How to Install a Bluestone Landing on a Front Entry | This Old House

this isn't the prettiest landing i've ever seen my wife's gonna agree more with you this is an old flagstone landing that probably popped and it looks like they tried to repair it and not very well by the way the only way to repair this is to excavate out all this flagstone all right rob to get started removing this flagstone we're gonna use a chisel and a three pound hammer okay what i'm gonna have you do is set the chisel like this and drive it and remove the flagstone i want you to move from the outside in okay because we don't want to loosen any of these brick we've already got a few that are loose and i can fix those but i don't want you creating any more so hop over here yeah grab the chisel try to drive it underneath that piece of flagstone you got safety glasses on yep do a little shopping angle try to drive it right underneath it and pop it that pop out now rob yeah i think so yep all right give it right to me yeah i'll take that first one's done start on the other ones okay all right let's take a look here here's the new mortar bed they used to build up underneath the flagstone here's the original mortar bed we not only have to get the flagstone out but both layers of mortar have to come out too okay well rob we've got all the mortar out we're down in the original concrete and if you look here we're actually down about a half an inch now if we wanted to put the original flagstone back we could probably get away with it but what i want to do is use thermal blue stone what's that well it's a piece of blue stone where they take a torch and pass it over it giving it texture that will give us traction right but if you look here this blue stone is an inch and a half thick plus we need a half an inch of water underneath it so we have to be down two inches below the brick using a rotary hammer with a chisel bit we just start in the center and make a hole now we don't want to go too deep because if we take out too much we have to replace it all right rob we're in good shape we're down two and a half inches now so i'm gonna sweep off this existing concrete and i want you to take that sponge and rinse it off get it nice and clean because we want a good contact between our existing concrete and our new mortar we're going to put in these brick in front are loose so what i want to do is remove them chip out this mortar bed so i can reset the brick after we've put the blue stone in place for our mortar today we're using pre-mixed mortar mix all you have to do is cut that open and pour it out all right take that shovel make a little hole in the middle for me and i'm going to pour in a little bit of water we want to mix this on the thick side i don't want it too wet because if we do the blue stone's just going to settle down when we put it in take and mix that up for me rob these are the three pieces of blue stone that are going to make up your new landing i had them cut to size at the stone yard now this is the top of one stone with a thermal finish on it it's nice and rough this is the bottom of a stone that's smooth so what i'm going to have you do is apply a bonding agent to it before we set it in the mortar rob a little easy on the edges there i don't want any of this to run down onto the top of the stone it's a bear to get off all right now for the mortar i'm going to lay in a bed that's just a little bit wider than the stone the stone's 18 so i'm going to come out about 20 inches but the important thing to remember is that the stone is an inch and a half thick so i want to be a little proud of that an inch and a quarter with my mortar and then i'm just going to tamp the stone down lightly i'm going to spread it as much as i can with a shovel and then finish it off with a hand trowel take him back up the steps be real careful yep all right now grab it from this edge got that yep okay come down into me just hold on till i get my fingers out all right lay it down in lay it down okay we're looking for about a half inch gap on each edge now what we're going to do is just grab the rubber hammer and we're just going to tamp it down into place get it right down flush with these all right now you notice we just laid enough mortar to set our first piece if i'd filled the whole topping with mortar there'd be no place for you to work good idea roger let's get the next piece okay okay rob you got it swing around put your hand where you're not gonna hit the brick all right yep now you got room to work there so let me get my fingers out yep okay you're good i'm good right in there okay rob that's great that you're cleaning up as we go along now i have to mix up one more batch of mortar for the joints the mortar is the same but to the water i'm going to put in an additive and what's the additive for that's going to make the mortar more flexible in the joints okay we'll just add that in and we'll mix it up you want to pour some in for me okay sure okay pour a little right here in the middle funny okay let me try with that all right we're just going to load up the big trowel and take the little trowel and work this into the joint and pack it in now we don't want to get the mortar all over the place i want you to be just as neat as you can fill the joint to the top and then we'll come in and tool it off gotcha while you do those joints i'm just going to use the same water to reset the loose brick rob all we have left to do is finish off these joints with our joining tool this is a half inch joining tool with a concave edge on it we're just going to finish off all these joints nicely and wash it down one more time looking good well rob what do you think it looks great and it's going to be a lot safer that's for sure thanks a lot for coming out roger oh happy to help

Channel: This Old House

Views: 599,960

Keywords: This Old House, Ask This Old House, DIY, Home Improvement, DIY Ideas, Renovation, Renovation Ideas, How To Fix, How To Install, How To Build, Bluestone, front entry, landing, steps, stairs, Brick, stone slab, roger cook, Do It Yourself, How-to Entry, landscaping ideas, landscaping for beginners, how to landscape around house, landscaping how to guide, home renovation ideas on a budget

Id: cvYxMM1R4os

Length: 6min 57sec (417 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 15 2014