Crystalline products are applied as slurry coatings or mixed into concrete as admixtures. Their reactive chemicals use water and cement by-products to form crystals that fill capillaries and hairline cracks, and they reactivate when new water arrives. Because they become part of the concrete, they work on the negative side. They do not bridge moving cracks or joints, which still need waterstops or sealants.
Mat slab gets crystalline admix, and the joints still get hydrophilic waterstop, the crystals won't handle movement.
Also heard as
- crystalline admixture
- crystalline coating
Related terms
Negative side
The interior face of a wall or slab, opposite the water, where waterproofing must resist water pushing it off.
Waterstop
A strip cast into concrete joints to block water from traveling along the joint plane.
Cold joint
The seam where one concrete pour meets a later one, a classic leak path in below-grade walls and slabs.
Crack injection
Pumping polyurethane or epoxy into a leaking concrete crack through ports to seal it from the inside.