At 09:26 AM 2/8/2005 -0500, you wrote:
am thinking about getting a mixer for doing some sidewalks, steps,
curbs, maybe short sections of driveway (extensions/turnarounds). Any
suggestions on what to look for? Bigger is better? Is drum speed
important?
I only have experience with the one I have, which I got at Harbor Freight
on sale a year or so ago.
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=31979
They occasionally go on sale for $159, which is what I paid for mine. The
only thing I changed was to take the little hard rubber and tin wheels off
and replace them with a pair of 10" pneumatic wheelbarrow wheels (from HF,
on sale, of course).
I think for occasional use it's fine. I bought it to build a 24 x 48" pole
shed carport for my tractors and other odds and ends. The shed has about 18
uprights and I put three to five 60# bags of ready mix around each post,
depending on how big the hole was and how much scrap material I had handy
for makeshift forms. I dug the holes with my backhoe, as the soil was too
rocky for my auger, and it's real hard to auger a hole right on a string
line anyway. This past summer we also did a 4 x 4' landing for my friends
deck stairs.
The mixer will handle about 3 sixty lb bags of ready mix, or two eighty
pound bags, but you can't just dump it all in and start mixing. I found the
best way was to dump the first bag in, start the motor, spray in the water
(too much for one bag), get it mixing, then add the next two bags one at a
time, continuing to add water. It also helps to have a spade or
sharpshooter shovel handy in case the dry mix sticks to the bottom, which
it probably will. At first I tried mixing it in the driveway and dumping it
in my tractor loader bucket, but without a trough that's kind of messy, so
I finally started mixing each batch next to the hole and dumping it right
in. That was when I went to the bigger tires, well, actually it was after I
squashed one of the tin ones with the loader bucket.....You also have to
mess with the mix angle on the hopper. Too high and it won't mix well. Too
low and it mixes great, but the mix splashes out. Maybe if you only had 2
60# sacks in it, it wouldn't splash as bad.
The drive mechanism looks a little cheesy, but I haven't had any problems
with it. I think for incidental homeowner use it's fine. No way it would
work for a contractor, though.
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