I’m pouring a small concrete wall today that will be exposed and needs to be nice and smooth. It’s formed with AC plywood and has chamfer installed in all of the corners. Mix is 6-sack pea gravel and it will be vibrated well, but even so I expext some bug holes or other imperfections. What techniques and materials do you guys use for skimming a wall? Didn’t find much using Google… one article suggests a cement slurry on the wall, rubbed with a burlap sack partially filled with sand/cement mix. Funny thing is, I’ve had a sub do this in the past but I have no idea what they did.
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There are several products out there for that. Ardex, Raeco and Rapid Set all make patch and sack products. You can even skim the whole surface with something like Ardex's Featherspread but that is trickier than it sounds
Could you cover your forms with a lubricant to prevent adhesion then use a vibe sander on outside of form?
We always use a mixture of portland and sand(preferably from the concrete supplier so it matches) apllied with a masonry sponge float. Not a grout sponge. The masonry one are orange.Fill big holes first and let dry. Then aply mixture, let set awhile and rub out.
The color match is a definite issue. I need to pour some stairs up against part of this wall, using 'crete from the same supplier. Hoping for one shade of gray here.
What's your sand/cement ratio?
1 cement, 3 sand. I forgot to mention that if the walls are green enough,besides filling in big honeycombs, sometimes a wet sponge will bring out enough cream to fill pinholes and give you sone texture. If its too dry and you only have small holes, you can use straight portland too.
This is the guy to ask....Bing