wrote:
My home builder poured me a nice thick (16") concrete patio (8'x10')
which we didn't ask for or pay for. Unfortunately it's squarely in the
way of where we want to build a deck and there isn't really clearance
above it to get the deck joists in.

Well, the crack, that's a problem, but I would never remove a patio to
install a deck. Still...

I find it amazingly unlikely that it's 16" all the way through: it's would
almost certainly be only that thick on the edges and substantially thinner
at the center.

Still breaking this thing up would be an amazing PITA. Don't go the
jackhammer route that tpeople are suggesting: that should be your last
resort. Instead go with an expansive demolition agent.
http://www.concretenetwork.com/concr...ion_agents.htm

It's a special sort of expanding concrete that you pour into hole
strategicaly drilled into what you want to break apart. As it sets, it
expands and the force quietly breaks whatever you've got.

But I'd keep the slab.

Either lay sleepers on the slab to support the deck, as you suggested
elsewhere, or build your deck around the slab, maybe 9" down so as make
the deck a step if the grade if the site warrants such a thing.

snip
As a result it's starting to look like i'll be doing this myself .
I've never done any concrete work on this kind of scale, although i've
got friends who've got some experience with jackhammers and excavation
and will work for beer. One suggested that i rent a big hammer drill
and drive a grid of holes into the slab which I could then drive a
jackhammer into and break apart... is that plausible?

After drilling the holes, pour in the expansive mixture and then drink the
beer while waiting for the thing to break up.

How likely is it that a builder would put rebar into a non-structural
patio?

Hard to say, but I rather doubt it.

Any other advice?

Yeah. concrete is wonderfull stuff: don't get rid of it.


Good luck with whatever you decide to do.


John
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