# Form, pour, finish these concrete steps - how would you do all?



## UpNorth (May 17, 2007)

These were cast in place, and have an exposed-aggregate pebble finish. Sorry about the poor photo and pixelation.

Note the bullnosed tread feature, projecting out from the risers.

How would you do this?


----------



## Kent Whitten (Mar 24, 2006)

Do what? The bullnose? A full length board goes where the inset toe kick part is.


----------



## UpNorth (May 17, 2007)

I know dat part. A cured silicone fillet forms the bottom half of the nose in the form, with the top quarter-round done with a special edger trowel. Mostly am seeking other techniques for getting the exposed-ag finish. Nice and uniform, risers, nosings, and tread tops.


----------



## Kent Whitten (Mar 24, 2006)

I guess I am not following your question Gene. These are done all the time. 

It's a mono pour, it is all formed up, where your toe recess is, there is a piece of form installed to create the form. 

Then when it is being poured, molasses or sugar water or a concrete retarder is used in conjunction with a mix of pea stone. The molasses is sprayed onto the surface to retard the curing of the cement, then when the whole thing is kicking you take apart the forms, get the water hose and spray off the mud on the surface leaving exposed aggregate. 

Of course you have to be a tad bit talented and know what to watch for or it all goes to ****. 

We used to do these all the time in Seattle. Some had lamp black (or other colors) poured into the mix to create a much more attractive end product. If you can get all white pea stones and lamp black....that is really nice looking.


----------



## UpNorth (May 17, 2007)

And I've done that myself. Yours truly. Truly.

My solution for knowing when the time is right to use the sprayer to wash off the cream and make it all pretty, is to form some 12 x 12 boxes with 2x6 or 2x4 and pour those test tiles at the same time. Make at least three of them. When you think you have enough cure to do the hosing, try it on a test tile. If you are too early, wait a while and try it on test tile number two. When you are happy, then do it for real on the work.

For flatwork, when only the top side gets the treatment, I use a mix of molasses and water in a garden sprayer. Sugar is an excellent retarding agent. All the 'crete pros know about it, and I have heard of guys throwing a couple five pound bags of Domino in the top hopper of a redimix truck to screw up a rival's pour.

But there are techniques involving form surface coatings and pressure washers I am not familiar with, and I was hoping to hear from those that know about it.

And no, it is not commonly done here. Not at all. Maybe all the time where you are, but things are different in my backwoods venue, where rusticity rules. One concrete guy has the silicone mats for doing texturized flatwork. One guy. And no one could be counted on for doing anything in exposed ag.

For your viewing enjoyment, I am attaching my tool of choice for doing the top edging of the noses, and my hallucination for how to form the riser and nose. It is an adaptation of what I've done to form concrete countertops, only for c'tops, the fillet is doing the top arris, and the tool is doing the bottom one.


----------



## tgeb (Feb 9, 2006)

I've done some exposed agg flatwork, and one or two that included steps, but not with the bull nose detail.

We bullfloat the area spray on the commercially available retarder, come back the next day with a pressure washer and wash away cement.

I would think that if you had that bullnose formed completely and sprayed the forms with retarder, it would come out pretty much like your example photo. I would imagine that is how the precast co. does it.

The biggest problem with exposed agg is that you can't do any leveling or filling low spots with cream. You've got to have a good strait edge guy that knows what he's doing.


----------



## parkers5150 (Dec 5, 2008)

you will definitely be working up hill trying to finish those steps with an edger. In fact i highly doubt you can do it without busting a section or two. Like Kent said there are companies that make foam profiles that you apply to your wooden forms. More importantly they have trowels with the exact same profile so that you are able to finish without making the bull nose fail. After you have pulled your forms,clean up profile with trowel, add retarder and cover with 2 mil plastic so that the retarder doesn't run down the face. Next day use a gareden hose with a spray nozzle (low pressure) and a soft bristle broom and brush


----------



## CJKarl (Nov 21, 2006)

I'd love to help some one that knows what they're doing pour some steps like that. I don't know ANY local concrete guys that could do that around here. The Stampcrete guy wouldn't even try I'm sure.


----------

