Goldenwest Huntington Beach Concrete pours in Placentia, the inland end of our list, where a July afternoon dries a slab faster than it can cure. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
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Placentia is 20 miles from the surf and 10 degrees hotter on a summer afternoon, and heat is the enemy of fresh concrete. Water leaves the surface before the slab has set, and the surface cracks.
At the beach the marine layer keeps a pour damp until noon. In Placentia the sky is clear by nine, the tract streets off Kraemer Boulevard and Rose Drive have little shade where the grove was cleared, and from June to September the afternoon runs into the 90s. In October a Santa Ana wind comes down the Santa Ana Canyon dry and hot, and a slab poured in it loses its water in an hour. A patio poured at midday in August crazes before the crew has packed up.
So the pour is booked for first light and the cure is worked, not left. The mixer takes the earliest slot the plant runs, the slab is screeded and floated in the cool of the morning, the joints are sawn as soon as it takes a blade, and it is kept wet under blankets for 7 days, because a slab that cures wet reaches its strength and one that dries in the wind never does. On a day the forecast names a Santa Ana we do not pour. Under it the build is the build.
Placentia is the one town on our list where the sea has no say. The tracts on the old grove grid are 50 and 60 years old, their first drives and patios are worn through, and every replacement is poured to a calendar set by the heat.
A Placentia drive is a 1960s slab worn through by 60 summers, and it is replaced whole. We dig out any soft pocket the grove left, compact the silt in lifts, lay 4 inches of crushed rock, and pour 4 inches under cars, 5 under a pickup, at first light so it sets before the heat.
A Placentia patio sits in full sun where the grove trees were cleared, so it is poured pale and poured early. We pour 4 inches on a compacted base, broom it for grip, saw the joints by noon and keep it wet for 7 days, because a slab left to dry in a 95 degree afternoon crazes.
Stamped concrete in Placentia is colored in the mix and sealed against the sun rather than the salt. We stamp the pattern in the cool of the morning, when the surface stays open long enough to take it cleanly, and seal it at 28 days so the color holds through the summers.
A Placentia walk crosses the parkway strip and the roots of a street tree planted with the tract. Both panels go in under one encroachment permit, the root is cut back where the city allows, the slab is thickened over it and the new panel is doweled to the old.
Garage floors in the Placentia tracts were poured in the 1960s and have cracked where a stump or a soft pocket sat under them. We break out the slab, firm up the ground and pour 4 inches on a vapor barrier, troweled flat enough to coat or to live on.
Exposed aggregate suits a Placentia front yard because the stone stays cooler underfoot than a smooth slab in the sun and hides the dust the dry months leave. We wash the stone proud the morning of the pour, trowel a plain border and seal it at 28 days against the sun.
Walls in Placentia hold the rise north of Yorba Linda Boulevard, where the streets climb off the flat. We footing them 24 inches into firm gravel below the silt, drain the stem to the street and cap them level, and pour them at dawn, since a wall dries from both faces.
An interior floor here is for a converted garage or a new room on a Placentia tract house. A vapor barrier goes on the compacted base, the slab is troweled to take tile and the joints are set under a wall, with the doors closed on the day so the wind cannot dry it.
The crew takes Beach Boulevard north from our office to the 91, runs east past Anaheim and leaves it at Kraemer Boulevard, about 22 miles and 40 minutes before the traffic builds, one more reason the day starts early. Permits come from the Building Division at Placentia City Hall on East Chapman Avenue, and the drive approach, the parkway and the public walk need an encroachment permit from Public Works on top. A patio replaced inside your lot needs neither.
The town is the grove grid. Between Chapman Avenue and Yorba Linda Boulevard the 1960s and 1970s tracts run on the straight lines the orange rows left, on lots wide enough for a two-car drive and a patio, and many keep a Valencia tree from the grove. Old Town along Santa Fe Avenue and Bradford Avenue is the packing-house end, with smaller lots and older concrete, and Atwood south of Orangethorpe Avenue by the tracks is older still. Above Yorba Linda Boulevard the streets climb.
The ground is the alluvium the Santa Ana River and the canyons north of it laid down, silt over gravel that drains when dry and holds water for a week after rain. A slab settles here where a stump or an old irrigation line was buried under the tract grading, so the ground is probed and a soft pocket is dug out and refilled with compacted rock before the base goes down. With no salt in the air the sealer is for stains and sun, and it still goes on at 28 days.
Four steps on a Placentia lot, timed to the heat. The estimate is written on the first visit, the pour is booked for first light, and nothing is poured on a day the forecast names a Santa Ana wind.
Scott Ferreira measures the slab, probes the old grove soil for soft pockets, checks the shade and the fall, and writes the estimate there.
We file at the Building Division on East Chapman Avenue for a wall, a footing or an approach, and take the encroachment permit for the curb.
The old slab comes out, soft ground is dug and replaced, silt is compacted in lifts and 4 inches of crushed rock goes down on the second day.
The mixer arrives at dawn, the slab is finished before the heat, the joints are sawn by noon and it is kept wet under blankets for 7 days.
Ring or send the form and we come back to you within 1 business day. Scott Ferreira drives out the 91, measures the slab and the ground under it, and writes the estimate on your drive with the pour date set for the cool of the morning.
Reviews
Reviews on Google, Facebook and the BBB, left by the owners of slabs we poured in Placentia and on the way back to the coast. Each one names the job and the year it was finished.
“Our pool deck was the original 1972 surface, lifting at the coping. They cut it out, compacted the sand, poured 640 square feet at 4 inches with an isolation joint at the pool, and sealed it at 28 days. Scott Ferreira measured it on a Thursday and we had the written estimate before he left.”
“The old driveway had sunk where the sand washed out under it and the cars scraped at the apron. They pulled the encroachment permit themselves, compacted the base in three lifts, poured 5 inches for my husband's truck and cut the joints that afternoon. Two winters on, not a crack.”
“We wanted a patio that looked like slate without the joints weeds get into. Scott Ferreira laid the pattern out with us on the visit, the crew poured 380 square feet, stamped it in ashlar and sealed it at 28 days. A full year of salt air later it still looks like the day it was finished.”
What we are asked on the grove grid and in Old Town, answered as we answer them on the drive: what moves the estimate, who permits the work, the heat, the ground under the tracts and how long it takes.
What is under the old slab. A drive poured thin on grove silt in 1965 comes out in a morning, but one with a buried stump or a soft pocket under it needs that ground dug and replaced with compacted rock, and that is a line on the estimate. Thickness and finish come after that, and a first light pour costs no more than a late one. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
Not for a patio, a walk or a drive replaced inside your lot. A wall over 4 feet, a footing under a cover or a slab under a room needs a building permit from the Building Division at City Hall on East Chapman Avenue, and the approach, the parkway and the public walk need an encroachment permit from Public Works. We file whichever the job needs and are on site for the inspection.
About 22 miles, up Beach Boulevard to the 91 and east to Kraemer Boulevard, which is 40 minutes at dawn and longer by nine. That is why a Placentia job is booked as a full day and the crew leaves before the freeway fills. We reply within 1 business day, come out the same week, and order the mixer from a plant on the Placentia side rather than ours.
Because the surface dries before it sets. A slab loses water to a 95 degree afternoon or a Santa Ana wind faster than it can bleed water up from below, and the surface shrinks over a core that has not moved, which leaves a fine map of cracks across the whole face. We pour at first light, keep the surface wet under blankets for 7 days and do not pour on a wind day, so the slab cures instead of drying.
Two to four working days on site, then a week before a car goes on it. The tear-out and the base take the first day or two, the pour is one early morning, and the joints are sawn by noon. A summer job runs the same days, only earlier, and the blankets stay on the slab through the week. Walk on it after 24 to 48 hours, and keep anything heavier than a car off it for 28.
Villa Park to the south and La Habra to the west are on our list, and so is Buena Park past the 57. Fullerton, Brea, Yorba Linda and Anaheim share Placentia's lines and none of them is on it, so a job across one of those lines is one we will decline rather than stretch to. Call with the street and we will say in one sentence whether it is ours.
Placentia is the north-east corner of what we cover, with Villa Park below it and La Habra and Buena Park to the west. The same crew drives the 91 to all of them, and a house nearer one of those towns is described on its own page.
Open the Huntington Beach Office in Google Maps Send the form or call and we come back to you within 1 business day to book the visit. The estimate is written on your drive, costs nothing, and the work is guaranteed in writing.