Hawthorne Torrance Concrete pours driveways, patios and garage slabs in Manhattan Beach, 5 miles up Sepulveda from Torrance. Every estimate is measured and written on site, at no charge.
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Manhattan Beach is built on dunes. West of Sepulveda Boulevard the ground is beach sand to a depth no driveway will reach, and it holds nothing at a cut and drains anything poured on it.
Sand is a good subgrade and a bad edge. Compacted and confined it carries a slab evenly, which is why the old cottages of the Sand Section sat on it for ninety years, but the moment a trench is dug the sides run in, and a slab poured to a form set on loose sand ends up thick at one end and thin at the other. Water is the other half. Rain passes straight through, so nothing heaves, but a footing for a step keeps sinking for a year if the sand under it was left as the excavator found it.
So the forms are staked deeper here than anywhere else we work, and the subgrade is wetted and plate-compacted until a probe stops moving before the base goes on. The base is 4 inches of crushed rock on a geotextile, because rock laid straight onto dune sand works down into it and is gone in a few winters. Steel is number 4 rebar at 18 inches, and every slab within a few blocks of the Strand gets a penetrating sealer at 28 days, because salt in the morning air reaches the steel.
Most concrete in Manhattan Beach is poured beside a house that is new, or one being taken down to the lot line and built again three stories tall. The slab has to fit a lot 30 or 40 feet wide, be reached from an alley, and be built for sand.
A Manhattan Beach drive is short, steep or both. In the Hill Section it falls from a garage under the house to the street, so it is poured at 5 inches with a heavy broom across the fall. On the 1950s streets east of Sepulveda Boulevard it is a flat two-car tear-out on loose sand.
Patios here go in behind a rebuild, in the strip the new house left, and the concrete comes up the walk street from a pump in the alley. We compact the sand, lay geotextile and rock, and pour 4 inches jointed to the width of the strip so the slab does not crack toward the house.
Stamped concrete in Manhattan Beach is asked for as a border and a path rather than a whole yard, since the lots are small and a large pattern reads as a few stones. We cast it into a 4 inch slab, and near the beach it is sealed at 28 days and resealed every 2 to 3 years.
The walk streets of the Sand Section are public walks, and the city keeps them. The path from your gate to the door is yours, and on a lot that falls to the walk it becomes steps and landings. We dowel each new panel into the old so the joint stays flush instead of lifting.
Garages under Hill Section houses and behind Tree Section ones have slabs poured on sand fifty or more years ago, thin and without a base, and the cracks follow where the sand settled. We break them out, compact, base and pour 5 inches troweled flat enough to take a coating.
Exposed aggregate suits Manhattan Beach because the salt air dulls a smooth finish within a few years and a washed surface hides it. We seed the stone into a 4 inch slab, wash it the same evening once the marine layer has let the surface set, and seal it at 28 days.
The Hill Section is built on the face of a dune, and a lot there steps 4 to 8 feet from the back fence to the street. A wall in sand is footed wider than one in clay, because sand spreads a load rather than gripping a stem, and drained behind so the sand cannot wash through.
Interior floors in Manhattan Beach go into new construction, garages turned into rooms, and the ground floors of rebuilt houses. We pour over a 10 mil vapor barrier on compacted sand, trowel the surface flat enough for tile, and cut the joints on a grid that suits the room.
Our office is on Hawthorne Boulevard in Torrance, and Manhattan Beach is 5 miles northwest up Sepulveda Boulevard with no freeway to sit on, so a crew is at Manhattan Beach Boulevard in about 20 minutes. Permits come from the Building and Safety Division of the city's Community Development Department at City Hall on Highland Avenue, and work on the apron, the parkway or the public walk takes an encroachment permit from Public Works. We file both and meet the inspector at the base.
The Sand Section is the hard one. Its walk streets have no road at the front door, so a mixer parks in the alley or on the nearest through street and the concrete is pumped up the walk, which is why a Sand Section patio is booked for the morning before the alley fills. The Hill Section above it has drives that fall to the street and garages under the house, so a drive there is broomed heavily across the fall. The Tree Section, between Ardmore and Sepulveda, is the flattest ground.
East of Sepulveda the city changes. Liberty Village and the streets around Polliwog Park went up in the 1950s as one-story tracts on lots wide enough for a two-car drive, and these are the drives now being replaced, poured thin sixty years ago on sand that was never compacted. Manhattan Village came later, with drives still sound. Everywhere in the city the marine layer sits on a pour until late morning from May to July, which slows the set and gives the finisher time.
Four stages, one crew, and the order is fixed by the sand. Nothing is formed until the subgrade has been compacted and probed, and nothing is agreed until the estimate has been written at the property and handed over.
Kenji Okamoto measures the slab, walks the pump route from the alley or the street, probes the sand and writes the estimate before leaving.
Old concrete and topsoil come out, the sand is wetted and plate-compacted until firm, then geotextile and 4 inches of crushed rock go down.
We file with Building and Safety on Highland Avenue and book the pump, and on a walk street we reserve the alley space for the morning.
Most jobs run 2 or 3 days on site. Joints cut the same afternoon, feet after 24 hours, cars after 7 days, and a sealer at 28 days by the sea.
Call or send the form and we reply within 1 business day with a day for the visit. We measure at the property, probe the sand and write the figure before we leave, and there is no charge for any of it and no obligation to book.
Reviews
Reviews left on Google, Facebook and the BBB by homeowners across the South Bay, quoted as they were written. Some of them are in Manhattan Beach, and the work they describe is the work above.
“The garage slab in our 1955 house had heaved and the door would not close. They broke it out in a morning, found no base under it, compacted 4 inches of rock, poured 440 square feet at 5 inches and troweled it smooth. The estimate was written in our driveway and the invoice matched it.”
“We built an ADU and Hawthorne Torrance Concrete did the slab. They set the forms to the plans, the City inspector passed the steel first time, and the pour went in before eight in the morning. 620 square feet, edges thickened to 12 inches, and the framers were on it a week later.”
“Our slope in the Riviera crept onto the patio every winter. They dug footings 30 inches into the clay, poured a 42-foot wall with weep holes and a drain behind it, and backfilled with gravel. Kenji Okamoto came back after the first rains to check it. Dry, straight, and it has not moved.”
Cost, permits, the sand, the salt and the alley, answered the way we answer them at the door in Manhattan Beach. The visit is free and the estimate is written on site, so none of these answers is a guess.
Access more than area. A slab behind a house on a walk street is pumped from the alley, which is a pump on the estimate that a Tree Section drive does not carry, and a tear-out that has to be barrowed out the same way adds crew hours. Thickness and finish move it after that. Every estimate is measured and written on site, after the pump route has been walked, so the figure is measured rather than quoted.
Not for flatwork inside your lot line, which the California Residential Code exempts. The apron, the curb cut and the public walk are the city's, and take an encroachment permit from Public Works. A retaining wall over 4 feet, or a slab under an addition, takes a building permit from the Building and Safety Division at City Hall on Highland Avenue. We file whichever the job needs and meet the inspector.
Not if the sand was compacted before it was poured. Dune sand carries a load well once it is confined and dense, and the old cottages stood on it for decades. What sinks is a slab poured on sand an excavator loosened, or a footing dug and filled the same day. We wet and plate-compact the subgrade, lay geotextile so the base cannot migrate down into the sand, and probe it before the forms go in.
Yes, through the surface. Concrete is porous, and on the blocks nearest the Strand the marine layer carries salt onto a slab every morning, where it soaks in and in time reaches the steel. So a slab west of Highland Avenue is poured with the steel held at mid-depth on chairs, sealed with a penetrating sealer at 28 days, and resealed every 2 to 3 years, which is the schedule that keeps the surface closed.
About 10 days from the first day of tear-out. Demolition and base take a day or two, the pour is one morning, and the joints are cut that afternoon. You can walk on it after 24 hours and park after 7 days. On a walk street the alley is the only way to the garage, so where a shared drive is the only way out for a neighbor we pour it in halves and keep one side open.
By access and by age. West of Sepulveda Boulevard the lots are narrow, the houses are new or being rebuilt, and everything is pumped from an alley. East of it, in Liberty Village and around Polliwog Park, the 1950s tracts have wide drives on sand that was never compacted, and those are tear-outs a mixer can back up to. The sand is the same on both sides, and so is the base we build on it.
Manhattan Beach shares a border with Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, El Segundo and Hawthorne, and we cover every one of them from the same office. If your street sits on a city line, the page for the town next door says how the ground changes there.
Open the Torrance Office in Google Maps Send the form and we call you back within 1 business day to book the visit. The estimate is free and written on site, and every slab carries a written guarantee.