Flooring...

I once worked for a firm, and they had wood block floors, As well as being most comfortable, they had the advantage should anything drop on them,E.G.-- Cast -iron components there was a lesser chance of it smashing , But the heavy machine shops/fitting environments were concrete floors, I guess for strength in holding down the heavy machinery, The old guys were want to sweep a little amount of sawdust around the foot of their machines at night, this soaked up any oil creeping out of the machines thus the concrete floor was always free of massive oil staining, Guess todays insurance and health people would have forty fits.
 
We had a wooden block floor in the Hot Strip mill shop where I used to work, we even had a special machine to scrape it when the grease and mill scale built up. It held up real well until we had a flood. I went on a maintenance call and when I got back to the shop a big blister like bulge, about 3 ft high and 10 ft across, had developed in the center and when my helper messed with it, it collapsed. The company took out the loose blocks and filled the hole with concrete.
 
I had forgotten all about wood block floors! I have never had any real experience with them other than having been in a couple of shops that had them. A quick look around the web shows that they seem to be enjoying some new found popularity again, but not so much in industrial environments. Instead some people have been installing them in their homes.
 
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