Making concrete: U3A Living Sustainably in the Suburbs
$1500 if paid to have the path done. ~$100 to make your own concrete.
Buy half a metre of 10mm concrete blend and lots of bags of Ezy Mix Cement.
Hire or borrow a cement mixer. Need a big wheelbarrow a long handled shovel a good spirit level. Planking to make a frame for the path trowels (wooden float metal float small pointy trowel tool to make grooves at edges large piece of polypipe to make drain grooves block of dense foam for finishing)
You want the water to flow away from the house.
Make a frame to hold the cement out of pine boards.
Work it while it’s fresh. Don’t let it go off while you’re working it.
It takes hours to go off but the first preparation needs to be done straight away.
Add water by the looks: 6 shovels of concrete gravel to 1 or 2 of cement and then water (for paths). Add water very judiciously as if you are making icing. Mud pie or cake mix consistency.
Wash mixer a little bit once cement comes out.
There are 2 types of labour in it:
o Manual (Making the cement and shovelling it into the frames)
o Skilled (finishing it off)
Use the wooden float first to flatten it off after shovelling it into the frame. He filled the frame very high.
Use the large diameter polypipe to make a slight indentation for a drain on the outside edge of the path.
Make an edge groove between the slabs. Need to do early while you can push the stones out of the way before it sets.
Use a steel float to finish further.
The water rises in the cement.
The more water in the cement the weaker it is but not enough and it won’t mix.
Finish it off just before it’s dry. He used a large block of dense foam to give it a final smooth over then.
Need about ½”-1” fall from house wall to side of path.
For fall around the house measure where it has to end up.
Weep holes in bricks have to be 100mm above anything like a path or white ants get in. By Law.