The Big Pour

The first Saturday in May, I awoke to quite a bit of commotion in the back yard. Yup, it was time to pout the concrete. Jeff and Doug were here bright and early to join in the mess fun. 

One of the most important and time sensitive parts of this job was making sure the the anchor bolts that will secure the columns to the foundations were properly located. Here, Greg is triangulating the location of the center bolt, with the help of Doug and Jeff at the other end of the tapes. At least he knew that the anchor bolts would be correctly spaced from each other because of the jog he built. Pardon the screen in this shot. I couldn't open the door or I would have hit Jeff (the yellow blob in the corner) in the head. 

With the anchor bolts properly set, it was time to fill in the rest of the slab. 

The guys took turns bringing the wheelbarrow to the concrete truck to for a load to dump in the slab. It took at least two people to move the wheelbarrow when it was full. The original intention was to have the truck much closer to the slab. But we'll get to that part of the story in a minute. 

Once the slab was full, they used a 2x4 to smooth the surface, and make sure it was nice and level.

So, we needed about 3 cubic yards of concrete to fill in our 4 foundations and our slab. We opted to have a concrete truck come deliver this, as opposed to having to mix dozens upon dozens of bags of concrete ourselves. 

As I mentioned, we had hoped that the truck would be able to make it into the back yard to pour directly into the slab. But, well, it had been raining for a few weeks, or so it felt, by that point. And, 3 yards of concrete plus the weigh of the truck carrying it isn't exactly light. 

  

So, the truck got stuck in the yard. Dangerously close to the edge of the house. 

And, it did a number on our path in the process. Good thing we plan to redo the driveway and this path later this fall. 

It also pretty much blocked access from the back side of the truck, where the concrete comes out, around the corner of the house. Which meant that the guys had to push the wheelbarrow all the way around the front of the house, around the red fence, and navigate the dirt and rock pile in our former patio to get the concrete where it needed to go. Not fun. 

And then there was the little matter of getting the truck out of the yard. The concrete guy called one of his employees, who showed up in a dump truck, with a really long chain. 

Greg held our drooping electrical wires out of the way during the tow. I would like to pretend I hadn't seen this!

Thankfully, it worked, and we didn't have to spend an extra $900 to have the truck towed out professionally. Then, all that was left was a lot of destruction, and some really deep ruts in our lawn. 

(Greg is 5'-10", Jeff is 6'-4)

Oh, and a fresh new concrete slab that was just dying for an inscription.