Concrete Repair and Resurfacing in Arlington, TX and the DFW Metroplex

Most of Arlington, Mansfield, Grand Prairie and Fort Worth sits on expansive clay. It swells when it gets wet and shrinks when it dries, and it does that every year: soft and high after spring rain, hard and low by late August. A slab rides on top of that cycle. Edges lift where water collects, centers settle where a tree pulls moisture out, and the concrete cracks where the two movements meet.

That is why the same driveway that looked fine for ten years starts breaking up after one bad drought or one wet winter. The concrete did not get weaker. The subgrade under it changed shape, and concrete has almost no ability to bend. For the longer version of why slabs crack and what is normal, see why concrete cracks.

The practical point for repair: if we do not deal with the water, the repair fails the same way the original did. Downspouts dumping next to the slab, a flower bed that holds water against the edge, a gutter that drains across the drive. Those get fixed first, or the job is not worth doing.

Hairline cracks that stay flat are cosmetic. Concrete shrinks as it cures and it will crack somewhere; that is what control joints are for. A crack that is wide enough to drop a coin in, or where one side sits higher than the other, is a different story. Vertical offset means the subgrade moved and the two pieces are no longer supported the same way.

Offset is also what makes a trip hazard. Under the federal ADA Standards, a change in level up to 1/4 inch can be vertical, and anything from 1/4 to 1/2 inch has to be beveled. Past 1/2 inch the Standards require a ramp; on a sidewalk that means it is a step, and that is where the injury claims come from. Those rules bind public and commercial walks, but they are a good yardstick for a home sidewalk too.

Spalling is when the top surface flakes or pops off and exposes the aggregate. It usually comes from a weak finished layer, too much water in the mix, deicer, or a finish that was worked while bleed water was still on top. Spalling is a surface problem on a sound slab. A slab that has settled, heaved, or is pumping water at the joints when you drive on it has a void underneath, and that is a subgrade problem.

Patching fits spalled spots, chipped edges and small holes on a slab that is otherwise sound and stable. We cut the edges square, remove everything loose, and fill with a polymer-modified repair mortar that bonds to old concrete. Be honest with yourself about the look: a patch never matches perfectly, and on a front driveway it reads as a patch.

Resurfacing, an overlay or microtopping, is for a slab that is ugly all over but sound and not moving. A thin cementitious layer, roughly 1/8 to 3/8 inch, goes over the whole surface with a new broom or textured finish. It can change the color and hide a field of surface damage. It cannot stop a moving crack; the crack telegraphs through the overlay within a season. If the slab is still shifting, an overlay is money on top of a problem.

Lifting, called mudjacking with a cement slurry or polyjacking with polyurethane foam, is for a panel that settled in one piece and is otherwise intact. Holes are drilled through the slab, the void is filled, and the panel comes back up to grade. It works on settled concrete only. A heaved slab cannot be lifted down, and a panel broken into four pieces comes up in four pieces.

Saw-cutting and replacing a panel is the answer when one section is broken or badly offset and the rest is fine. We cut at the existing joints so the new piece lands in a clean rectangle, dig out and compact the base, dowel the new panel into its neighbors so they move together, and match the thickness and finish of what is there. Replacing the bad panel instead of the whole driveway or walk is usually the best value on the list.

Some slabs are past saving, and we would rather say so. If more than a third of the panels are cracked or offset, the subgrade has failed across the whole thing and you would be chasing it panel by panel for years. If the slab is thin, under about 3.5 inches, or has no steel in it, it will keep breaking no matter how good the patch is. Crumbling aggregate, a surface that sheds sand when you sweep it, or a driveway that slopes toward the house all point the same direction.

A slab that has already been lifted once and settled again is telling you the void keeps coming back. Stacked repairs in different colors also hurt resale more than one honest new pour. At that point replacement is the cheaper repair over the next ten years.

Full replacement of 4 inch broom-finish flatwork runs about $8 to $14 per square foot installed in our market, plus $2.50 to $4.50 per square foot to break out and haul the old slab. If the old concrete is coming out anyway and you have wanted a carport or a covered patio, this is the moment to plan both: we pour the pad, CJM Metals builds the steel on it.

Prep decides the result. Every repair edge gets saw-cut straight and square so the new material has a clean face to bond to, not a feathered edge that chips out in a year. Loose material comes out down to sound concrete. Where a panel is replaced, the base gets re-compacted and, if it was the problem, rebuilt with compacted crushed stone that drains instead of holding water.

New panels get rebar or dowels tied into the old concrete so the pieces move as one. Joints are cut in the new work to line up with the old, which is where the next crack wants to be anyway. The finish is matched to what is there, broom to broom, and on a stamped or exposed aggregate surface we will tell you up front how close a match is realistic.

Then it cures. Repair mortars and new panels need their full cure time before they carry a car; cutting that short is the most common way a good repair fails. If the work is a public sidewalk or the driveway apron at the curb, that is City right-of-way and may need a permit or inspection. We confirm that with the City of Arlington (One Start Development Center, 817-459-6502) before we cut, and this page covers what usually applies in Arlington.