Making a concrete mould
-
T1 Terry
- Posts: 13708
- Joined: Fri Nov 23, 2012 3:44 pm
- Location: Mannum South Australia by the beautiful Murray River
- Contact:
Re: Making a concrete mould
The gravel dust around here is from the blue metal quarries, packs down like cement. If the crusher dust you are having problems with up there goes to powder, mix a shovel of cement powder with a barrow load, rack it out and then hose it down, put the bricks/concrete pads down, then hose it again. If you put your special concrete things down where the wheels will be when parked and the other bits with bricks from the builders dump it should come out ok.
A person may fail many times, they only become a failure when they blame someone else John Burrows
If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine. – Jim Barksdale, former Netscape CEO
If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine. – Jim Barksdale, former Netscape CEO
-
supersparky
- Posts: 7295
- Joined: Mon Nov 26, 2012 7:00 pm
- Location: Home on the beautiful Gold Coast for a while.
Re: Making a concrete mould
The more I think about how hard it will be to make a steel mould the more I think that the end result will be something like that. If it doesn't rain too much tomorrow I will unstack the lot and lay them out.
Cheers
David
David and Terrie with Bandit the travelling companion
2006 Winnebago Alpine
Recently retired and loving it.
David
David and Terrie with Bandit the travelling companion
2006 Winnebago Alpine
Recently retired and loving it.
-
aussiegirl
- Posts: 131
- Joined: Fri Nov 30, 2012 8:48 pm
Re: Making a concrete mould
We have quite a big yard and have been fighting off weeds for quite some time. We brought in tonnes of reconstituted rubble, made from crushed up concrete and bricks (looked like gravel, but a bit orangey) We put that down and it seemed fine for quite a while, BUT once Mike started doing other stuff around the yard, and had driven his little Kanga Loader over it again and again, it turned to a very fine powdery dust that got into everything. When it rained it turned to pudding, probably because of the clay content (from the crushed bricks)
We have left that original base in place, but lately have been using Dolomite sand ( quite fine gravel made from crushed blue stone rocks) that we buy direct from the quarry. Mike has leveled it out and screeded it, then rolled it a few times and then wet it to settle it. Once that has gone hard, he then uses his cement mixer and mixes up a load of the dolomite with cement powder but mixes it dry. Once it is well combined, he then puts it onto the hardened dolomite, screeds it, lightly rolls it and then sprays it with a fine mist of water until it is thoroughly wet through. Once this dries it sets like concrete, but is easy to break up if you need to remove it. We have put it down in front of our lounge room window and we have driven our 3 tonne truck with a 3 tonne load over it without it cracking. We even had some pavers delivered and the guy drove his big tractor over it with the load and it still withstood the weight. All up the base would be about 4 inches thick, with the top part with the cement making up about half that thickness. It has worked out to be a very cheap alternative to concrete. Mike has done several other areas in the yard to keep the weeds out. Hardest part is the screeding, but a good set of knee pads works wonders.
We have left that original base in place, but lately have been using Dolomite sand ( quite fine gravel made from crushed blue stone rocks) that we buy direct from the quarry. Mike has leveled it out and screeded it, then rolled it a few times and then wet it to settle it. Once that has gone hard, he then uses his cement mixer and mixes up a load of the dolomite with cement powder but mixes it dry. Once it is well combined, he then puts it onto the hardened dolomite, screeds it, lightly rolls it and then sprays it with a fine mist of water until it is thoroughly wet through. Once this dries it sets like concrete, but is easy to break up if you need to remove it. We have put it down in front of our lounge room window and we have driven our 3 tonne truck with a 3 tonne load over it without it cracking. We even had some pavers delivered and the guy drove his big tractor over it with the load and it still withstood the weight. All up the base would be about 4 inches thick, with the top part with the cement making up about half that thickness. It has worked out to be a very cheap alternative to concrete. Mike has done several other areas in the yard to keep the weeds out. Hardest part is the screeding, but a good set of knee pads works wonders.