Find a trusted concreter in Adelaide

Why Adelaide driveways crack

Cracking is the number one worry with concrete in Adelaide, and the clay is why. The reactive clay under much of the Adelaide plains swells through a wet winter and shrinks over a dry summer, and a slab sitting on top gets pushed up and dropped along with it. A good concreter designs for that: stripping topsoil and roots, compacting a crushed rock base, laying steel mesh and cutting control joints so any cracks run along a straight line instead of wandering across the driveway. Trees close to the pour make things worse, because their roots dry the clay out unevenly.

Falls matter just as much. A path or driveway that slopes toward the house can keep the soil under the footings wet, which is linked to cracked walls. Side paths should fall away from the house, and the stormwater needs somewhere to go, usually the street water table or a drain.

Hot pours and the growth suburbs

Summer is the tricky season. On a 40-degree day concrete can start to set before it’s finished properly, so careful concreters pour at first light, keep the surface from drying out too fast while it cures, or move the pour to a milder day. A concreter who reschedules for a heatwave is doing you a favour. Exposed aggregate is especially touchy, because the surface has to be washed off at just the right moment to reveal the stone.

A lot of Adelaide’s concreting happens on new homes in the outer north and south, from Angle Vale and Munno Para to Seaford Meadows and Aldinga, where driveways, paths and alfresco slabs often go in after the builder hands over. Established suburbs see more replacement work, breaking out cracked driveways and pouring again. Either way, building or widening the crossover from the kerb to your boundary usually needs your council’s approval, and it has to be built to their standard.

Licence checks for SA concreters

In South Australia, concreting around your home is building work, and paving is named in the building work regulations. Any concreter you hire directly needs a CBS licence for building work, with concreting or paving in its conditions, whatever the job costs. Look the business up on the CBS Occupational Public Register and check the name matches the quote. The licence checks for SA page explains how to read the result.

Concrete prices in Adelaide

Expect Adelaide prices to land a little below the east coast. Per square metre, budget about $70 to $140 for plain concrete over a prepared base, or $100 to $220 if you want exposed aggregate. For a single driveway of about 30 m², that means roughly $2,500 to $6,000 in plain concrete. A plain double is more like $4,000 to $9,000, while doing the double in exposed aggregate takes it to around $6,000 to $12,000. Removing an old slab, pump hire and the crossover permit are usually extra. The concreting price guide has more examples, as a guide rather than a quote.

Your Adelaide concreter, matched

Describe what you want poured, roughly how big it is and the finish you like, and tell us the suburb. We’ll put one Adelaide concreter onto it once their CBS licence, insurance cover, ABN and reviews have been checked. Nobody else gets your number, and homeowners don’t pay for the service. See concreters, the Adelaide trades page, or get a free quote.