Good day everyone I am interested in knowing what sort of cement sealing products are available ,they could be clear or paint finishes its uncertain to me which way to go because I live in S.Ontario and the cement apparently is a high air content mix and I dont know if the cement truck brought the correct mixture or skimped on it because the top surface is begining to chip off and I avoid using any salt to deice for fear of making more damage.I have used some claer sealer about 2 years ago I would like to take further protection. Thanks Pete.
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You may want to try posting this at the Breaktime forum as well. May get more answers there. I don't really know if a sealer will prevent what I would call "spalling" of the concrete surface. They may have answers for you at Breaktime.
Outside concrete should always have air-entrainment. Even with the air scaling may still happen. 1.Any finishing operation performed while bleed water is on the surface. If bleed water is worked back to the top 1/4" of the slab a very high water-cement ratio and , therefore, a low strength top surface layer is produced. 2. Insufficient or no curing. This omission often results in a weak surface skin which will scale if it is exposed to freezing and thawing in the presence of moisture and de-icing salts. 3. The concrete was poured with too low of a slump. 4" slump is workable.
I am unclear on the term slump,but I get the rest,the platform I will describe is about 6" thick with lots of rebar in it,below is a cold storage and there is 2" thick solid foam at the bottom it is visible in the storage room above my head everything there seems okay.The chipping is not a lot it is mostly at one corner at the front and it hasnt chipped more 3/16" deep,would an epoxy type paint work in a Canadian (toronto) climate to seal it,would that work I have also seen this other coating material that has a course texture that is trowelled on but havent checked out yet. thanks pete.
I'm sure others can explain "slump" in more exact terms, but in a nutshell they pour some of the concrete into a cylinder, then slide the cylinder off the concrete and see how much the concrete slumps--doesn't retain the cylindrical shape.