Portfolio

This marina building project needed a material flowable enough to arrest all the electrical conduit lines in place, but strong enough to prevent cracking or damage over time. Access was difficult due to site logistics and the pour geometry. Heavy equipment could not be brought in to pour back in the trenches without damaging the utilities.

The utility trenches were filled with lightweight cellular concrete and burrito wrapped once the material was cured to ensure the conduit lines were fully protected. Backfill material was then placed directly over the wrapped pour areas to finish the site and protect the electrical lines.

Landfill sites provide a serious and complex challenge for any future land development, especially in Alameda. The entire site is built on a landfill and with rising tides plaguing the area, developers are finding it difficult to safely build multi-story structures. Excavations often experience water intrusion, compromised boundaries and sluffing of material, and geotechnical reports can easily miss extremely challenging soil conditions.

To mitigate soil integrity issues, the entire site was excavated and the landfill material was removed and replaced with LCC. The areas where LCC was installed could support multi-story structures without risk of extreme or unexpected settlement due to the net neutral loading on the soil but overall, more consistent and controlled density of material.

Just off the East side of I-215 near exit 1 stands an iconic rock formation known as Suicide Rock at the mouth of Parley’s Canyon. This highly vandalized rock is a billboard for youthful rebellion, love, loss, and causes they support. The name is adopted from a local Native American legend of a Native American maiden who threw herself from this lookout point because her betrothed Brave was killed in battle.

A steep winding dirt service road with sharp turns along the Parley’s Creek and rock formations is the main access to this site where a new waterline was placed inside the older pipeline. These conditions made it impossible to get large equipment down to the bottom or to get trucks bearing any load back up the road after working on the annular fill inside the pipeline.

LCC was the only solution to access these areas, maintain low injection pressures, flowability required, and the experience to fill the annular void in this pipeline. Our team met with their superintendent immediately after being contacted to discuss a pour plan. By dividing the fill into 4 separate sections with 5 injection points, we were able to run over 1000’ of hose to fill approximately 1400 LF of annular fill. This was achieved by staging our equipment in one location in the general contractor’s “yard” next to their water supply.

This was only one phase of the project. We look forward to the next phase and LCC going where no other lightweight flowable fill has gone before!

Rasmussen Farms is farmland that is being turned into a new development with over 50 units. The site plan shows a 10” RCP sewer line that runs East to West into another condo/apartment complex then turned south from a manhole to the other site entrance. This run of pipe was just under 1,000 LF and they needed to abandon the line with flowable fill.

LCC was selected to abandon the sewer line because of its flowability and our ability to batch it on site. We were able to stage our equipment in one location and pump uphill to the vented end of the sewer line. The general contractor prepared two manholes to allow the LCC to flow through them to the vent. This plan allowed us to pump LCC without having to add a second injection point in the condo/apartment property.

Boudreau Pipeline Corporation installed hundreds of feet of 7ft x 14f reinforced concrete box (RCB) near the March Air Force Museum located in Riverside, Ca. A lightweight material that would reduce surcharging and settlement was required for the backfill along the RCB over a 100 ft section.

Cell-Crete Corporation was subcontracted to provide labor, materials, and equipment to install Lightweight Cellular Concrete (LCC) as backfill around the 100 ft RCB section. The material specified for backfill was Class IV LCC per California Department of Transportation Specification 19-8.01A. Over 2,000 CY of class IV LCC (40PCF, 120+psi) material was installed successfully. LCC was considered because expected minimal settlement, decrease of surcharge, and ease of installation. The work was completed with Cell-Crete Corporation’s mobile batch plant (small footprint) within four days.

Cell-Crete partnered with Webcor Concrete to provide lightweight cellular concrete to this project on the waterfront in Oakland, CA. Building loading on the site made a heavy concrete footing a challenge, so our lightweight material was used to fill the gaps while still providing significant fill strength. Each blocked out area was filled with LCC in a sequence following an aggressive pour schedule.