Hey guys Mike here with EverythingAboutConcrete.com
This video is going to be about pouring a pool deck. Now we get asked to do a lot of these pool decks every year
It seems like in Maine there's a lot of people that install pools
Let me know down in the comments how many of you guys do pool decks like this. So we're going to get this formed up
I came here with Tia today to get it formed up and get it ready to go so we can get it
poured the next day. Now we're going to make two of the sides about four feet wide and that four feet is
going to run down a little bit on that third side and then the very back where that yellow
wheelbarrow is and to the left where the stairs are that's going to be around six feet wide
over there. So the first thing I do is I just get my forms laid out and I get my ranks all screwed together
And you know the way I figure my ranks is if the pool is 36 by 18 and I know I have
four feet of deck on one side and six feet on the other that adds another ten feet
So I'll need at least 46 feet on that right side. And then over here I've got the 18 foot wide part of the pool
So I've got four feet of deck on the right and four feet of deck on the left. So there's about 26 feet of length I need there
So that's basically how I go about going around the pool. And then to get my four feet I just measure off that white coping on the pool and I measure
four feet off each side. Put my pins in, run my strings, get all my corners screwed together and then the last
thing I need to do to really set the forms is set them to grade
So I'll use my laser and I'll shoot the top of that coping on the pool, that white coping
around the pool and that's top of concrete up next to the pool
Now I want to make sure my form is a little bit lower than that. So in about four feet, you know, we'll drop it about a half inch in four feet and that's
what I use the laser for to go around and make that process pretty quick
So we're just going to get the wire mesh put in here. We're going to be using a 4000 PSI concrete with fiber mesh
It's an exterior mix so it has air entrainment in it and we also put the wire mesh in here
too so it's got two types of reinforcement in it. We've had really good luck with that in Maine, especially when there's a good gravel base
you know, or a sandy base like this one has. The frost really doesn't seem to want to play with them much at all
So here we are pouring the concrete. Now we had to use a power buggy because the pool was out back of the house quite a ways
so we had two options really. We could power buggy it like this or we could pump it
Now it cost about a hundred bucks to get a power buggy and it cost about nine hundred
bucks to get a pump. So you know, power bugging it really wasn't that bad because it wasn't a huge deck
If it would have been bigger like eight, ten, twelve feet wide around this thing we probably
would have, you know, got a pump because it just would have been a lot faster
But where this was just one load of concrete, here we are with a little different angle
on that first dump. This was just one load of concrete. You know, it took us about forty-five minutes to an hour to get it all dumped out using
this power buggy. So it really wasn't too bad. Plus, as you can see, we're kind of in the shade here to start with early in the morning
so that made things a little bit easier too. The access, you know, when you use a power buggy like this, those things aren't great
in soft sand and stuff. So it's got to be hard packed dirt you're running that thing on
And obviously you've got to have access all the way around the pool which the homeowner
gave us really good access for this so that made it a lot easier using this power buggy
here today also. Now everybody's got a job here. You know, Darren's got the stand up screen
Luke's kind of breaking down the concrete as they dump it out with the power buggy
Tia's kind of helping Darren puddling. She's magging edges. So that's another thing that the teamwork here makes this job go really, really easy
So kind of lucky to have a bunch of people that really enjoy what they're doing, enjoy
working together, and they all know their role. They all know their job. Like, I don't have to tell them anything
You have, you guys that do concrete, you have employees like that too that just, you show
up, they show up, they know what to do, they know what to expect and they just get it done
I mean, let me know down in the comments. That makes life a lot easier when you go to work each day
Darren's using the stand up screen for most of this. We made, just made that
It's just a bolt hole handle into a piece of one by lumber and it just works
It's kind of handy for smaller stuff like this. We don't use it on big floors or anything like that but for small stuff when the forms
are right to grade, it just helps on bending over. You don't have to bend over quite so much when you screed like he's doing right here
He wanted to use the magnesium screed when he's going around those railings
And you can see how he's screeding around that. He's just kind of kicking in his feet, his footprints as he's screeding there
So, that's the way we typically screed concrete. Either kick screeding like that or if it's a big floor, something flat, you've seen in
some of my other videos, we'll use a power screed. For those of you guys, if this is your first time watching me, you know, this is what we
do every day. We pour concrete every day, some type of flat work
If you like that kind of stuff, you know, please go ahead down there and hit subscribe now
I come out with a couple videos a week. I'm trying to teach and educate as many people as I can about how to pour concrete
That's what I like doing. And if you like that kind of stuff, then hit that subscribe button
Now we've moved around to the back of the pool. This section is four feet wide
It's actually a little more difficult to dump with that pile buggy because that pile buggy
holds quite a bit of concrete. We didn't want to, you know, make a mess when we're dumping it
So we had to dump it pretty slow. Just a little bit at a time, then I'd have to set over and dump out the rest of the buggy there
That buggy holds a lot of concrete. It makes it actually pretty fast
A lot better than wheeling it by hand. I own four wheelbarrows, actually, but we hate wheelbarrowing concrete
So I threw my back out one wheel and just trying to stop that thing from tipping over
And I said, that's probably going to be the last time I wheelbarrow concrete
So now we'll either use a pile buggy, we'll tailgate it, or we'll use a pump truck
Darren's doing the screening. He's doing the bowl floating, finishing his magging
You know, we're on a, you know, we want to be quick doing this. We're not really rushing or hurrying, but we want to be quick because we know it's pretty
warm out today. We know that concrete's going to be setting up and we got quite a bit of handwork coming
up to finish this. So that'll be coming right up too at the end of the video. So make sure you hang out for that
You know, we got to cut grooves in, we got to edge it, we got to mag the whole thing out
We got to broom it. So there's quite a bit of finishing to do on these
And you just want to make sure you get back on it in time. You don't want to be late finishing something like this
If you're late, then your broom marks aren't going to come out very nice and you're really
going to be working a lot harder than you should be. So we've got it, we're almost, we're onto that last side now, getting down to that last
corner for pouring. And then, you know, we're going to get the tools washed up and then we're jumping right
back here, starting to finish. I'm cutting grooves in with the walk behind groove that I started with
We just, we lay out, you know, quite a few grooves in this thing
The grooves are there for a couple reasons. Number one is we want to try to get the concrete, if it's going to crack, we want it to crack
in the groove so it kind of hides it. Now there's no guarantee in that, as most of you know with concrete, concrete cracks
But we are trying to control those cracks with these grooves. And then the grooves also aesthetically give it a nice look to the whole pool as you get
finished up. Now Darren's going around, he's cutting in the edges in with the edger
As I got down to my last grooves, it got a little firm to do with the walk behind groover
So now I'm just going to cut them in by hand. It was still pretty easy to cut it in by hand
Traditionally this is how I was taught to cut grooves right here, with a screed and
a little hand groover. It is pretty easy to learn that way
And it's pretty easy to cut grooves with a groover that way too. We call them grooves, a lot of people call them joints
They're basically the same thing. Serve the same purpose. But that's as easy as it is right there
You see how easy that one was. And just as soon as we got those joints cut in, you know, we're right back on it, mag
floating it, Luke's cleaning up the joint, and then we're going to broom right over it
I'm checking that other end up there, as you can see. So we're kind of mag floating this thing out both ways
It's starting to set up pretty good now. That other half over there to the right is in the sun, so we know we don't have a lot
of time to wait here. We want to get it mag floated, get it boomed out, and just keep moving around this thing
as it sets up. As you can see, it set up pretty quick
If Luke can get on there with those knee boards and just work his way around without sinking
in, then this stuff set up pretty quick. I'm way over there in the back in the sun, mag floating out that piece back there
Because it's basically all setting at the same time right now. It's just right for us
If we wait 5, 10, 15 minutes, then we're going to stop getting behind
So we just want to keep working at it at the same pace. Now you can see way back there, I just haven't got some knee boards like Luke
And I'm going to get on that. And then Darren can just jump back and forth with the broom
We kind of mag out a square. A square is like in between the joints from one joint to another
So we'll get one square magged out. Darren will get it broomed
And then he'll jump over to where I am and broom that square that I got magged out before
it dries up. And then Tia's going to follow behind with the edger and make sure she gets a really
nice edger mark in it. And then that'll be the finished process right there
You want pretty good texture around the pool. You know what I've noticed? I have a pool and I have kids
And they're running, playing, throwing toys and stuff around this pool. And you don't want them slipping because it does get wet and they get in and out of the
pool quite a bit. So you want a pretty decent texture on it
I know mine did. Mine's about 20 years old now so the texture's starting to wear on it a little bit
But it's still pretty nice and it's not hard on the feet at all
And it's definitely a non-slip type texture. You don't want really anything smooth around the pool
You're going to get a lot of water on that deck. You can see now how Luke and I are kind of working towards each other on that piece in
the sun. Darren's out there grabbing a mag. Tia's finishing up the edges
Once something like this starts going, starts setting out, there's no time to stop or anything
You just got to keep going until you get it done. I teach this stuff too, guys, in more depth in the concrete underground
And the concrete underground is my private training area. And I have a link to that down in the description
Down where it says show more under the video. You just click on that and then all my links show up for all the tools I use, all my courses
and all that. So you can check that out if you want. So we're coming down this side here, this side on the right
And then we have that one last side over there on the left over where the ladder is
We got to finish up. So we're going to jump right over there. Get that mag floated real quick
And then get it, boom, before it starts setting. Because some of that's in the sun over there
Boom. You see, I'm headed over there now. Luke's going to finish up that square there and then he's going to jump right over there
So we are kind of hustling, but we're not behind. And that's the key
I mean, this is with four people, so you kind of need to know what you're doing on these
to really make them come out right. Even though this isn't one of the larger ones that we do, it's probably a medium to average
size pool deck. We've done them smaller for sure, but we do some larger every year too
And those, you know, the larger ones, you really want to make sure you know what you're
doing or just get some extra help, one or the other. Right now what I'm doing over there, me and Luke, is we're just making sure everything
looks good under those stairs. There's a couple couplings that those, the stairs slide into
We want to make sure those are set nice. Everything's cleaned up around them
So when we broom over it, you know, it looks really nice right there
But that's the basic process, guys. Pouring, setting up, pouring, and finishing around the pool
It's quite a job. There's a lot to know, a lot to know to get it done right
And this is how you do it right here. Thanks for watching, guys
We'll see you on the next one. Bye