Concrete and Mortar
#1
Concrete and Mortar
A stairway on one side of my garage had sagged along with the floor. I'm going to have the floor lifted but I decided to first create a footer for the stairway and the landing above separate from the garage floor. So I cut through the floor, created a 2.5 foot deep footer with about 8 inches of concrete reinforced with rebar. On top of that are three coarses of block and mortar. The footer is about 8 feet long overall.
The question I have is how long should I give it to cure before applying significant weight to it? I'm guessing a week would be OK but I could use a qualified opinion please.
Cheers!
The question I have is how long should I give it to cure before applying significant weight to it? I'm guessing a week would be OK but I could use a qualified opinion please.
Cheers!
#2
A lot depends on the mix of the concrete... but generally it is safe to build on after 7 days. Concrete continues to cure beyond that and gets even stronger by the end of a month but I doubt you will be putting point loads on it that would exceed it's current strength. I'd say that after 7 days it's probably at 60% of its full strength. See this chart for a better idea of average cure times.
http://www.ce.memphis.edu/1101/notes...hics/conc3.gif
http://www.ce.memphis.edu/1101/notes...hics/conc3.gif