Patios, walkways, hot tub pads, any size concrete pad. Can you make them with premix concrete mix? That is the question. Can you build a porch without the services of a contractor who will bill plenty. Make a walkway and not use a concrete truck. Do It Yourself and save money. The answer is yes, yes and yes. The next reasonable question might be could I really do it?’, followed quickly by ‘just how hard can it be?’. There’s not really an easy way to do cement and there is a hard way. Actually lots of hard ways and I’ve tried all of the them. No easy ways, but there sure are some things you can try to make any concrete project easier to do.
However before we get into that I want to list the steps for every cement pad. First is pick the place for your pad. Second is prepare it. Third is the cement forms and Number Four is the concrete itself. The last thing, Step Five, is the finishing, which is typically the hardest part to do for everyone with limited concrete training. The purpose of this article isn’t to to show you how to do the steps. You can go to Patios and Sidewalks and get that information. The steps are listed here only to show what is involved in starting a project.
Everyone begins a concrete project with some objective in mind. Perhaps it’s adding on to an existing patio. Or building a walkway along side of your home. Or perhaps a hot tub pad. You might want your patio twice as big as it is now or the sidewalk to be 30 feet long or well you get the idea. It’s about how large, how much, what do I need? Size. And size can be a killer if you have never worked with concrete before.
Tackling too large a project frequently leads to disaster. And disasters aren’t cheap. So avoid the disaster. You do that by making the project into several smaller sizes and build it a section at a time. A 10 x 10 patio can be built as several 5 x 5 pieces. Cut a 30 foot walkway down to 3 – 4 four foot lengths. Take a larger size and make it several smaller sizes.
The next easier thing to try is use premix concrete mixes. Sakrete and Quikrete are just two examples of concrete premix, but there are many more. You can purchase them at most lumberyards and home improvement centers and they are always as strong as what you get from any concrete supplier.
To calculate how many bags of concrete you will need for your project just look on the side of the bags to see how much of an area one bag will cover. All have easy to understand instructions that will help anyone determine how many bags of concrete you will need for what ever size project you are planning to make.
Here’s an example of how to estimate how much concrete a small pad would need. A 3 x 4 foot length of walkway is 12 square feet. An 80lb bag of concrete will cover 2 square feet. So 12 square feet (your pad size) divided by 2 square feet (what one bag will cover) gives you 6 bags of concrete premix.
After you get the bags of concrete home and you are ready to begin mixing your materials, try to be as close as you can to your sidewalk as possible. That alone will make things easier. Next just follow instructions on the bag for mixing the concrete. After that it’s pouring the concrete in your forms and finishing it off. If you need information on finishing you can get it Concrete Pads.
Just remember size matters. And in this case small is better. At least on your first attempt.
Good Luck.
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