Hawthorne Torrance Concrete saws drives, patios and floors where new concrete joins old, full depth and straight, so the edge takes a dowel, not a crack. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
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How a slab is cut here
A cut is a joint before it is a hole. On most jobs in Torrance the concrete being sawn stays, and the new work is poured against the sawn face, so that face has to be plumb, full depth and on a straight line for a dowel to be drilled into it. A breaker leaves an edge that feathers to nothing at the top, and concrete poured against that edge cracks along it inside a winter. The saw is what makes the join a joint, which is why we cut before we break.
Hawthorne Torrance Concrete was founded in 2017 by Kenji Okamoto, who put in 19 years on South Bay crews first, and he marks every cut line himself with the new work drawn beside it. The saw runs wet from a tank on the machine, the slurry goes into a vacuum and not the gutter, and the cores and slab plugs go in the truck rather than the green bin. A cut on a tract lot in West Torrance is over by lunch, with the yard hosed down and the dust never in the house.
Any cut that reaches the apron, the curb or the public walk is right-of-way work under an encroachment permit from the City's Public Works Department, and a trench for a new sewer lateral is permitted as plumbing and inspected open. The work is done under our CSLB C-8 license with the California Contractors State License Board, with liability insurance on every job, and every cut carries a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built.
When a saw is needed
The single-car drive the tract came with is a car short, and the second one sits on the grass or the street. Widening it means the existing edge is sawn straight to the depth of the slab before the new panel goes in, so the two are pinned with dowels instead of butted.
A parkway tree lifts the panel nearest the street an inch, and the rest of the drive is sound. That one panel is sawn out on its joints and repoured with a root barrier under it, and the drive keeps the rest of its concrete. The whole run comes out only when all of it is that bad.
A 1950s patio was poured to 10 or 12 feet and the yard runs on past it. Extending it means the outer edge is sawn back to sound concrete on a straight line, the new slab is doweled to it, and a joint is tooled where old meets new so the two can move without cracking each other.
A new lateral to an ADU, a gas line or a conduit has to cross the drive or the garage floor, and it is going in whether or not the concrete is ready. A sawn trench 12 to 18 inches wide comes out clean, takes the line and the inspection, and is patched flush on dowels.
In every cut
Eight things are in every cut at no separate line, and each answers something this city's lots do. Drives were poured one car wide, patios stop short, and the lines to an ADU have to cross concrete poured sixty years before anyone planned them.
The cut is drawn where the new pour or the trench needs it and the joint layout of the old slab checked, so the cut lands on a line that stays.
A core tells the slab's true thickness and what is in it, and a scan finds copper or conduit in the sand beneath, before the blade is set.
The blade runs wet and through the whole slab in one pass, so the face is plumb to the bottom and nothing is snapped off below the cut.
The wet dust is pulled into a vacuum at the blade and taken away, because slurry down a gutter sets in the storm drain and draws a fine.
Holes are drilled into the sawn face at 12 to 18 inches and epoxied rebar set, so the new concrete is pinned to the old and cannot step.
The sawn panel or plug is lifted out whole where it can be, so the base under the slab next to it is left compacted and undisturbed.
The concrete goes to the crusher the same day and the drive is hosed clean, with the gutter checked before the truck leaves the street.
We walk the cut with you against the estimate, its depth, line and dowels, and the written guarantee is handed over before we leave.
How it can be cut
Four ways to open a slab on a lot this size, set against what the cut is for and how deep the concrete runs. The marking, the scan and the dowels are the same in all four, so the table is about the tool and the edge it leaves.
| Option | Suits | Cuts to | Edge it leaves | Back in use |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Walk-behind slab saw | Drive edges and trench lines, 6 feet and up | Up to 6 inches with a 20-inch blade | Plumb, straight, ready for dowels | Pour against it the same day |
| Hand-held cut-off saw | Short cuts, corners and inside a garage | 4 to 5 inches with a 14-inch blade | Plumb, with the corner finished square | Pour against it the same day |
| Diamond core drill | A round hole for a pipe, a post or a drain | Any thickness, 2 to 12 inches across | A clean sleeve, no breakout below | Pipe fitted the same day |
| Breaker with a relief cut | Whole panels coming out for replacement | The whole slab, once the edges are sawn | Ragged inside the sawn line only | Base recompacted before a pour |
The walk-behind saw is the least to run per foot and the core drill the most per hole. A breaker is cheaper than either and leaves an edge that has to be sawn anyway.
Lots and lines
Two things put a saw on a Torrance lot before the truck comes, both the tract's doing. The 1950s single-car drive is a car short, and the lines to an ADU cross concrete poured 60 years before it.
The tracts that filled the fields between Old Torrance and the beach cities were sold with a drive one car wide, 8 to 10 feet from the street to a single garage, and most households there now run two cars or three. Widening the drive is the cut we make most, and it is a join, not a removal. The edge is sawn back to sound concrete on a straight line, drilled and doweled, and the new panel poured against it at the same depth. A wider apron goes under the City's encroachment permit.
The ADU is the newer reason. A unit built over or behind the garage needs a sewer lateral, water and power, and on a tract lot every one of those crosses the drive, the garage floor or the side-yard walk on the way to the street. The trench is sawn in two parallel lines, the strip lifted out, the line laid and inspected in the open trench, and the strip patched flush on dowels so nobody trips on it. Where the garage floor itself is going, we pour the new slab after the cut.
From mark to patch
Five stages, one crew, and the person who marks the line is the person on the saw. Any cut reaching the apron or the walk is permitted before the blade starts, and a trench for a lateral is inspected open.
Kenji Okamoto draws the cut beside the new work, cores a hole for the thickness, scans for lines and writes the figure before he goes.
You confirm the width and the depth, the apron permit or the plumbing permit is filed where one applies, and a morning is set for the saw.
The blade runs wet through the full depth on the marked line, the slurry is vacuumed as it forms, and the panel or strip is lifted out whole.
Rebar is epoxied into the sawn face at 12 to 18 inches, a trench gets its line laid and inspected, and the base is recompacted for the pour.
The new concrete goes in flush on the dowels, the seam is tooled, the drive is hosed and the gutter checked, and the paperwork is handed over.
Behind the number
Feet of cut and the thickness under the blade start the figure, and what the scan finds finishes it. Two drives the same width can be a day apart once the core is read, so nothing is quoted by phone. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
Widening a 1950s drive is 20 to 40 feet of sawn edge at 4 inches and a row of dowels, and whether the apron widens too is the line that varies.
A shared drive or courtyard slab was poured thicker and often with mesh, so the depth per foot rises and the cut is planned around tenants' cars.
A trench from the back of the lot to the street is sawn twice its length, lifted in strips and inspected open, so the run's length sets most.
A reinforced slab at a shop off Western Avenue or Lomita Boulevard takes a larger blade, a second pass and rebar cut through, figured by the inch.
The core, the scan and the written figure cost nothing, and the call to set a time for them comes within 1 business day. (424) 484-9860 or send us a message.
Send the form or call, and someone rings back within 1 business day to set a time. Kenji Okamoto marks the line, cores the depth and writes the figure at your property, and the sheet is yours to keep whether or not you book.
Slabs we cut
Three reviews left on Google, Facebook and the BBB, each about a cut rather than a new pour, and each naming the width sawn, the depth found or the line that went through.
“Our drive in Southwood was one car wide and my son's truck lived on the street. They sawed the edge dead straight, drilled it and doweled the new 9-foot panel to it, and widened the apron at the curb under the City permit. You have to look for the seam. Three years on there is no step.”
“We built an ADU over the garage in North Torrance and the sewer line had to cross the drive and the garage floor. Two saw lines, the strip out in pieces, the inspector saw the pipe in the open trench and the patch was flush the next day. The dust never got into the house.”
“One panel by the street had lifted over a root and my mother tripped on it. Hawthorne Torrance Concrete cored it to check the thickness, found it poured 3 inches thick, sawed just that panel out on its joints and repoured it at 4 with a root barrier. The rest of the 1958 drive is there.”
Before you book
What moves the figure, how long the saw is on your drive, what the City permits, what the guarantee covers and whether you have to be home, answered for a slab on a lot here.
The feet of edge, the thickness under the blade and what the scan finds, more than the size of the piece coming out. A 4-inch tract drive saws at walking pace. A 6-inch reinforced floor takes a bigger blade, a second pass and rebar cut through, and a slab with copper in the sand under it is cut shallow and finished by hand along that stretch. All three are read off the core and the scan at your property.
A morning for most cuts on a tract lot, and a day where the piece is a trench. Marking and coring take an hour, a 30-foot edge saws in about the same, and lifting out the strip and vacuuming the slurry is the rest of the morning. A trench for a lateral then waits open for the plumber and the inspector, which is a day or two that belongs to them, and the patch goes in flush the day after it passes.
Yes. Lifting the sawn pieces, loading them and hauling them to a crusher is written into the figure, and so are the dowels and the patch where the cut is a trench. What sits outside the figure is named at the visit rather than added later, which is the plumber's line in a lateral trench, the encroachment permit fee at the apron, and any repair to a pipe the scan showed and the cut went round.
Nothing sawn inside your lot line, which the California Residential Code leaves alone as flatwork. The apron, the curb and the public walk are the City's, and a cut there takes an encroachment permit from Public Works, with the repour inspected. A trench for a sewer lateral or a gas line is permitted as plumbing through the Community Development Department and inspected before it is closed. We file both.
Only when the cut is part of repairing a covered loss. A drive widened or a patio extended is an improvement and is yours to pay for. A slab cut open to reach a burst supply line under it is often covered under the policy's access clause, since the carrier pays to get to the leak even where it does not pay for the pipe, and that is the case to put to your adjuster. Photograph the floor before anything is cut.
How it was cut and closed, meaning the depth sawn, the line held, the dowels drilled and epoxied at the spacing on the estimate, and the patch poured flush, with those terms printed before you sign. It is a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built. Cracks in the old slab beyond the cut, a line the plumber laid, and ground moving under a patch sit outside it. Our fault, we fix it.
A diamond blade, 14 inches on the hand saw and 20 on the walk-behind, run wet from a tank on the machine, and a diamond core bit for holes. The dowels are number 4 rebar epoxied 6 inches into the sawn face at 12 to 18 inches apart, and a patch is 3,500 psi ready-mix poured to the depth the core showed. The blade size, the dowel spacing and the mix are on the estimate, so what arrives can be checked.
Only for the marking at the start and the walk-through at the end. In between the crew needs a hose bib, the cars off the drive and the gate unlocked, and the saw is loud for about an hour, which the neighbors on both sides will hear. If the cut takes the whole width of the drive, tell us at the visit and it is sawn in halves so a car can always get out to the street.
Towns we cut in
The eight nearest towns on the coverage list, with the straight-line distance from the office on Hawthorne Boulevard beside each. Every cut is marked and cored at the property before a figure is written.
Four jobs the saw is usually the first day of, poured against the sawn edge by the same crew, on the same dowels, and itemized on the one written estimate.
The widened or replaced drive poured against the sawn edge and doweled at the seam.
The patio extended past its 1950s edge, sawn back to sound concrete first.
The ADU slab behind the garage, with its lateral trenched across the lot to the street.
The garage floor repoured whole where the trench found it too thin to keep.
Call or send the form and you hear back within 1 business day. Say roughly how many feet need sawing and what the cut is for, a wider drive or a line going through, and the visit can be booked inside the same week.