Thanks for the many responses. Sorry about the vagueness of the terminology. I was talking about mortar vs. sand when dry laying bricks. We're still in the middle of the project. It's been interesting. Bahia, I'm glad you agree and would not be "inclined to fault someone for not being able to fully explain the process in english." These were not workers we obtained ourselves at a "shape-up" outside Home Depot. The contractor was hired at full-dollar, and these are workers he obtained. And I do fault the contractor for switching crews mid-project and substituting a crew who had an entirely different conception of what the project is. Fortunately, I have many bilingual neighbors who can help with translating. Today we've made it clear we want a 2-inch bed of sand, as promised, and that they will have to dig deeper to accommodate that. Half inch of sand won't cut it. We've hired a lowboy Dumpster to put all the soil and broken concrete in, something the contractor promised to do but reneged on. We do not want them disposing of four 3x3 foot slabs of concrete from an old jacuzzi pad we inherited by BURYING them underneath where the patio is supposed to go, as they were doing yesterday. Just intuitively, that would seem to invite uneven settling of the patio. This was all hashed out before work started with the first crew. The second crew was not properly informed by the contractor and was improvising with disposal of debris, since nobody wanted to cut into their profits by renting a lowboy. So these guys have to dig up the concrete, break it up, and they're piling it up on trees, wherever they can. Do twice the work, in other words. In record 97-degree heat. And they thought 1/2 inch of sand would be OK because where in hell is all that excavated dirt going to go with no lowboy to put it in? Seemed like such a simple job, one we've done many times ourselves, except our backs aren't what they were 20 years ago. We think we're all on the same page. We'll see what happens.

These control joints should not be effected by putting the polymeric sand in them. Their sole purpose is to create a weakened plane in the concrete to control the cracking. I have never seen the polymeric sand used in this manner. Maybe someone else will chime in. I would think silicone or some other crack sealant would be more appropriate. Have you checked whats available at the local home improvement store? Riles

You might want to try polymeric sand by Techniseal. It hardens up, but looks just like sand. It lasts about two years before a re-apply. My DH and I did a re-apply to our flagtone walkway in about an hour yesterday. It looks like new except where a few birds walked through it! We have wider joints since we have flagstone. Last summer, I put the polyermic sand on an 18x20 flagstone patio in just a few hours by myself. You need 2 days of dry weather on either side of the application. Don't walk on it for 24 hours. You lightly mist the sand between layers. It comes in grey or taupe. A bag costs around $19.00 here at the local John Deere Landscaping store.

Pennsylvania is a state with a fair variety . . . What littlebug was saying was that labor costs per hour isn't a set rate. What one pays in well-off Philadelphia suburbs won't be what one pays in economically depressed areas and what might be the going rate in CA isn't going to be the same in OH or NH, big city or small town. "Aren't they literally just brushing it in with a broom and wetting it with a hose?" IME sweeping sand into the cracks in between brick or block is time consuming; one puts down sand and sweeps in many different directions, and then puts down more and repeats the process. If you don't want gaps and future heaving and cracking, it takes time. When you are paying someone labor, rolled into that is the cost of their tools, health insurance, liability insurance, time and gas money spent speccing out and tracking down materials, etc. etc., not just what you see them doing for the work on your sidewalk. All the things that make up the general cost of the job has to be divied up and included in that labor fee, along with their expertise. So whether it is reasonable as far as cost . . . is kind of up to you. Arre you willing and able to do the job? Are you satisfied with the quality of the work? Would you hire them again? If so, I'd say it most likely was worth the cost. Conventional wisdom is that one can have any two of three: fast, inexpensive, or done well.