A few months ago we poured a walkway alongside our house. It was the first time we’d worked with concrete.
It turned out pretty well, except there are a few dips in it - lower spots that turn into puddles when it rains. I would estimate the diameter of these dips to be about 12".
Is there a way to patch or fill these spots that is simple and also not too obvious? Or are we screwed?
I’m no expert, but if you are in Canada, I doubt skim coating the thing would do much good - one winter of frost heaving would bust it all up. You neglected to say how deep the dips were. If they’re less than a quarter inch - er, five millimeters - I’d live with it.
Clean with an acidic cleaner, apply a bonding agent and add a 1/4" top coat, being sure it is flat and drains away from the house.
BJMoose yep, that is what we are afraid of - the frost heaves. The dips are maybe an inch deep, maybe a bit less. spingears - do you know how well your solution would hold up after a winter? It gets to about -20 Celsius here somedays.
Unfortunately the two worst dips are on either side of our gate, so you can’t just scoot around them or step over them, they’re RIGHT where you stand to open and close the gate.
They’re in the WORST possible spot, and unfortunately are very noticeable.
We plan to sell in a couple of years, maybe we will live with the dips until then, and then do a quick skim coat / patch job right before we list.
Unless anyone else has any other ideas?
Drill a small hole at the deepest point of each dip to allow the water to drain away?
This worked for me. Drill a series of holes in the deepest part of the “dip”. Install tapcon screws( a special concrete fastener) leaving the head “Proud” of the surface about half as high as the dip is deep. Then when you put a skim coat to even it out it will have somthing to hold to and not just float on the surface.
What is the concrete over ?
My guess is newly turned earth
Take a sledge hammer to it and break it up, then put down new concrete.
Well I’ll chime in, I’m the one tthat laid the concrete. It’s a large pour (40" wide x 7" deep x 40’ long). There will be no breaking the concrete with a sledge hammer. For reinforcement I put some crusher screen into the concrete. The crusher screen is has 2"x2" holes in it, and the material is 1/2" steel.
I pity the fool who trys to remove the concrete!
My other thought was covering the concrete with a new non-slip surface. Home Hardware has advertised a 3 step process, lay down a glue surface, add the texture, then seal it. If we filled the holes with a skim coat first, then did the non-slip surface it may work out. Does anybody have any thoughts on this?
I think we’ll wait becuase it was about $5 a square foot and we can’t really afford that right now.
MtM
Have you looked into any Self-Levelling Concrete solutions?
I saw a product like this on Hometime, for refinishing a basement. I guess most self-levelling products are designed for interior floors, but that one I linked to looks like it has several products for the outdoors.