Water Damage Restoration and Fire Damage Restoration Blog

All Aces Services received  a phone call from an insurance company for a water damage restoration job. The insurance company were in a bit of a situation with a house based in Cleveland, South Brisbane, had flooded from a dishwasher on the second storey  of the property. When All Aces Services was called the premises had actually flooded two weeks earlier. Unfortunately another restoration company that had inadequate equipment and knowledge had tried to dry the premises.

Once the assessor had inspected the property they soon realised that the task to restore the property was just too big for the company and then allocated the job to us. All Aces Services has technicians that have spent many years travelling all over Australia and overseas to learn state of the art drying techniques and hold many seminars to pass that knowledge on.

All Aces Heat Drying Process

We sent Ashley one of our most experienced technicians to the premises. On inspection Ashley noted that carpet had already been removed. Particle board, kitchens, skirting boards and ceilings were all affected. Ashley put our Heat Drying equipment to use, which consists of the two Boost boxes and two Drymatic Heat Dryers. This allowed Ashley to target specific areas within the room, along with our booster box which allows our technician to increase the performance of the other drying equipment we installed.

All Aces Services left the equipment in the property for two weeks. However, the job was not over, due to the extensive moisture left in the property, from the previous restoration company, there was microbial growth underneath the kitchen and behind the skirtings. We then completed what we call a fogging treatment, this allows us to treat microbial growth in hard to get places.

The job was successful as we had removed all moisture and the builders could complete their work safely.

For any disasters in property from water damage to fire damage call All Aces Services in Brisbane, Sunshine Coast and Gold Coast on 1800 00 10 10, we offer a 24 hr emergency service and are the masters of disasters.

Technorati Tags: Cleveland, drying process, flood damage, heat drying, south brisbane, water damage restoration

A recent storm caused extensive damage to a house in Wynnum and required wood floor restoration. Water flowed through the house, causing damage to the owner’s lovely wood floor. Wood floors are not only costly to replace, in this case the owner had a special attachment to this wood floor as he had laid it himself by hand.

Luckily, All Aces Services was called to the property quickly to do a wood floor restoration inspection and assess whether or not we would be able to dry it out and restore it.

It is always best to call a restoration expert, such as All Aces Services, when you have storm damage, flood damage or general water damage. Our All Aces Services Technicians are fully trained through the Institute of Inspection, Cleaning and Restoration Certification so that they are able to inspect damage and suggest the best wood floor restoration method.

The first thing an All Aces Services Technician will do is take moisture readings of the area on their trusty “Delmhorst Total Check three-in-one meter” to establish how much moisture is in the area. This allows our technician to select the best mix of equipment to dry the area in the minimum amount of time.

When our All Aces Services Technician tested the wood floors at this property, they noted that there was a still a great deal of moisture in the floors as the wood had absorbed a lot of the water from the storm damage. If the floor was not dried quickly the wood would start cupping and warping and the customer would need to have the floor replaced.

VAC-IT Panels allow air to be pushed into the floor to dry the area.

The fastest way to dry a wood floor is using Heat Drying Machines and an Injecti-Dry system using VAC-IT panels, an Interceptor and a Silencer. At present there are approximately seven Injecti-Dry systems in Brisbane and All Aces Services owns three of these systems. The Injecti-Dry technology is so rare that there may only be twelve systems in the whole of Queensland, which means All Aces Services has one quarter of the Injecti-Dry systems in the whole of Queensland.

Injecti-Dry was formed to develop specialised drying equipment that make it possible to dry out structures more quickly and with less invasive tactics. The aim is to limit the amount of replacement when drying out wet structures when ever possible, while at the same time, keep our environment healthy. The first solution came with the adaptation of a device from the packaging industry, (also used by aquariums to deliver air to fish), called a “regenerative blower”. From a pure physics standpoint, it had all the solutions, as it had the ability to deliver consistent air movement with the pressure needed. The accompanying delivery system did not exist and has been developed as the family of Injecti-Dry Systems, i.e. a system of hoses, connectors, injectors, etc. that are needed to move the air from the compressor to the interior of the structure.

We installed all three of our All Aces Services Injecti-Dry Systems into this property and also two Heat Drying Systems. Normally a job this large may require the owners of the property to relocate while the work is being undertaken due to noise and inconvenience of having the drying equipment onsite.  However, in this case the customer was able to remain living in the property because All Aces Services have Interceptors and Silencers which they were able to install in the property during the wood floor restoration.

The Interceptor contains a HEPA filter which can be set up to process air going into or coming out of the wood floors. It is important to know that HEPA filters do not make a HEPA system. Only by processing all air negatively, can a HEPA system be achieved. All air is processed before going  through the blower in either negative or positive drying modes, thus never contaminating the Injecti-Dry System. Whilst the Interceptor was cleaning the air in the system and making sure it was free of contaminants, the silencer was reducing the noise of the system to a liveable level so that the customer could remain living in their property. The Silencer is made of ABS plastic and quiets the drying system by about 28%. It takes some of the impeller noise out in addition to attenuating the air rush sound.

Thanks to the specialist knowledge of our All Aces Services Technicians and our state of the art equipment, we were able to dry the wood floor on the batons and the concrete subfloor underneath at the same time. The two Heat Drying machines were able to maintain a temperature of 40 degrees celcius in the air that we directed into the wood floor and concrete subfloor. After only two weeks, All Aces Services had successfully dried the concrete to 75% Relative Humidity and the wood floor to below 12% Wood Moisture Equivalent.

What this means in real terms is:

1. We saved the wood floor that was precious to the customer as he had laid it himself.
2. We saved the insurance company approximately $20,000 as the wood floor did not have to be replaced.
3. We saved the customer the inconvenience of having to vacate their property. Our equipment ensured they were able to continue living in their house.

At All Aces Services we always try to restore items rather than go through the costly and time consuming ordeal of replacement.
This customer was so thankful to us for saving their floor. Another successesful wood floor restoration for All Aces Services, the Masters of Disaster!

Technorati Tags: flood damage, water damage, wood floor damage, wood floor drying

Calling a restoration company for water damage restoration may not be at the front of your mind when you’ve had a break in at your property. However, we at All Aces Services find we are often able to help out in break in situations.

Water Damage to Carpet

Recently we received a call from a real estate agent where one of their properties had been broken into between tenants living at the property. To add to the disaster there was also rain that afternoon which caused water damage to the property. As no one was living in the property at the time it was a while before the real estate agents were alerted to the damage and could call All Aces Services.

Once we received the call we sent two All Aces Services technicians to the property to rectify the water damage. We noticed damage to one carpeted room and the hallway which had wooden floors. Because we arrived at the scene relatively quickly we were able to save both the hardwood floor in the hallway and the carpet in the affected room by extracting the standing water with our Flood Pumper. Having two technicians on site allowed us to work quickly. While one technician was extracting water with our Flood Pumper, the other was setting up a Phoenix Quick Dry Chamber to prepare the area for drying and dehumidification.

Arriving on site and working quickly is the key to restoring wood floors, the sooner we can get our technicians to a property, remove standing water and install drying equipment – the greater chance we have of successful wood floor drying.

After removing standing water and setting up the drying chamber, our technicians installed a R200 dehumidifier to remove the moisture from the air in the area we were attempting to restore. The use of the Phoenix Quick Dry chamber ensures the R200 dehumidifier is able to perform at optimal levels as it minimises the area from which the moisture in the air needs to be removed.

Our All Aces Services technicians also installed Force 9 Axial fans and High Speed Air Movers in the Phoenix Quick Dry Chamber along with the R200 dehumidifier. This ensures that air circulates in the drying chamber and dries the carpet and wood floor affected in the minimum amount of time.

After only 4 days of our equipment being on site we had successfully dried the carpet and wood floor. In order to complete our full service of restoring the affected area to pre-damage condition, we performed a Deluxe Carpet Clean on the affected carpet.

Our Deluxe Carpet Cleaning System is our premium service that involves our specialised 10 Step Process to give our customers the optimum result from the carpet clean.

Not many of our water damage customers realise that a Deluxe Carpet Clean is part of our service when we restore water damaged areas. Often our customers are simply overjoyed that we have been able to restore their carpets and floors. Providing a Deluxe Carpet Clean is our way of ensuring our customers are left feeling completely satisfied with our service.

100% Customer Satisfaction is our goal at All Aces Services.

If you have any problems with damage from Break-Ins or water damage, please call All Aces Services on 1800 00 1010.

Technorati Tags: break in clean up, flood damage, water damage, water damage brisbane, water damage gold coast, water damage sunshine coast, wood floor drying

Recently we had a very interesting job where the upstairs area of a house had flood damage and water had travelled down the inside of the walls which were insulated. This provided the perfect opportunity for one of our highly qualified All Aces Technicians to show off our fancy “Direct-It-In” drying technology.

How do you dry insulation inside a wall without removing the gyprock? The answer is really very simple. With an All Aces Technician, an Air Mover Fan, a Dehumidifier and his trusty Direct-It-In!

The process is really very simple and involves minimal to no damage to the wall. We simply remove the skirting boards of the water affected areas and we feed in the Direct-It-In tubes which are attached to one of our state of the art Air Mover fans. On top of that we use a Dehumidifier to extract the moisture from the air which creates what we here at All Aces Services like to call the “Arizona Effect”, that is, we create hot dry air and feed it through our Air Mover fan through the Direct-It-In tubes and into the wall. Good bye, flood damage! Hello, dry insulation!

The next step in this job was to dry the floor upstairs where the flood damage had initially occurred. Wherever possible we choose to restore and repair existing flooring so first of all we tried using an Injecti-Dry to suck water from the floor. The beauty of an Injecti-Dry is that it can be use to blow air or suck water – whichever is required. The flooring was wood and we had to suck the water out of it in order to stop it cupping or buckling. After we had removed all the water, we focused on drying out the floor from the bottom up. Our All Aces Technician used a Dehumidifier, an Air Mover Fan and a Direct-It-In, this time we fed the Direct-It-In into the ceiling downstairs and dried the upstairs floor from the bottom up. Our highly trained technicians are all about creative solutions.

When it came to drying out the interiors and exteriors of the walls upstairs we got creative with Zip Walls. Our technicians love zip walls, they bring out the “interior designer” in each of them. Zip walls are an effective way of creating smaller rooms and spaces to allow more efficient drying. We can put a zip wall up almost anywhere and in very little time. At this property we used zip walls to separate upstairs from downstairs and to create smaller drying areas so our fans were more efficient for the flood damage.

So what was the result? We restored the flood damage affected area and made yet another customer happy, which is what we take the most pride in here at All Aces.  If you have any problems with water damage, please contact All Aces Services 24 hours/7 days on 1800 00 1010.

Technorati Tags: ceiling drying, drying insulation, drying walls, flood damage, flood damage brisbane, floor drying, water damage, water damage brisbane, water damage restoration

It has been 3 months since the January floods and there is still a lot of flood damage work going on. This will continue over the next few years. Yes that’s right, a few years, because insurance assessors still haven’t been able to get out to some properties.

The mud army did a fabulous job of cleaning up the bulk mess, but it is imperative you get qualified people to do the detailed cleaning work. This entails jet pressure cleaning of the inside and the frame work of your house once the plasterers have removed the sheeting, then applying an anti-microbial treatment which sanitises the area and prevents mould growth and finally putting in commercial drying fans to make sure the areas are at the legal dried level of 15%. As professionals we do a thorough job and inspect regularly to make sure the moisture levels are where they should be. No job is left unfinished.

I know many people who had flood damage have been leaving the wood to dry naturally, if you have done this, please make sure you are getting the wood moisture levels checked before the plasterers do the re-sheeting, the dry level you’re looking for is around the 15%.

If you don’t have insurance and have to pay for this out of your own pocket, I can’t stress enough how imperative it is that you still get this done professionally as this will save you money later on down the track. You could be looking at thousands of dollars in 6 to 12 months time if your property wasn’t cleaned by professionals as it will only be a matter of time before the mould starts to grow and the wood rots due to lack of detailed cleaning, which means all the builders will have to be called back as well.  You’ll be kicking yourself that you didn’t pay the smaller professional cleaning costs up front.

This is all ‘food for thought’, if you had flood damage to your property and are in this situation please contact us on 1800 00 1010 for advice. We are here to help and provide the best possible service to accommodate your needs. For more information please check out our website here.

Technorati Tags: 24 hour water damage cleaning, flood damage, mould damage brisbane, mould inspections, Mould Remediation, water damage, water damage brisbane