My husband and I owned a concrete lawn ornament business for 7 years. We bought a lot of concrete in North Carolina, packed it on a 30′ trailer, and drove up I 81 through Pennsylvania to get home in central New York. If anyone’s ever driven I 81, you know how bad the road surfaces are. Several pieces broke each trip no matter how well we packed them.
We found it quite necessary to learn to repair concrete while we were selling lawn ornaments. Each trip to the hardware store would bring home a new trial of another form of repair for the pieces. Different products would work best for different repairs.
Small holes – Quickrete Vinyl Concrete Patcher is available in powder and readymix patch repair. You can mix a small amount of the powder with water and stuff it into the hole. Whether you use the powder mix or the readymix, wipe any extra off the surface and let it dry thoroughly. You can sand the rough spots with sand paper.
Small cracks – Quickrete works well on the small cracks also. You can mix the powder a little thin. Squeeze the wet mix into the cracks and wipe off the excess.
Small piece broken off – Superglue works well to glue a small piece of concrete back onto concrete. Just make sure both surfaces are clean and fit together tightly. Hold in place until the superglue dries. Try to keep superglue off outside surfaces other than the break.
Large piece broken off – Bondo Body Filler – regular car Bondo – works the best. Bondo is available in red, blue, and grey. The grey is best if you can find it. The Bondo contains two containers and you mix the ingredients. The tube contains the color. The darker you make the color, the quicker the piece dries and sets up. Keep this in mind when you are mixing. You can file or sand off the excess. You will likely have to paint a piece after it has been repaired with Bondo to cover the repair.
Several pieces – When a concrete lawn ornament has broken into several pieces it is best repaired with Bondo.
When doing lawn ornament and statue repair, you will find that some products did not match up color as well as others, so this must be taken into consideration if you are not painting the piece after you repair it. You may want to paint a piece after the repair just to completely hide the repair.
Once a concrete piece is repaired properly, it is as strong as new. It’s great to be able to repair a damaged piece that you care a lot about.
Copyright 2006 Alice Scott