PoolQ I am not sure if this is the right place to go… 15 months ago I contracted with a company to remove my pavers, pour a concrete pad, and install spraycrete. It was beautiful! The contractor even has photos on his website. Now, I have hairline cracks all over the place and there are more weekly. My contractor is definitely giving me the runaround regarding this. I explained that I would not have paid more than $16,000 if my pool deck would be cracked a year later. Hurricane Irma took out my pool cage and the insurance money was not enough to replace it, so I used the money for my pool deck. Can someone please tell me what to do? Should these hairline cracks be everywhere? What is the lifespan of the material? Help!
Spray-crete is NOT shotcrete. Shotcrete is high-velocity placement of concrete in thicker structural sections. It appears Spray-crete is a low-velocity sprayed mortar product generally applied in a very thin layer to provide texture to an existing concrete substrate. Since you mentioned the underlaying concrete pad was cast and then the Spray-crete added the cracking could well be originating in the underlaying concrete. Concrete cracks for a variety of reasons, such as drying shrinkage, thermal volume change (summer/winter cycles), inadequate curing, insufficient reinforcing steel, or settlement of the subgrade. You should locate a local professional engineer experienced in concrete slab evaluation who can evaluate your site, materials used, application techniques, and potential causes of the cracking. You may find the Florida Engineering Society and ACEC-FL has a list of firms who offer evaluation services.
