I need to pour 10-12″ round deck footings that are 48″ in depth. I am low on manpower, and was thinking of doing them one at a time with bags of concrete. My question is, can I get away with just emptying the dry bags into the tubes, and then filling with water, or do I need to mix everything up before pouring into the tubes.
Thanks,
Chris
Replies
You need to mix it. There is a "pour in the hole" mix for setting posts, but it's not all that good, and doesn't develop the strength you need for footings.
Consider just pouring the footing base -- 6" or so -- then setting a treated wood post or some such on top. If you don't surround the post with concrete you greatly reduce the rate of rot, and you'll only need a bag or so per hole. Or you could do pretty much the same with steel.
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I'm gonna be interested to see if some BTer, with all it's diversity, is gonna come along and say pouring dry mix in the footer hole is acceptable.
To the origional poster: Do what Dan said, and add a metal post foot bracket to the bottom of the post to hold it up off the damp concrete.
Here I am.
Dump it dry...it'll slowly set up harder than a mixed pour.
Don't believe me? ASk Brown bagg. Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
He he he...
there's always a wise guy....
Definitely premix. The strength of wetting dry mix in the hole is terrible. Our neighbor paid a fence contractor to replace a section of fence between our properties and the contractor used this method. The fence posts all blew over in a big storm about 4 years later. I would NEVER use the "wet the dry mix in the hole" method.
Not saying that you're wrong.....
But did the posts blow over, and pull the entire concrete post footing out of the ground? Or did they just break off?
When in doubt, get a bigger hammer!
I need to pour 10-12" round deck footings that are 48" in depth.
I'm going to assume you didn't really mean you need 12"-dia. footings 48" tall, but rather that you need 48" tall concrete piers above the footings to get the top of the pier up to grade. (Correct me if I'm wrong.) You didn't fill in your profile, so I don't know what area you're in, but if you need to be down 48" to get below the frost line, you might be fairly close to me, LOL....
You can pour the pier and footing simultaneously if you use one of the commercially-availble footing forms made for use with pier-forming tubes. You just insert the tube into the footing form, screw it in place with a couple of #7x1¼" Piffin¯-screws, and set the assembled unit into your hole. Spot and plumb it and then backfill. You're now ready to pour.
It isn't that hard to mix and pour the concrete for this job with a ½-bag electric cement mixer from your local tool rental agency. Do it that way and you'll be laughing. Do it by hand, and you'll be aching....
Build yourself a pour-chute or a big funnel out of scrap ply. Move the mixer into position over each sonotube before mixing up the 'crete for that tube, put the chute/funnel in place, and just tilt the mixer over it while the barrel is still turning. You'll be done before ya know it....
Dinosaur
A day may come when the courage of men fails,when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship...
But it is not this day.