to maintain exceptional standards of cleanliness and hygiene control. Poor hygiene can have detrimental impacts on health and safety, not to mention the quality of the product your factory is manufacturing.
If flooring cleaning practices are neglected or, indeed, not carried out effectively, you may be allowing harmful bacteria such as E.Coli and Salmonella to grow and thrive.
However, poor hygiene control isn’t just a result of ineffective cleaning methods. The type of resin flooring you specify could be equally responsible for the build-up of dirt and bacteria within your food factory setting.
In this post, we identify why hygiene is essential for your food factory flooring and what you can do to optimise cleanliness within your facility.
Read on…
What Causes the Build-up of Dirt & Bacteria in food production Resin Floors?
In simple terms, a resin floor becomes unclean when dirt, moisture and bacteria reside underneath the outer layer of the floor. This can happen for a number of reasons, but most notably, it will be because:
- a) An area of your resin flooring is damaged: In many cases when thermoset plastics are exposed by a crack or impact damage, they can delaminate, leaving bond lines.
Even when these are repaired, the damaged area is cut out, but joints will still be left around the patch.
We often compare this to a pot-hole repair in the road. In other words, these joints will eventually open, allowing for water and dirt to penetrate the floor.
- b) Pores or pinholes in the surface of the resin floor: Some thermoset plastics such as Polyurethane, once cured, will leave tiny holes where gas has escaped during the curing process of the resin floor.
Again, this can eventually cause a significant build-up of dirt and bacteria within a floor over time. It’s one of the main reasons why your floor still looks dirty, even after you’ve cleaned its surface!
Which Resin Floor Is Most Hygienic for your Food Factory?
Of course, every manufacturer will have a different answer to this question, but we encourage specifiers to explore the chemical composition of each type of resin floor before making a purchasing decision.
Thermoplastic resins (such as Acrylicon) – as opposed to thermoset resins – are different in that each layer chemically fuses to the previous layer, ensuring the total system, including the primer coat, is truly monolithic.
In simple terms, it is not possible to separate the individual layers that make up the system.
As you will have guessed, because it is impossible to separate individual layers, the flooring cannot leave bond lines or delaminate.
Seek A Resin Floor Partner That Provides Care & Maintenance Support
Each floor is unique in its chemical composition and, as such, cleaning and maintenance practices should be adapted accordingly. If you clean too vigorously or use certain harsh chemicals, you may affect the anti-slip properties of the floor; a health and safety risk you don’t want to take.
The resin floor you specify should come with its own care and maintenance plan with detailed cleaning instructions. You should also expect annual check-ins with the manufacturer to ensure your resin floor stays in optimal condition.
This will be a challenge if you don’t opt for a system that provides a ten-year warranty – or if you choose to work with multiple stakeholders to carry out the installation of your floor. In other words, you choose X company to manufacture the product and Y company to install it.
Instead, choose a single company that is responsible for the manufacture and installation of your resin flooring system. This will guarantee ultimate transparency and clarity when it comes to warranty.
Conclusion
As you can see, hygiene in your food production factory is largely down to the type of resin floor you specify, yet it is still important that you or your client maintain appropriate cleaning practices.
Acrylicon is a unique thermoplastic resin that boasts exceptional strength coupled with short cure times to ensure minimal disruption to the production of food and produce within your facility. It has full EEC and FDA approvals for use in food processing plants throughout Europe and the USA.
If you’d like to improve standards within your food manufacturing facility or project, speak to an expert today.
About Acrylicon
Acrylicon, the go-to industrial flooring company, has been implemented by Unilever, Walkers, McCain, Network Rail and many more companies that understand the cost implications of shutting down.
Their fast cure combined with the immense compressive strength saves you time, money and hassle when it comes to your industrial flooring. They can work at weekends or in business downtime to ensure minimal disruption to your daily processes.
With a life expectancy of up to 4-8 times longer than traditional resins, Acrylicon’s unique chemical composition ensures you get better value for money than from any other resin floor available.
Acrylicon’s long-lasting resin flooring is used across a variety of sectors including in food factories, commercial kitchens, warehouses, hospitals, supermarkets and car parks.
All new flooring comes with a 10-year performance warranty for complete peace of mind. Every installation is carried out by trained and certified regional installers so there are no split warranties.
