Looking to buy a wheel barrel. Will using it to move some bricks and for other around the house usage. Seems HD and Sears are the only major dealers for wheel barrels around here. Any recommendations... metal, plastic? Other features to look for?
I may be mixing some cement. Do they still use wheel barrels for this... metal or plastic... any difference? Or, am I better off mixing cement in something else? I'll be filling some sonar tubes (sp?) and mortaring around the house. Thanks!
I think you'll find the metal variety much more durable. The tendency for mortar to slosh around and tip the wheel barrow will be greatly diminished if you get a two-wheeled model. You can even handle them with one hand. BTW - it's 'barrow'.
Actuall the barrel will roll just fine w/o the wheel.
I got a relatively cheap one at Wal-Mart last year (metal, single wheel) and it seems to work fine.
As for the one-wheel vs. two-wheel: The tradeoff is stability (two-wheel) vs. manuverability (one-wheel). single-wheels are easy to tip if you're not careful, but they're also the only kind you can roll up a 2x6 and dump into a footing...
As for the best way to mix concrete -- I'd say rent an electric mixer. I'm actually going to be doing this in a few hours to pour 7 deck footing tubes... I did it the manual wheelbarrow way a couple years ago for a buddy's deck and it wasn't much fun.
-Tim
Thanks for all the advice. I didn't know it. We had one up in the attic. It's an old metal one with a steel wheel. It's old, and a bit awkward to handle. But, it will do the job.
Thanks for the mixer idea too. I'll probably to filling a number of two to three foot deep tubes. For mortaring around the house I could do the mixing by hand.
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