Can anyone give this newbie the ins and out of working with cement? I guess my questions would range from; What type of cement? How do I mix it and for how long? How long does it take to dry? What If I cemented myself to the ground? What do I use to break old cement? What are the best ways to work with cement?
#1: Cement is a pain in the rear to work with and if you screw it up you can't fix it without starting from scratch. #2: It is a pain in the rear to remove old cement. Basically you break it into pieces that are small enough to work with and pay someone to haul these off. When I had to do it I rented a jackhammer for a day from Home Depot and went to work. I then payed 1-800-GOT-JUNK to remove it at a special expensive 'old cement' rate. Cement is heavy and hard. #3: If you are dead set on laying your own cement or concrete go to Home Depot and pay out the $20-30 to get a basic book that shows you the tricks and details. Asking for advice on a BBS won't be enough to enable you to do it well. If you are laying it for something critical, like the slab of a building, don't even think of doing it yourself. Get a professional to do it.
chow_yun_fat- What are you up to? If you're going to install a basketball goal or something, you don't need any books. If you're pouring a foundation for a garage, by all means get a pro. Even a sidewalk is probably more than you'd want to try by yourself. It's not that technically difficult or anything, but it's an awful lot of work. Now, if you're going to pour a driveway... you can probably form it out yourself and save some money if you know how to use a plumb bob. Have a pro come out to finish it for you. (don't even think about mixing this yourself, have the concrete delivered LOL) mixing- depends on the cement/concrete and the instructions are on the bag- couldn't be any more simple. You mix until there is no more dry powder. You should mix one 80lb bag at a time. That is about .75 cubic feet. If you need more than a few cubic feet of concrete in one piece, you'd better have some help. Also, concrete shrinks a little as it dries. That would be more difficult than you think. If you can sink into it, it isn't about to dry on you. Depends on what you're working with exactly and the conditions you're working in, temperature, volume, etc... The warmer and drier the air, the faster it dries and the faster you have to work. Assuming you're talking about more than a small chunk of cement, this is seriously hard work... a jackhammer is really the only tool for the job... well- that or explosives A sledgehammer is ok for really small amounts.
lpbman: It's hard to explain, but here goes. For example, it's like this. ________________ l-----------------l l-----------------l l-----------------l ````l______l```` ok this picture isn't turning out right that works The structure is around 6 inches high. What I want to do is remove the old bricks that are on top of cement, then plaster new cement over the old cement. I want to remove the excessive brick/cement on the left and right edges and create a ramp. Do I need a permit? It doesn't seem like a job that would be too difficult and Im always interested in learning new things anyhoo so I thought I'll give it a go. I've already set aside a whole day to work on this, I think that should be sufficient?
Cement is any adhesive. Concrete is sand, mortar and aggregate. Your little project doesn't sound like it's too tough but..... It's tough for an amature to get a smooth surface on concrete and a thin layer of concrete over an existing layer is about 100% guaranteed to crack up. Probably what you want to do is bust up the bricks on top then build a wood frame around the old concrete with 1x2 's (use concrete nails but don't drive them all the way in) Use a level on the tops of the 1x2's to make sure the tops are level all the way around. Mix your concrete in a wheel barrow and dump it in to the forms and use a another piece of 1x2 laying across the tops of the form to drag across the top to level you concrete. Also you probably want to cut a piece of welded wire mesh to fit inside the form...pour in half of your concrete, put the mesh on top of it and then pour in the rest of the concrete. This reinforces the concrete giving it some tensile strenght...it will still crack but the steel keeps it fom separating. You have time to work with your wet concrete, like an hour but don't waste any time. You don't want any cold joints. You can use a trowel to put a smoother fininsh on the top but don't over work the surface, that just brings up too much water making a weak surface. You can build an angled formed to build your ramp too, just use a stiffer mix on your concrete (less water) so it won't slump before it drys. Concrete will get stiff over night (structual concrete continues to harden for 28 days) You might stay off of it for a day or two.
Thanks for the advice and pointing that out Dubious, I meant concrete. I think I'm going to go ahead and purchase a book. I don't want to mess up on my first try and have to do it all over again.
