Concrete Form Rental

[central1ny]

I am considering renting concrete forms from a local rental house to form up my footing and walls for my new garage build. Does anyone here have experience using the wall forms and pouring walls? Is this a DIY job? Seems like it should be fairly straight forward.

 

[paullie]

yes, i've poured alot of mud and used alot of forms, depends on how tall the walls are, you can use wood and build em and then reuse the wood for the garage, you better have more help then you think you need and this is a DIY if you or a good buddy has done it before, if not it may be cheaper to have it done, it's alot more involved than it looks

 

[ConCretin]

Personally I wouldn't recommend it if you haven't done it before and have plenty of good help. You can take your time building the forms but any mistakes are likely to show up in the middle of an already hectic pour. After all that time and money, you don't want to be stuck with a crooked wall of even worse, having to rent one of those 60 lb 'erasers' and starting over.

 

[Kevin54]

I am considering renting concrete forms from a local rental house to form up my footing and walls for my new garage build. Does anyone here have experience using the wall forms and pouring walls? Is this a DIY job? Seems like it should be fairly straight forward.

Will you really be saving any money by renting them and doing it all the work yourself over having someone that has the forms already, is experienced, and can be in and out in no time? Just something to think about. I'd call around and get some quotes from various ones, then research the difference

 

[red]

When I was building my house, I did the math and found it cheaper to paid someone than to rent or build the forms. (And that with my free labor) A friend told me to ask for quotes by the yard. You paid for what they use. This is less risk for the contractor. Ended up being cheaper and I'm sure they were "generous" with the concrete they were pouring, since more meant more money in their pocket. What PSI concrete are you going to use? And how high are the walls?

If over a few feet you have to do multiple pours so the bottom does not blow out. That's why you see the contractors going around and around. It allows the first foot or two to start to set up.

 

[Red05GT]

As a general contractor for nearly 30 years, my advice is hire it done. We have rented
forms before when we had several jobs to do in a months time and were able to save
a little money and keep our guys busy. It will take longer to form, strip, clean, stack
and return the forms than you can imagine, not having done it before. Aligning and
bracing the forms for a professional looking job is harder than you think. Just sayin'.

 

[Falcon67]

I'm planning my forms so that the boards that come off can be reused. That's what most builders around here do. I have concrete stained 2x6 rafters in my attic and most of the form material for the house next door went back into the building. I need 2x6x16 rafters and some 2x6x12 joists - two 12s and a 16 makes a 40' run. I'll need two 14s on the ends to make it a real 24x40 but that's no big deal. I also scarfed over 100 form stakes and braces from scrap pile after the pour next door.

The biggest issue will be getting your forms square and level. Spend a month, buy a laser level, buy clear tube and make a water level, triple check the corners, buy a long enough tape measure to go diagonal across the whole thing - whatever it takes. And do it at least three times, make damn sure. 1/4 out in 10' makes for a full inch off in 40. Framing can be imprecise to a point, but if the slab it off everything else will be 10x harder to do.

 

[central1ny]

Will you really be saving any money by renting them and doing it all the work yourself over having someone that has the forms already, is experienced, and can be in and out in no time? Just something to think about. I'd call around and get some quotes from various ones, then research the difference

I got a price for the forms from a rental house for $1500 for 1 month rental. I calculate that I need approx 15 yards of concrete and at $90/yd around here, that is $1350. So that is approx $3K if I do it myself. I haven't received any quotes for just the walls yet but based on a $12K quote last year that I got for a smaller footprint (slab included), I would guess that I would come out ahead. But I am finding it damn hard to get any of the contractors to break down their quotes for me by line item.

 

[carhunter]

werented forms and had laborers install them for a 4' x54' retaining wall with a 6' L at the end. They are a lot of repetitive work and you need to get the bracing right or the forms will bow out under the weight of the concrete as its poured. We had one section blow out on the backside but it wasn't visible in the final product.

In hindsight, it was significantly cheaper (saved maybe 1500-2000?) but that may just have been because we had cheap rather than skilled workers.

Forms cost 350 to rent for 3 days from a local supplier. The quick turnaround saved is $$ also.

 

[ddawg16]

I'm in the process of forming up the foundation for my 2-story addition right now. Half is slab...other half is footings with a crawl space. I'm not doing retaining walls....but my footings are almost 2' high with about 18" more of conctete below them.

Overall, it looks like I will need about 25 yards of concrete.

I have an experienced concrete guy doing most of the work so it's saving me from costly mistakes. He is the same kind of guy contractors hire to do the work...so my savings is in 'me' being the contractor. So far, I have spent about $2500 in labor...and about $500 in material...about $300 of that was for wood for the forms....some of which I will be able to use on the house.

I already got a quote for concrete...right now my price is $86/yd for 3000 PSI...so with pumper, I'm looking at about $3000 for the pour.

Assuming nothing else crops up....I esitmate my total cost for the foundation is going to be about $7000...compare this to the $10,500 my garage foundation cost...and this pour is a lot more complicated.....so I would speculate that I'm saving about $3k.

Bottom line...unless you know what your doing or have someone helping you that does know....farm it out...all of it....

 

[brownbagg]

icf insulated concrete forms