Crushed concrete as base

[ChrisS]

Hi everyone,
I hope someone can ease my fears. We went the cheaper way and ordered crushed concrete for our brick paver base. Well when the truck dumped 40 tons of what looks like dirt I got worried. Is this what its supposed to look like or are we screwed! It does have concrete in it but also a lot of what looks like dirt. Please help me because I am driving my boyfriend nuts! by the way we did put fabric under our base. we have also been mixing our 3/4" driveway stone in with the crushed concrete is that ok? thanks for any info

[ckcland]

I'd love to tell you it's "OK" but it doesn't sound good. If your application is for a patio you may get lucky but with that quantity it sounds like your doing a driveway. You will never get the proper compaction with recycled concrete, especially if it "looks like dirt". You run a very high risk of sinking/settling without using the proper 2A modified(as it's called in PA) base. There is some very good articles on this site and also on ephenry.com. Read more on the importance of base material. After all, this is the foundation of your project.

[sleepy]

You went the cheaper way! Cheap base cheap job? You get what you pay for. You have 40 tons of fill in your yard Time to find a hole to fill.

[Bill Schwab]

We use recrush all the time. It is typically darker than virgin crushed gravel because there are many different stains and colors mixed in the recrush. Depending on the batch you may even get some asphalt in the load, and occasionally you might get a scraping of dirt.

When we test for hardness, we can get it harder faster using recrush than we can using virgin Class 2 base. As long as you have a 1" chip minus, meaning all different sized chips along with dust you will be fine. I5t also could have been a concrete that was mixed from the plant using fly ash rather than cement, which typically produces a darker load. Many plants began using fly ash on common work 30 years or so ago as a means to try and recycle it.

When you ordered did you ask for a certified run, like a particular number for the base?

Anytime you mix a larger stone into the dust you will create more cohesion, and as long as you wet it down as you pack it, it will dry hard as concrete. Just don't wet it too much and pack away..

[Nac]

I also use it for paver base and base for asphalt. I just crused 400 tons of concrete into 3/4" minus RCA for future use sitting in my yard since it was all my material I know what it made of (concrete footings, slabs, sidewalks, block, brick and just a couple loads of ashphalt no dirt at all)

[Nac]

Here are some pics: