Crack repair, spalling, and slab leveling that fixes trip hazards and stops small damage from getting worse.
Small concrete problems don't stay small in Colorado. A hairline crack or a lifted slab lets water in, and freeze-thaw pries it wider every winter. Fixing it early is far cheaper than replacing it later.
We repair cracks, spalled surfaces and uneven slabs across Denver, and tell you honestly when a repair makes sense versus a replacement.
If the slab is sound with surface damage, repair or resurfacing is the smart, cheaper fix. If the base has failed and the slab is heaving or badly broken, replacement lasts longer. We'll give you the honest call on-site.
What it looks like: the top layer coming off in thin sheets or chips. Rough, pockmarked patches. Aggregate showing through. Usually worst near the street, near the garage, or on steps.
What causes it here: freeze-thaw plus magnesium chloride, almost every time. Denver runs around a hundred freeze-thaw cycles a year. Water gets into the pores at the surface, freezes, expands roughly nine percent, and pushes the top layer apart. Mag chloride off the roads makes it worse in two ways at once, attacking the cement paste chemically and lowering the freezing point so the surface cycles even more often.
The part worth hearing: this is usually not your original contractor's fault and it is not bad concrete. It is an unsealed slab in a climate that punishes unsealed slabs. Almost every spalled driveway we look at in this metro has never been sealed.
The fix: if the slab is structurally sound, this is surface only. Repair the damaged areas, or resurface the whole thing for a uniform result, then seal it and stay on a two to three year cycle. Repairing spalling without sealing afterwards just resets the clock on the same problem.
Not all cracks mean the same thing.
Cosmetic cracks get filled and sealed. Structural cracks mean addressing what moved underneath, which usually means removal and replacement of the affected section. Filling a structural crack is money spent to have it reappear.
Most of the spalling we get called out to look at started with water and deicer working on an unsealed surface, and the worst of it is usually on newer concrete that took a dose of ice melt before it was ready for one.
If your driveway or patio went in this year, the short version is to skip the deicer this winter and use sand for traction instead. We wrote up the longer answer, including what Colorado's magnesium chloride does that rock salt does not, in should I put salt on my new concrete driveway this winter.
What it looks like: panels at different heights. A slab that rocks. A driveway section that has dropped away from the garage, or a walkway panel standing proud of its neighbour.
What causes it here: two things, and they are opposites. Expansive clay soil, which runs through much of the Front Range and is heaviest through the south and east metro, swells when it takes on water and shrinks when it dries out. A slab on a thin or poorly compacted base rides that movement. In Highlands Ranch, Aurora and Littleton this is common enough that it should be the first thing anyone checks.
Tree roots do the opposite, lifting rather than settling, and they are the dominant cause on older walkways in Littleton and the established Denver neighbourhoods. Different cause, similar symptom, different fix. See walkways and sidewalks.
The fix depends on the cause and how far it has gone. Small offsets can sometimes be ground. Panels can be replaced with the base corrected underneath. Where the base has failed across a large area, replacement is the honest answer and we will say so.
We'll measure, talk through your options and hand you a fixed written price. No pressure, no hidden charges.
Yes. We clean and fill cracks and seal the surface. If cracking is from a failed base, we'll talk through replacing the affected section.
In many cases yes. Leveling removes the trip hazard for less than a full replacement.
Get a free on-site quote this week. Honest pricing, no pressure, work backed by a warranty.
