Pavers Over Concrete - My Cousin's Method

lukachuki

First of all i'm not doubting you....but obviously things are different around here. I pour concrete for about 4.00 a square foot give or take and do pavers for about 15.00 give or take. (I'm talking residential patios here)

Pavers are just so much more work than concrete and materials are more around here as well.

In looking through your pictures I see that we have the same dump truck and plate compactor. I guess you are just more efficient, so good job.

__________________
"The problem with internet quotes is, you never know if they are authentic." -Abraham Lincoln-

Less with the jaw more with the paw!

NICKPAUS

On smaller jobs when you figure in short load fees and pumper fees is when pavers can be cheaper for me to install than concrete. Finishers still want $250 a day here. I can dump concrete for $60 with truck or dump trailer $40. Base is $20 for dump trailer full (4-5 tons) $30 for dump truck full 6 tons + or another location that is closer $6 a ton.

scrapecc

You wanna try to haul concrete around in a dump trailer? WTF are you talking about. I am raising the bs flag on that one. unless I read the post wrong. But it was kind of unclear where you were trying to go with that one.

Penwood

My company has been installing concrete pavers on concrete slabs for over 16 years. All of the projects are as nice and as exact as the day they were installed. We excavate and install clean ½ stone as done in normal flatwork, form and place concrete reinforced with wire or rebar. After the concrete has been finished and cured, the field pavers are set directly on the surface and the border pavers are glued to the concrete with high strength adhesive.
We then brush and water in fine brown river sand that fills any voids and fills the vertical joints to approximately one half the paver depth. This is followed by brushing in polymeric sand to finish off and create extremely stable joints. The end result is a lasting paver project that has no ups, downs or separation.
In regard to the “usual method” of installing concrete pavers on a sand/stone floating base it has been our experience to witness from our competitors work, a very high degree of project failure as in unlevel surfaces, edge roll-off and paver separation. Many of our competitors projects looked great when installed but have not stood up to the test of time.
When you’re experienced in working with concrete flatwork it really doesn’t take that much time for base preparation and the finished project is very durable and professional.
In the end, your work is of the highest quality which means no call backs; your customers are delighted and you can charge for it.

concretemasonry

If you are installing a non-critical small and lightly loaded paver installation, installing on a concrete slab can work if you can drain the moisture that and prevent the freeze-thaw deterioration common in northern climates. - Polymeric sand is not a cure-all.

If you are into any serious work (like a city streets with heavy loads, a 747 taxi-way or a 100,000# straddle loader) a compacted base (no concrete) and a sand setting bed is the only way that really works. This has been proven for many, many years internationally where the paver history and engineering comes from. - The U.S/Canada only got into pavers in a very small way in the 1970's.

__________________
Dick

Engineer, designer and consultant recently active domestically and internationally on construction and design in about 35 countries.

izzy

TOMMY C,
I don't know allot about this subject but I do know that we had a state engineered job that was installed per plan design very similar to what you have described.

72chevy4x4

I'm just passing through on this thread, but $5 for a ton of base material-is that gravel as in crusher run? I've hauled it straight from the quarry before and it's $14-$15/ton...what gives? You're nto really proposing that you haul concrete from the plant in your dump trailer, are you? My local hotmix plant won't sell to guys w/ a dump trailer-only dump trucks-maybe plants have differnet policy's.

NICKPAUS

Its recycled road base for that price not clean rock and sand. The dump trailer loads mentioned are broken up concrete and price to dump broken concrete at recycling plant. They crush it into road base and re-sell it.

One of my customers motorhome + stacker trailer weighs in at 65,000 pounds pavers over concrete would crack in half without some sand to set in. The concrete drives up the price compared to cheap road base.