Concrete pad

[Shane04]

Hi all. I need to build a small concrete pad 224cm x 86cm x 10cm for a new bin store. I always find it hard to calculate ballast and cement for concrete which I need to get to grips with. Can somebody help me work out my materials please? Thank you!

 

[martygturner]

try : https://www.calculator.net/concrete-calculator.html

 

[Shane04]

Thanks martygturner. I’d already found this website but couldn’t quite understand the answer from the dimensions when input. I know the pad is 0.19m3 but still for the life of me can’t work out how many 25kg ballast bags and cement bags

 

[thomp1983]

I laid a pad last year that was 0.12m3 for a water butt and used,

8 bags of ballast,
1 bag sharp sand,
1.5 bags of cement,

They were all 20kg plastic bags, I'd guess I mixed at 1 cement, 1 sand, 5 ballast, but I can't remember.

You need pretty much a third more so I'd get,

11 bags of ballast,
2 bags sharp sand,
2 bags cement.

Unless you live miles away from a diy store or builders merchant you'll be able to nip out and get some more if you run short, it takes plenty of time to dry off, likewise if you won't use it all you can return the unopened bags.

I hand mixed mine in one of those flexi buckets, I think it took about 3 hours to do the lot, I did it in the evening as it was the middle of June and hot.

 

[martygturner]

ok so the volume required is 0.20 of a cubic meter , the amount of cement and all in ballast required depends on the strength you want for the base. As its for a bin store not a runway its not going to need that much strength

1:3 mix would be 72kg of cement 3 bags and 240kg of ballast - say 12 bags but that does depend on water content of the ballast, if it was me i would add 2 extra.