Floating dock including buoyant wharf modules and method of making such modules

摘要

Buoyant wharf modules of a floating dock include a rotary molded polyethylene structure having a lower shell portion filled with a steamed polystyrene foam and an upper portion that is a permanent mold form for a concrete aggregate-water mixture. The foam has sufficient compressive strength so that when the mixture is poured into the form over a reinforcing mesh, the form remains stable. The form includes troughs and mesas shaped so that the water flows by gravity to sumps adjacent walls of the form. The walls have openings so the water can flow from modules. Lined tunnels in the set concrete include removable rods having threaded ends which extend through openings in wales extending along longitudinal walls of the modules. Nuts and washers threaded on the rods abut exterior side walls of the wales to hold the modules together. Short spacer tubes having straight side walls abut wales of side-by-side modules. Rods of the side-by-side modules extending through openings of the tubes and walls connect the side-by-side modules to each other by a thread, nut and washer arrangement. Utility lines extending through the tubes extend to a utility tower on an outboard edge of one of the modules via a transverse opening in that module and a depression on that module under the tower. Notches in a bottom face of the modules enable forklift trucks to move the modules on land.