Colouring Concrete

[MikeT]

Hello. I've got some existing treated pine timber stairs of varying tread depths (up to a meter). It has been previously filled with that coloured gravel that is real annoying (gets weeds, hard to clean leaves from, isn't flat) so I'm going to dig it out and fill the tread depth with concrete. One day I'd like to replace the stairs with sandstone - but it's a fair distance, and I'd like to do it myself so I reckon it'll be a while.

In the interim - concrete. I'd like to colour it somewhat so it blends in better. Not sure what yet as I may stain the timber as well (first question - does treated pine stain fine) Research i've done throws up lots of different ideas. From adding paint/liquid stain to the concrete to etching and staining afterwards to adding proper colour powder to the concrete. The last one seems the preferred option but hard to gauge the final colour - and the colours are very different in cost - sandstone colour (whatever that really means) is almost 3 times yellow?

So firstly, any experience on different approaches would be great (or point me somewhere that sells this stuff that really knows what they're on about).
And if I am to stain what is likely to give me a more predictable outcome - white cement and white sand (as opposed to river sand and normal cement) or will this give a colour with lack of body. It would be nice to simulate the varied colours of weathered sandstone but I suspect that takes a bit of practice.

Cheers,
Mike.


Basically I

[MikeT]

Oh - and I'm in the sydney hills district.

[woodbe]

We coloured some concrete for the new gutters on our driveway last year. We had the option of colouring all the concrete (they throw a bag of colour in the truck as it leaves the depot) or adding a top dressing to the laid concrete before it sets, and trowelling it in.

As it turned out, labour was cheaper than pigment, so we did the top dressing thing.

The advantage of doing all the concrete is that chips etc won't show grey underneath...

woodbe.

[MikeT]

Thanks Woodbe.

I'll be mixing it myself. Not big enough quantities for delivery. I had considered sprinkling the stuff on the top and working it in but didn't think I could get it consistant. This may not be a bad thing if it looks like natural variation - but will be if it looks like cr@p.

[woodbe]

That's what they did. The concrete was worked in the usual way, and then the colour powder was sprinkled over the surface - probably a few mm thick, then trowelled into the surface of the concrete. It looks fine, I can't find a patch on it anywhere.