1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to apparatus and method for treating by injecting a fluid treatment material into porous structures such as those formed from concrete, brick, stone, marble and wood including those structures with metal reinforcement members or other members embedded therein.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Buildings, roads, bridges, tunnels, airport runways, marine supports, monuments, sculptures, art works, and various other man made outdoor structures are formed of concrete, masonry, brick, stone, marble or wood all of which are porous in varying degrees. Many of these structures have metal, such as steel, reinforcement members or other members embedded therein. These outdoor structures are exposed to the environment including water and its various hazards from such atmospheric pollutants and conditions such as acid rain, salt, extremes of temperature and other airborne and water pollutants. Reinforcing steel members embedded in the porous structures increase deterioration created by the corrosion and oxidation of the steel following erosion of the surrounding material caused by the pollutants in the atmosphere and water. The pollutants, acid in character, penetrate and react with the salts present in the material resulting in slow and persistent erosion, cracking, crumbling, spaulling, and eventual failure of the exposed porous structures.
As carefully described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,413,808 and 5,565,032 and other U.S. Patents issued in the name of Jay S. Wyner, and repeated herein, the heretofore methods of treating and preserving porous structures of the nature referred to above, have provided only short term and often times inadequate protection. Preservative materials applied by brush, spray, roll-on, and even pressure injection methods, achieve only shallow penetration by capillary action. A single coating of the preservative material proved insufficient with a second coating tending to clog the porous structure's breathing passages according to the National Bureau of Standards Report No. 1118. With the surfaces of the porous structures clogged, internal stresses and pressures develop within, created by the effect of thermal changes on the ever-present moisture in masonry. As a result, the trapped vapor pressure generated thereby breaks through, cracks, delaminates, and destroys the protective coating.
Other methods have been used in attempts to preserve porous structures of concrete or masonry. The structure is opened, rusted reinforcing members are cleaned, the structure repainted, the reinforcing members replaced where needed, and the outer structure then repaired. In another method, holes are drilled in the structures containing reinforcing steel members, a preservative material applied under manual or pump pressure, the holes refilled and the masonry repaired. Yet another method used on roadbeds and such like structures involve cutting elongated slots or grooves, filling the slots or grooves with coating material. These preservation methods are slow, tedious, costly, and often times somewhat ineffective.
As to wood preservation, paint, shellac, epoxies, or urethanes are applied to the surfaces resulting in protection which lasts a few seasons before the need arises to scrape and sand the old protective surface and repeat the coating applications. Damage often results to the original coating from the shallow penetration and sealing effect of applications made by brush, roll-on or spray. The cellular resin structure of wood tends to cause a chemical migration in the wood when thermal expansion stresses, such as hot and cold weather conditions, are imposed. During the warm weather times, the expansion stresses cause the coatings to expand as a result of the forces imposed by the wood's cellular resins. At colder weather conditions, the contraction stresses cause the coatings to crack and peel, allowing moisture, acid rain and pollutant intrusion to cause the coatings to lift off the structures when freeze-thaw cycles occur. Moisture and pollutant absorption into the wood fibers accelerates decay.
Various concrete structures are formed in marine or water environments such as piers, sea walls, tunnels, bridge supports, and various others. In order to treat such water surrounded structures, enclosures or dikes are formed around the structure, the surrounding water pumped out, and the treating processes followed. Certain of those processes described hereinabove have been used. Extreme care is required to insure separation of the water from the structure in following the time consuming method used for treating water bound structures.
The presently used methods of preservation and treating porous structures are inadequate in providing deep impregnation of treating liquids into the structure. Additionally, the methods and treating apparatus cannot be used effectively on all structures. Typically, brushing, rolling, spraying, or pressure injecting treating liquid on vertical structures is seriously ineffective since those methods rely on gravity and capillary action to move the liquids into the structure. Although concentrated pressure injecting of treating liquids into a structure or substrate results in some degree of impregnating, the methods used are limited in that they are useable with structure such as construction lumber, utility poles, and certain portable concrete structures where the various structures are placed in a fixed tank and subjected to pressurized treating liquids. These pressure systems are not useable on outdoor structures of the kinds already mentioned. Apparatus for injecting preservative liquids into porous structures are limited to use on flat, horizontally oriented structures such as floors, roads, walkways, tunnel and bridge surfaces, runways, and such like. Spraying treatment material also results in the bouncing of the liquid as it hits the surface of the structure resulting in unnecessary waste of the treatment material. It has been found that spraying on outdoor structures does not result in deep penetration of the treatment material into the structures. Aside from not being useable on upright or vertical oriented structures, the known injection apparatus is not useable under water or on ceilings.
The present invention overcomes the problems inherent in existing methods and apparatus for treating outdoor porous structures, by providing an apparatus and method for treating and deep impregnation of such porous structures and which apparatus and method are useable on upright structures, ceilings, under water as well as on standard horizontally oriented structures. The apparatus and method of this invention are also readily useable on structures of virtually any shape or form, such as on cylindrical, fluted, artistically formed, layered structures or statues and monuments, for example. The apparatus of this invention which applies the inventive method, is simple in construction and relatively inexpensive to produce while achieving the results of deep penetration and impregnation of fluid treatment material into porous structure of virtually any configurations and orientation including walls and ceilings in the atmosphere or under water.