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Finally caught my bad habit with air entrainment after a cold pour disaster
Was screeding a 40 yard driveway last winter and had 3 panels surface scale right in front of me, realized I'd been running my mixer too dry for like 5 years. Any other guys here just dump the air entrainer in without checking slump first?
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irishenderson5mo ago
Idk I mean the real issue nobody talks about is that cold water actually holds way less air than warm water does. So if you're pouring in the winter and your mix water is like 40 degrees, you're never gonna hit your target air content no matter how much entrainer you dump in. I've seen guys double the dosage in December and still get single digit air because nobody checks the water temp before they start. Maybe it's just me but I always test my mix water temperature first now, even keep a bucket of hot water on the truck to blend with cold hose water. That whole surface scaling thing is almost always a water temp problem not a dosage problem in my experience.
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tessa_hill865mo ago
Gotta love winter concrete work where the real enemy isn't the cold but your own damn water hose. I've watched a guy dump a whole jug of air entrainer into a load and still get 3% air, then just stand there scratching his head while the concrete's already half froze. Honestly I think the secret is just to boil a kettle of water at home and bring it along like some kind of concrete tea ceremony. At this point I figure if the water's below 50 degrees you might as well just pour soup instead of concrete.
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