We are filling as I write.
First I want to catch everyone up. The second day of concrete didn't go so smooth. The good news was that it was on a Saturday so I was there to watch, help and make decisions.
The plan was to fill the retaining wall cells with concrete and then do the flat work on the side of the house which will be boat storage. The first issue was that they made the gate wall at the back of the house 58 inches tall and it needs to be 60 inches to pass inspection. I do plan on putting a 2" cap but we hadn't picked it out just yet so I told the concrrete guy that another course needed to be added. The crew arrived nice and early and woke me up. When I came down they had started the extra course and were filling the wall. I really wanted to verify that the wall was indeed being filled completely. This is when the first minor problem happened. The second truck arrived about 30 minutes earlier than requested and about 10
minutes after the first. He just sat and waited. I knew I wasn't paying extra for standby time and hoped my concrete guys wasn't either.
The second truck got pumped off without any issues. It was cool watching the guys do their jobs. They made it look easy and they all really knew what to do without much direction from the boss. I kept looking to see if
the third and final truck was there but it never showed. They finished nearly everything on the concrete that had been poured to that point and the second truck still wasn't there. I could see that the concrete was really
beginning to set up and the end of the second batch was not at a control joint. The third truck finally showed 2 hours after it was loaded. They said they got lost but I saw that their paperwork had the correct instructions.
The guys had started trying to place a control joint down near the end of the second batch but it was in a spot that didn't match the adjacent driveway's joints. I told them that this is not acceptable and that all the joints needed to match the adjacent driveway. The foreman sent this truck and it's unhappy driver away and ordered a new truck. They said it would be one hour. We had to remove about 1/2 - 3/4 of a yard of partially set up concrete to get back to the previous control
joint.
The end result was pretty good and these guys made the best of a bad situation.
Adding the extra course and filling the wall
Waiting for third truck
Removing concrete back to previous control joint
Waiting for third truck...again