Pool deck crack repair

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Concrete Pool Deck Pros and Cons. Pool Patio and Coping Options. Concrete vs. Categories Follow Us Subscribe. Enter concrete. Why does concrete crack? Concrete usually cracks for at least one of the following reasons: Structural settling Ground movement Poorly placed control or expansion joints Improperly mixed concrete Fluctuations in temperature Cracks in a concrete deck can be the first sign of structural settling or ground movement.

Does concrete crack under heat? Why does concrete crack in cold weather? Those solids are filling the voids that the sealer needs to fill in order to "bite" or adhere to the concrete.

The more secondary color present, the bigger the problem. The sealer will encapsulate the solid color in an attempt to do its job, but if there are no pores to fill, adhesion is compromised, which leads to failure when external forces exceed the ability for the sealer to hold. This is usually why we see these types of failures in the spring, after a winter assault of freeze-thaw cycles, deicing salts and snow shovels. As a result, the sealer lifts up in small circular areas and takes the secondary color with it, since the color is all it had to hold onto.

You are then left with a stamped slab that has round, discolored spots. The "discoloration" is actually the base color that should have been visible in the first place, but was covered with too much secondary color.

The repair is fairly simple in theory, but more difficult in practice. The sealer has to be chemically stripped, but the process will usually remove most of the secondary color as well. Once the stripping is complete, you can remove any residual secondary color, give the surface a good cleaning, and then allow it to dry before resealing. The hard part is selling the client on the new "correct" color combination of their patio.

What was mostly dark brown with hints of tan is now mostly tan with hints of dark brown. Question: I hope you can give me some idea about what's going on with my concrete pool deck. The deck was poured in August by a local contractor, who then stamped the concrete in an Ashlar slate pattern using a dry color release.

After he washed off the residual dry color from the surface, the deck did not look evenly colored. Some areas had barely any color while others had too much. I told the contractor that the color was unacceptable and needed to be fixed before the sealing. Despite that, when I wasn't home the contractor went ahead and applied a sealer pigmented with a dark brown stain. That made the deck look even worse, but it isn't my biggest problem.

After the first winter, which was mild for the central Midwest, the decorative surface of the deck started to peel and chip away. In some large areas, the surface came off completely, down to the aggregate.

I did not apply deicing salts, and no water was left lying on the surface. This stamped concrete patio is flaking away due to a surface layer of weak concrete. Answer: Unfortunately, you have a slab of decorative concrete that's in bad shape and beyond easy repair. Once the top surface has been breached, it's just a matter of time before the entire top will break apart. Because the layer below with the stone showing appears to be strong and intact, you have two repair options: totally rip out and replace the slab or remove the top 1 inch and cover the underlying concrete with a stamped overlay.

In my opinion, the problem is not caused by the contractor's coloring methods. Instead, it's probably due to poor installation techniques, poor curing, a bad concrete mix or a combination of all three. Stamping the surface of bad concrete only speeds up the deterioration process. What makes things worse is that the contractor is refusing to take any responsibility and will not get involved to help figure out what happened.

Get Job Leads Today! About Us Free Newsletters. Correcting Someone Else's Mistakes A microtopping enhanced by decorative brick-patterned borders and stenciled designs gave this dysfunctional pool deck new life.

Resurfaced Concrete Pool Deck Makes a Big Splash A cast-in-place concrete overlay, stamped with a fieldstone pattern and a decorative medallion, completely restored this deteriorating concrete pool deck without the need for replacement. Hotel Pool Deck Resurfacing In addition to chemical and hard water stains, this indoor hotel pool deck had a rough surface that was unfriendly to bare feet.

Without appropriate expansion and contraction joints, your concrete will not have the ability to expand and contract effectively, and this will lead to cracking. Construction of a low standard concrete surface. These are the problems that develop due to substandard building practices. Your concrete deck should be properly reinforced with steel for good adherence and preventing cracks.

During construction, the soil below the concrete should be compacted effectively to ensure ground movement is reduced. If you add too much water into your concrete, the slab will become weak, leading to cracks and surface problems. Plastic shrinkage. When concrete is still in its aqueous state, it has a lot of water. When the water in the concrete dries up, voids are left in the concrete making the concrete weaker and prone to cracking. Expansion and contraction cracks.

These cracks are caused by a sudden increase and decrease in the temperature of concrete. The use of control joints controls the cracks. The epoxy coating can support in preventing water from accessing the patch.

After the sealant has settled, put water into the enclosed region to verify if the sealing is adequate. If water stays on the patch, so you get a strong cover. Undo the sealers phase as the waterfalls into the patch after the sample water has dripped. Meanwhile, this fast remedy is appropriate to patch cracks. Even so, this is best to contact a pool deck specialist of severe damages that are too wide to fix or if fixed cracks grow over time.

This will relieve you from the burden and could ongoing maintenance costs. You may read also — How to Build a Pool Grotto.

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