Aluminium Formwork - Importance of Kicker panel

Dnyan Deshmukh

Staff member
Aluminium Formwork - Importance of Kicker panel
Kicker is a panel of 65 mm wide and 125 mm deep, it is most important panel in aluminium formwork.
Kicker.jpg

Kicker is also named as Starter block

It is anchored in concrete and act as a ledge for the wall panels on the next floor to sit on.

It also forms the wall face at the top of the wall panel.

Kicker is basically a starter which keeps the walls and columns in position and does not allow it for movement.

It comes with slot of 25mm in it, to put M16 bolt generally 80mm long, which goes into concrete. After concreting, all kickers / starter block get rigidly fix into concrete surface due to bolt.

As its a base of formwork and hold everything in position, it is most important to ensure its line and level to make smooth and vertical faces in plumb.

When we go for buying aluminum formwork, we must check its integrity with reinforcement steel also, to avoid any issues for anchoring of kicker panels.

The slot of 25mm allow us to adjust the level of panels by loosening bolts.

To ensure correct anchoring and no slurry loss, the bolt should be cover with PVC pipe and cone.

while placing reinforcement in position, it should be checked for integrity of kicker bolts.

kicker bolt below rebar.jpg

There may be possibility of, to put kicker bolts beam height is reduced by worker. - this is all the way wrong practice and does not allow kicker to work correctly.
kicker bolt above rebar.jpg

Below is the correctly placed kicker bolt photo.
correctly placed kicker bolt.jpg

To keep the alignment of kicker bolts soldiers are installed in panel with tie rods.

During concreting, it is must to ensure all kicker bolts goes into concrete, else it will lead to loose base and wall or column will easily get moves in next floor concrete and forms a offset in concrete surface.
kicker improper concrete.jpg

If kickers are not checked for its line and level, the chances of getting bad works are more and mostly lead to extra costs on repairing offsets and honeycombing due to slurry loss.
kicker offset.jpg

The whole purpose of using aluminium formwork is to achieve a form finish with speed and reducing the cost by eliminating plastering on external faces.

If kickers are not checked for its correct integrity in place, it will screw the structure and you will land up in spending more money on repairs.

its a smallest component in the system which make maximum impact on the formwork and poured concrete in structure.

So when you use aluminium formwork, keep maximum supervision on alignment and levels of kicker panel to execute a excellent quality structures.