One Man Pours Concrete Pad

Ignore all of the idiots that give out negative comments. It's YOUR job. You do it how you want. I appreciate your taking the time to make these videos. The youtube "experts" are sitting on there ass at home and proably have never touched wet concrete or even published a youtube video. Please keep up the good work !!!

In all seriousness, good job. A couple little comments. You poured a 28 cubic foot, just a bump over 1 cubic yard pad. You used a little less than 6 bags. At a minimum for durability you should be at least 6 bags for one yard. However, I like to be closer to 7 bags per yard. What I like to do is 3 stone, 2 and a half sand and 1 and a half cement. Makes a nice finishable mix. Another pointer that takes some time but will save a lot of time is to meter your water in a bucket and adjust until you get the slump you want. Then you dont have to guess the water and you can put all the water in upfront and not have to worry about it anymore.

When I was young we never had a mixer. We mixed in a wheel barrel with a hoe. The sand/gravel came from shoveling at the creek into our pickup. Now we’ve gotten to the point where we watch tv and have somebody else come and do it for us. You did a good job.

I would conciser repositioning the mixer and dump directly in the form to save some hauling

Good job on the first pad square. I found that using a reciprocating saw without a blade on the forms help remove the voids. Not such a big deal on the inside edges that will have another pad poured up against it, but on the outside it would be a good idea. It costs a lot for a contractor do do the job because its a lot of manual labour. If you are willing to do it, you can save a lot of money.

There will always be armchair critics. I just bought that same mixer. Instructions sucked but I’m ready to start several projects. Good job.

You did a damn fine job for 1 man, and the video was well done. Your grandpa is proud I'm sure, and rightly so.

I've been using my HF crment mixer for around 5 years now, just small things 2x2x3 pads, 10x12 shed slabs, when I need to do over 25 fence post holes. It's been holding up just fine, even built it a ramp that hangs on that solid bar below the drum so I don't have to empty the contents into a wheel barrow. Solid $189 purchase

Pls keep us updated on this project would love to keep seeing the progress!

Good job man... I can speak with a little authority on this subject. I'm retired from the swimming pool construction business 500 pools. About 20% of those pools worth vinyl liner inground pools that required 25 yds. Of concrete to construct. We built those pools with one gas powered Stone brand mixer. The only thing I would suggest that would help you would be to get anything to hold water next to the mixer such as a garbage can and keep it containing water just to bucket into the mixer. Count the scoops of water out of the water container and put the same amount every mix. As an added bonus the water container is a great place to dunk the spent bags to make them waterlogged and you can stack them neatly to be disposed of... Like I say great job it can be done that's the way they did it in the old days and it works.

Don't let the youtube schmucks change how you operate Your channel. The algorithm is working. I subbed

I have the same mixer. It was cheap but works good for the past 2 years. I find it easier to to pour directly into form and I also leave running when I pour it out.

You do you, I’ve done the same thing with my inexpensive Princess Auto mixer here in Canada and it has worked out fine. Did a 12x20 workshop floor for my shed and everything is fine, small expected cracks after putting my cj5 in and jacking but over all, great.

To raise the PSI with the concrete you can add more cement, as for the slump start out with adding a little water at a time to the consistency you think you’ll need so that it’s not too watery and it won’t take long to dry and harden.

We just did the same thing this weekend. A 4m (13') x 3m (10') x 10 cm (4") slab broken into 4 equal parts of 1m (3.3') x 3m (10'), with inter-connecting 1/2" rebar (by way of notches in the form that will "slide" into the next quarter as we get to pour it). The rebar was sitting on 3" dobies, some of which toppled over. The entire form is on builders plastic. For the first quarter (which was in most areas closer to 6" deep) we went through 10 mixers-full, each consisting of * 1 bag of 25kg 42.N portland cement * 22 shovels of 0-32 mm ballast (rock/sand mix) I think we got approximately the same result in similar weather conditions. Key difference maybe is that we used a vibrator (which aids in moving the mud around inside the form and reducing honeycombing, but I think also brings bleed water to the top maybe a bit too early). Used an aluminium screed bar. Used magnesium floats. I didn't get to the broom since we needed to get a move on as it was getting late, and also the available brooms in the EU are a bit crappy. For the 2nd quarter this weekend, I will try to run a wooden bullfloat that I made in between the screeding and floating. Hopefully I can get to the broom. Dunno how to post a pic anywhere on utube to show my results, but would like to. Good to see some other poor bastard giving this a go. Shout out to @AJDIYNetwork who also posted a nice vid on the same method.

I've poured several of these through the years, I did an 8X10 x 4" using sakrete concrete bags and by myself, hell of days workout and it was much warmer, can't remember the amount of bags but it was like over 40 I think, one thing to note if you didn't is oil those forms so they come off super easy. I did another 10 x 12 one time and hired a cement truck to come pour it all. My sides had lots spots like yours where the concrete didn't settle properly, if you can find a concrete vibrator that would eliminate that just by running it around the sides. Over all nice job on mixing it yourself and it turned out great, good luck with the rest of them.

Looks good Jeff I’m going to keep watching Thanks one man can do it if he wants to 👍

Looks nice. If you are planning to interlock the pads to make 1 giant slab you can drill holes in your form boards and run rebar through the holes. Then your next pad has rebar locking the first and second pad together. If you want them locked together so they absolutely cant heave seperately then take a 2X4 and run it through a table saw to bevel the edges 5-15o. The 2X4 is then screwed onto the inside of your form board around the centerline of your form board. You MUST bevel the 2X4 edges or else when you pour the concrete you will be cussing like a sailor trying to remove the 2X4 from the set concrete. The 2X4 will create a groove in the side of your pad so when you do the next pour the new pad will have concrete form into the groove and those two seperate pads are now interlocking. If you want to go hard core then once you add the bevelled 2X4 inside your form drill holes through the center on the form and 2X4 to run rebar through. Your next pad you tie onto those protruding rebars and continue the process. Critical thing... Bevel the 2X4. Trust me if you dont youll only do it once. As an apprentice carpenter i forgot only once. When you are chipping out a regular unbeveled 2X4 from concrete it is an unforgettable pain in the backside lol.

Awesome freaking job, bro! Just what I needed.

Even Mike Day gets haters and he has over 30 years experience. Don't worry about those folks. If you want to save yourself a few trips with the wheelbarrow, try two dumps from the mixer into it. Also I will always do a test pull with my broom if I'm not happy with it I just hand float over it or bull float and I just want a little longer. Great video looking forward for the next one.