Question about a sudden rain shower on a fresh pour

I was finishing a 20x30 patio slab in Charlotte last week when a pop-up thunderstorm hit about 20 minutes after we finished the bull float. We scrambled to cover it with plastic sheeting, but the surface still got pitted from the heavy drops. We re-screeded and troweled it once the rain passed, but I'm worried about long-term durability. Has anyone else had to salvage a pour like this, and did it hold up okay?

3 comments

3 Comments

nora_park721mo ago

Ugh, that's the worst kind of bad luck. My one attempt at a small garden pad looked like the MOON after a surprise sprinkle.

harper_smith1mo ago

Tell me about it. I spent a whole weekend leveling and tamping mine down, only for a hard rain to wash all the fines right out and leave nothing but lumpy gravel. It's like the ground just rejects the idea of being flat and neat. I ended up putting down those grid things you fill with gravel, which helped a lot, but it was a whole extra project I didn't plan on.

patel.leo4d ago

Oh man, those grid things are a lifesaver but yeah, why does it have to be another whole project on top of the first one? Did you have to cut the grids to fit your space, or did you get lucky and find ones that matched your driveway width? @nora_park72 's "moon" comment is too real, I had a spot that looked like a crater field after the first big storm. Seriously though, what did you use to edge them? I tried metal edging once and it just rusted out in a season.