Suggestions on repairing a porch?
decolores9
| Posted in Construction Techniques on
The porch on my house is poured concrete, over a concrete block “cellar” below. There is a crack in the concerete, about 1/4″ wide, and it leaks into the room when it rains. Also, a prior owner dyed the concrete red, which looks terrible (IMHO). The porch is about 8′ x 10′.
How would you repair it? I’ve thought of a few ideas:
1. chip it out and repour
2. seal the crack (with what?), the use concrete surfacer to refinish and hide the repair.
Have a better idea? Or thoughts for/against my ideas?
Thanks.
Dec
Replies
I'm no expert on concrete repair, but my answer may hold you until a better one comes along. I would try to open the crack up a bit with grinder or such and use hydaulic cement in it. Hydaulic cement expands as it cures. That should do it.
I would do the hydrolic cement also, but maybe layer of silicone down deep to get it "water tight"....then the cement patch to level it off.
You could also look into patching epoxies made for concrete pools.
Patching it is fine for now, but I would try to find out what caused that crack. Sounds like settling. What's the soil like? You have proper drainage away from the house? Fix the problem, don't just patch it.
I suspect the cracks are due to settling, and made worse over time due to lack of maintenance.
The largest crack cuts off a corner maybe 2'x3'. This part appears to be loose.
At what point do you decide it's better to replace it than repair it? What considerations drive that decision?
Thanks.
Money.
You'd have to weigh out new footers to stabilize the crack v. tearing it down to rebuild it.
There is a basement wall under this slab - the slab is the "roof" to a small cellar room. If I were to replace it, I would just remove the existing slab, use that corrugated steel material to span the opening and support the concrete, and pour a new slab - maybe filling the cores in the concrete block in the process. I would not be installing new footers and walls.