Concrete Driveways in Sioux Falls, SD

Concrete driveways in Sioux Falls take more abuse than almost any other slab on the property. They carry vehicles every day, get scraped by shovels and plow blades, collect salty slush that drips off cars all winter, and freeze solid for weeks at a time. When a driveway fails here it is usually for one of three reasons: water got under it, the mix could not handle freeze-thaw, or cracks had nowhere planned to go. Each of those is decided before the first truck of concrete shows up.

Signs it is time for a new driveway

• Panels that have sunk or tipped so water runs toward the garage or house
• A surface that is flaking, pitted or showing loose stone, especially near the garage door where salty slush drips
• Cracks that keep widening, or cracks where one edge now sits above the other
• A slab that heaves up in winter and settles back in spring
• Broken edges along the lawn where the slab was never thickened
• An old driveway that is simply too narrow for the vehicles you own now

A few hairline cracks are normal. Settled or scaled panels across much of the driveway usually mean replacement costs less over time than repeated repairs.

Tear-out and the base underneath

On a replacement the old slab is broken up and trucked off first, and then we study what it was sitting on. Many older driveways sit on little more than native soil. We remove soft or organic material, add a granular base, and compact it in lifts. The base is graded so the finished slab falls away from the garage and house. A driveway that drains well in April is the one that does not heave in January.

Thickness and reinforcement

HomeGuide recommends at least 4 inches for standard vehicles and 5 to 6 inches for heavier ones, with thicker edges of 6 to 8 inches. In practice we look at what will park there. A family car and a minivan are fine on a properly built 4-inch slab; a three-quarter-ton pickup, a camper or a trailer on the pad calls for more. Rebar or wire mesh does not stop concrete from cracking, but it holds cracks tight so the panels stay level. We tell you what we plan to use and why.

The mix, the joints and the finish

Every exterior driveway gets air-entrained concrete, ordered with the strength and slump we need and placed without watering it down on site. Control joints are laid out before the pour, usually aligned with the garage door edges and spaced so each panel is close to square, then tooled or saw-cut to roughly one-fourth of the slab's thickness. A broom finish across the slope gives grip on snowy mornings. If you want something dressier, a stamped or colored border along the edges is a common option that keeps the main drive simple.

Care through the year

Keep vehicles off a new driveway until we say it is ready, usually about a week for cars and longer for heavy trucks. Do not use any de-icer the first winter. After that, shovel early, use sand for traction, and keep chemical de-icers to a minimum. Seal the driveway with a penetrating sealer once it has cured, and re-seal every few years. Fill small cracks before winter so water cannot get in and freeze.