Breaking concrete?

[cacher_chick]

My 50 year old concrete stoop is in bad shape. It's 3' high and 48" square at the top. Today I sunk a 7" long masonry bit into it in several places and found nothing but concrete. I'm thinking it might be solid through and through. I need to bust this thing up and get it out of here, along with a 15'x20' concrete slab that is 3-4" thick.

Ideally this might be a good job for a large air compressor and full-sized pneumatic jackhammer. I'm wondering what my other options are? Is an electric jackhammer up to the task? How about a bobcat with a breaker attachment?

The local rental place has all the above options, I'm just not sure which is the most painless and cost-efficient?

Opinions?

[kingsotall]

You seem like a bobcat with breaker attachment gal to me. :cool:

[hj]

The Bobcat will be more kidney friendly, and faster, but might cost a lot more. The electric breaker will take forever if it is actually all concrete.

[Gary Swart]

I have a 3 function hammer-drill that is invaluable for small concrete breaking and hole drilling, but this sound like a job for super breaker. A number of years ago I had to remove concrete steps, and I rented a big jack hammer and compressor. I was overpowered. I ended up hiring a guy with a backhoe and dump truck. He just pulled and rolled the whole thing to the street and into the truck! It gave real meaning to the expression, "Cast in concrete".

[plumbingskool]

I would use a rental jackhammer, That should do you fine,

Check out Taylor Rental if you have one in the Area:)

[FloridaOrange]

I'd go with the bobcat. The jackhammer will certainly do the job but then you have to deal with moving the concrete to your disposal area/dumpster/neighbors pickup.

[sjsmithjr]

I have personally spent a lot of quality time with a Hitachi 70lb demo hammer. It'll get the job done (eventually) and maybe do you in as well, but you can't hang a bucket off of it to move and load the debris when your done.

If the stoop is solid, you could always try some non explosive demolition agent :D

[frenchie]

Another vote for the bobcat.