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Switched from magnesium floats to wood handles on my 4 foot Darby and lost 2 days of finish time, am I crazy?
For the first 11 years I ran a heavy mag float on everything, I thought the stiff feel was what gave me that flat, hard troweled look. About 6 months ago I picked up a wood handled Darby from a guy in Tulsa who was getting out of the trade, and I decided to run it on a 40 by 60 shop slab out in Broken Arrow just to see. Right away my arms were less smoked at the end of the day, but I had to work the mud a lot wetter than I like, and I burned through 2 extra yards of cream just getting the edges to sit down. My old partner swears wood floats soak up too much water and leave you fighting soft spots, and honestly he might be right because I chased one all afternoon near the drain. Now I'm torn, because the lighter tool is easier on my shoulders but the mag float gave me a flatter read on the grade without all the guesswork. Any of you run both depending on the pour, and if so what's your cutoff for switching? I'm leaning toward keeping the mag for big structural stuff and using the wood on small residential work, but I want to hear what the rest of you do before I sell one off.
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taylor30510d ago
What was the actual slump on that Broken Arrow pour compared to what you normally run? I ask because 2 extra yards of cream sounds like the mix was already wet when it hit the wood, not the float pulling water out of it. Wood doesn't soak up water from mud that's got a normal slump, it just doesn't push the paste around the way mag does, so you end up chasing cream instead of reading grade. That soft spot by the drain tells me the subgrade or the mix was the problem, because a float won't create a soft spot, it just shows you one you already had. What's your cutoff on slab size before you grab the mag, like square footage or thickness or just how many guys are on the pour that day?
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