Old Cement.

[busastars]

Just wondering, I have about eight bags of sealed cement. They were on a pallet off the floor covered over with a blue sheet. was in a make shift kind of green house. Had them since my last Shed build nearly a year ago I think.

How can you tell if the cement is usable, if it has gone a little firm but with a tap turns back to dust can it still be used.

It wont be for anything structural only a light floor covering that wont take any weight, just could do with using it up on a project in the next week or so.

Cheers

 

[Emmsy]

i would have thought as long as it goes to dust its ok. i thought moisture made it set so if it isnt solid then it must be ok

 

[stormin]

Test cubes!
Obviously your not going to go as scientific as crushing them to find out the compressive strength but a few test mixes in small quantites left for a few days should give you an idea if it's still usable.

 

[ytre]

The newer bags have a use by date on them now

 

[CTB]

This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine. I always used to buy cement in 50kg bags then would have one or two left over. I was told to turn them every month or so and they wouldn't get hard, but of course I couldn't be bothered. After sitting for 8 months the cement would be a hard 50kg bag of boat anchor and I would have to throw them out. Now I buy cement in 25kg bags and don't cry so much when I have some left over. I have a mixer but even that can't break up the hardened cement. If its still unhardened it's useable and will work fine, as long as you're not pouring to some engineering standard.

 

[mike os]

if its for puting down a few slabs its worth the risk, but if its anthing more substantial or something you really dont want to do again why take the chance for £40?

 

[busastars]

Cheers all, every penny counts and I hate waste. It's not structural or anything nice so I will be fine. I did pick up the bags today and dropped them, they did move about a fair bit so looks like there not gone hard.