Lens, Brush, Quill

We hired the same Samoan guys that brought the tub to us in Everett (when we first bought it). Three amazingly strong guys…  This is all they do – and they do it well!

So the tub is here, with nothing broken, and nobody hurt! It fits perfectly, exactly where I needed it to be, with the conduit coming up from the concrete through a 2 inch hole in the bottom of the hot tub.

So now I can clean it up, wire it to 220, and fill ‘er up!

Because I did this project “right,” the concrete pad is a flexible surface: if Camille decides to get rid of the hot tub in the future, this will be a perfect patio – the late afternoon sun fills this spot through the summer, which is one of the reasons I chose the spot for the hot tub. The project was a difficult slog, and Camille had almost nothing good to say about the project for a long time. But now that it is nearly completed – clean, neat, level, plumb, professionally done – she’s beginning to express delight. This is a relief, because the truth is, I was really doing this for her. I’m not a hot tub person, but in Everett, I saw how much she enjoyed using it, so I wanted to make that happen for her here in Mill Creek.

At last! The culmination of weeks of hard work – the concrete is going to be poured today!

Owen Davis (Start to Finish Concrete) came with a helper (Ty), and had the whole pad poured in about an hour and a half.

It is hard physical work – young man’s game – and I was happy to step back and let the pros handle it. There is actually quite a bit more to doing concrete work well than meets the eye.

Concrete has been with us since before the Romans, and there are dozens of variations of mixtures for different purposes and conditions, and a mismatch (using the wrong mix in the wrong place or conditions) will lead to a failure, such as cracking, scaling, flaking, or spalling. A discussion of concrete was part of the “Materials Science” course in my degree studies, and I was really surprised at the variety and complexity of concrete products that are available.

Owen was able to level the pad pretty much by eye. I had chalk lines snapped on three sides, and a 2×12 on the south edge, so this was not a typical pour where there is a form around all four sides so you get to level it with a board across the form.

I did make a calculation mistake. When I compacted the gravel, I used a laser level to check the resulting depth for the concrete pour. In some places, it was going to be 5 inches thick, in others, only 3 1/2 inches thick. I figured it would all average out to approximately 4 inches, from which I derived my calculation that we needed 2 cubic yards of mud.

Owen was two wheelbarrows away from filling the pad when the message came from the driver that there was no more mud, so Owen said it was time to “break out the concrete stretcher.”

Simply, he moved some of the material from the lowest edge (the entire pad slopes away from the house by an inch over twelve feet) and moved it to the void where we had run short. In the end, there is no way you’d know if you had not seen the process, which takes me back to the whole concept of leaving certain jobs for the experts.

For many years, I’ve been saying that the definition of mastery is knowing how to hide your mistakes!

We wanted the concrete to be finished with exposed aggregate, so it would match the rest of the existing concrete work. So Owen sprayed the wet concrete was sprayed with molasses and went to lunch. Sugar slows the curing of cement, so applying molasses to the surface keeps the top layer soft so it can be washed away a couple of hours later, exposing the gravel underneath.

In two days, I will power wash the surface, and I can set the hot tub on it in three days. In five days, we could drive a car on it, if we wanted to. Which we don’t.

We ordered a stronger mix (6 bag, 4,600 psi) because we will have a giant bucket of water (a spa with almost three tons of water) sitting on it forever.

Next – we get the hot tub moved, and I finish all the detail work!

Because it is the wet season, I was advised to cover the whole area with plastic, so that the concrete guys would not have to guess when they would have two successive days without a lot of rain.

I put all of this up yesterday, and OF COURSE there was a windstorm last night, which ripped it to ribbons. The today, I was out there again, this time with 4 mil (heavy) plastic sheeting, shaking my fist at the heavens!

The rebar is installed! I’ve used broken pieces of cinder block to support the rebar so it stays in the middle of the four inch slab.

I’ve managed to get this far in the project with a minimum of smash marks (see right arm, below) and cuts, which is always a good thing.

I rented a compacter from Home Depot, and this was my first time using one. They look pretty unimpressive – smallish, but really heavy. I’d seen other people use them, and it looked pretty easy.

So imagine my surprise when I started the thing up, it started to gallop across the gravel and slammed into into the house foundation! It was all I could do to wrestle it back and struggle to reach the kill switch!

Turns out that they are made to self propel, and you have to be able to plan your route so that you can simply steer the unit around the workspace. I got the hang of it, and it did a beautiful job!
Now I can start installing the rebar. It will be epoxied into the foundation, and into the retaining wall, creating a grid that is anchored on three sides.

I even epoxied rebar into the existing sidewalk, which had cracked and become separated from the main pour alongside the house. I don’t want ANYTHING to move with temperature or load changes, so it will all be tied firmly together.

The places where the rebar crosses are tied with annealed wire, doubled over and twisted.

The power disconnect for the hot tub has to be at least six feet away from the tub, to prevent people from doing stupid things – like grabbing the main disconnect while they are still in the water.

This presents another challenge: how to thread three pieces of conduit under the existing sidewalk?

I borrowed a page from the Alderwood Water district playbook.  They have this huge truck that shoots a jet of water that allows them to dig down to their facilities with unbelievable precision.

So… monkey see, monkey do.  I forced my garden hose into the end of a piece of conduit, turned the water on “blast,” and worked the conduit back and forth until I had a clear path cut under the sidewalk!

Next, I installed and cemented all three conduits and capped them for later. So far, everything is going well…

Now that the wall is set, we can move forward on the hot tub pad, which will be about twelve feet square. I need to install four inches of 5/8 minus gravel, compact it, install rebar into the house foundation, then have the concrete poured.

Two yards of gravel arrived yesterday, in pouring rain. Camille’s son Bob came over to help with the grunt work, and we both got soaked to the skin.

Surprisingly, it only took him about three hours to move all that 5/8minus gravel, and I had the opportunity to see how well my custom built ramps held up to being walked on, and how well they would support 400 pound loads. It is “pinch fit” between the house and retaining wall with wedges, so that it will (hopefully) not shift during use. Let the dice fly high!