How to level a cement seat?

dsenior

Hi, 

a little while back we built this outdoor seat for a fire pit area. Unfortunately because the seat isn’t quite level water pools in patches and it makes it hard to keep clean. Is there any recommendations for how we could level out the seat so that this doesn’t happen? we are renovating the area with a new base around the fire pit and real turf so would like it to have a nicer finish. 
Thanks in advance ☺️

JacobZ

Hi @dsenior,

Thank you for your question about dealing with pooling issues on your rendered seat.

To deal with the ponding, you are going to have to bring up the level of the surface with a mortar compound.

To do this, you'll have to start by grinding the paint from the existing render, as mortar will not bond to it particularly well. For this, you can use an angle grinder with a grinding disc like this Flexovit 100x16mm Stripping Ripper Grinding Disc.

Once the paint has been removed and you are back to bare render or block, you should prime the surface with Davco Ultraprime Surface Primer. This will help the mortar bond to the surface.

You can then build up the surface with a mortar compound like this Dingo Structural Mortar. You want to aim for about 3-5mm of fall per metre, so assuming the seat is roughly 500mm wide, I'd aim for a 3mm drop from the backrest to the front edge.

Once this mortar has dried, you can render over it and paint.

Let me know what you think and if you have further questions, please don't hesitate to ask.

Jacob