Most of our clients in need of concrete scanning are not necessarily concrete experts. More often than not, they are building owners or general contractors who want to make changes to a building but first need to know where it is safe to drill, cut, or core into their concrete slab. Because they aren’t concrete experts, they often don’t know exactly what to ask for. They might come to us asking for a “concrete X-ray” when GPR concrete scanning would be a much better choice for their specific project.
At Enhanced Scanning, we don’t expect or need you to be a concrete scanning expert—that’s what we’re here for—but in this blog post, we wanted to give you a basic overview of the pros and cons of both GPR and X-ray technology in concrete scanning and explain why we use GPR in most of our concrete scanning projects.
GPR Concrete Scanning and Concrete X-Ray: The Pros and Cons
In most situations, GPR scanning is more than adequate to provide the information our clients are looking for in a concrete scan, and therefore, it is the technology we use more than 90% of the time. It is safe, cost-effective, requires little to no setup prior to its use, and produces fast and accurate results.
When GPR isn’t sufficient for the project, our team will typically bring in other technologies, such as an electromagnetic locator, before we turn to X-ray. While X-ray provides extremely detailed and clear images of what is contained inside the concrete slab, this technology has its limitations.
First of all, the use of X-ray requires that a building be cleared of all inhabitants because of the radiation it emits. Completely emptying a building isn’t possible in certain spaces, such as a hospital or any other type of facility that operates around the clock, and it isn’t ideal in many other circumstances.
X-ray also takes longer than GPR scanning. With GPR, we can get the results in real time and can interpret them on site, while X-ray scans need to be taken off site for developing before the results can be interpreted by our team.
Finally, concrete X-ray imaging is more expensive than GPR concrete scanning. Unless there is a very specific reason why X-ray imaging is necessary, it doesn’t make financial sense to choose it over GPR concrete scanning.
So why would we ever use X-ray, if it is more dangerous, takes longer, and is more expensive? As we mentioned earlier, X-ray gives us very clear, high-resolution images, which are sometimes necessary in very congested concrete slabs. X-ray is also better in fresh or “green” concrete that still has a lot of moisture in it, since GPR does not penetrate well in materials containing moisture.
A Customized Approach to Concrete Scanning
At Enhanced Scanning, we take a highly customized approach to every project. Before we begin scanning your concrete, we will discuss with you, in detail, what information you need from your concrete scan. We will also assess your space and take any other variables into account to determine the best tools to use and best approach to take.
Whether you end up choosing GPR concrete scanning or X-ray, we have technicians on our team who are highly skilled at operating the corresponding equipment and interpreting the results. Contact us at Enhanced Scanning to get your initial questions answered, or to schedule concrete scanning service.