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Everything You Need To Know About Brewery Flooring

Up and down the country, Breweries seem to be cropping up everywhere. In fact, the number of breweries in the UK grew by another 216 in 2020, up 7.5% from 2019, according to new research.

This love of beer is largely down to the way in which it’s produced, with the resin flooring playing a crucial role.

In this post, we aim to highlight your options around selecting an appropriate flooring solution for your brewery, identifying those key things to consider before embarking upon your project.

Read on to find out more.

Commercial Brewery Flooring

It’s no secret: commercial breweries – whether large-scale or microbreweries – contain a lot of heavy-duty equipment

From equipment to facilitate the brewing process, to machines that help with the bottling and capping of the final product, breweries need to be geared up for heavy-duty use.

And let’s not forget the one thing that breweries are most famous for: the large stainless-steel kettle where the beer is actually brewed.

Why Good Resin Flooring Is Important In Breweries

Breweries have a lot of rules and regulations that they’re required to follow, not just in how they run, but how they’re set up, too.

And the type of flooring you specify has a large role to play in this. Requirements include:

1. Hygienic Purposes

Your brewery flooring should be manufactured in a way that doesn’t allow for cracks or gaps, which will act as a catalyst for the growth of bacteria and other harmful organisms.

Similarly, your resin floor should be easy to clean so that regular cleaning practices can take place efficiently and effectively.

2. Versatility

In a brewery, your flooring needs to work well in both wet and dry conditions. The nature of the industry means that your floor is likely to see a lot of moisture.

3. Slip resistance

As with any active working environment, slip resistance is crucial to maintain the safety of staff and visitors.

Examples of Brewery Floor Coatings

There are a variety of resin flooring options for your brewery floor and numerous considerations if you want a solution that stands the test of time.

1. Epoxy

Epoxy refers to the basic components that cure to become epoxy resin, often used for decorative purposes, as well as industrial flooring. When cured, it is solid, which makes it an appropriate option for floors.

But when it comes to epoxy, you should consider the cure time for the floor, as well as the repair process. Cure time on these floors can take anywhere from 5-7 days to fully cure and your brewery area will require a full shutdown during this time. When it comes to repairing the floor, you will find the exact same problem, with a shutdown being likely.

2. Polyurethane (PU)

Polyurethane is a polymer composed of organic units joined by carbamate links. Most polyurethanes are thermosetting and don’t react to heat after they have been set, making them an industry standard for brewery floors.

However, with PU, you should consider the hygiene levels associated with the flooring solution. When curing, the air is gassed off and can pass through and leave small holes all over the surface of the floor, these are called pinholes. These pinholes are a breeding ground for bacteria and cause dirt to get stuck within the floor, compromising how hygienic it actually is.

3. Methyl Methacrylate (MMA)

MMA is an acrylic resin flooring system that consists of a primer, a body coat and a top coat seal that are all applied over a substrate.

But a weakness of MMA is its low compressive strength when compared to PU and Epoxy. This makes it much more prone to damage and in need of repairs as well as dirt being pushed into the surface, which is far from ideal in a brewery space.

The Best Resin Flooring For Your Brewery

Whilst other flooring solutions have long curing times of up to a week, this isn’t the case with Acrylicon. The complete cure time for an Acrylicon floor is just 2 hours, meaning the floor is fully ready to be used after this time. Acrylicon’s cure time also doesn’t depend on temperature, and a fully controlled cure can be achieved at –20 degrees C.

Acrylicon also uses chemical bonding for its flooring solution. This means that each new layer softens the one previous, before fusing together. This removes any mechanical joints between the layers of the floor, reducing the likelihood of a delamination.

Hygiene is also improved with an Acrylicon floor due to the lack of pinholes and joints as a result of this curing system. Acrylicon has full EEC and FDA approvals for use in food processing plants throughout Europe and the USA.

Conclusion

When it comes to breweries, the type of flooring you specify is equally important as the equipment used to brew the beer itself.

To find out more about Acrylicon resin flooring, don’t hesitate to speak to an expert today. Simply get in touch, and we’ll be happy to help.