Paving

prajacWed 14/05/08 10:43

Has anyone ever done their own paving?

My budget is rather tight and I want to try and tackle it by myslef.

I have a lawn (- i lied it is mostly weeds now lol) which I wish to remove.

I believe I have to put black liner down and then a layer of sand (and cement?) before I lay the stones down.

Any advice would be most welcome

mintladdWed 14/05/08 11:23

You don't need to have any cement. They call the mixture of sand and cement powder dry mix.

You don't need to have black liner -- it stops the sand being absorbed into the earth over time though.

When my Dad taught me how to lay paving slabs (when I helped him as a kid and as a youth) it was a 2-3" layer of stones (anything from cherry sized up to plum sized) then the sand (he used coarse sand -- I believe they now call it hard sand? but beach sand works too -- I used that when I laid a path for my Mum about 6-7 years ago and it's still level with no tilted slabs).

When laying the slabs, use a spirit level to have a slight slope so that water doesn't lie on them.

pathoWed 14/05/08 11:25

you shouldn't need to put any barrier between the soil and the sand cement mix, I regularly get help and advice from another forum: www.diynot.co.uk

pathoWed 14/05/08 11:27

www.diynot.com not co.uk

ollysugarWed 14/05/08 11:48

I am in the same boat - got a couple of quotes in - all came in around £2000, (my garden is about 4mx4m and only 60% of it needs doing!) and that was just to re-lay the concrete slabs that had been put down so badly in the first place that the paving looked like a badly made bed.

I started by digging out some of the topsoil, and ground to a halt. So I got some help, and managed to dig up, and bag, about a skip-full of soil.

I have my weed suppressing membrane to put down, and have to now hire a skip, buy the sand and re-lay the paving. I suspect that I will have to lay out about £600 to do it myself, to a worse spec than getting someone else to do it; I have no experience either.

So, I feel unhappy about the whole thing really, but I live in a council flat, and can't spend £2k on a the garden of a rented flat that I could be putting toward a deposit.

And I have had to locate some experience and some muscle - I reckon to have spent at least £200 of the outlay on help to do the job, which I started a year ago... if I had to put new paving down it would another £150.

There is a brief fact sheet here: http://www.applegategardens.co.uk/free/patio_1.pdf

And you will probably turn up a couple more on the internet. I wish there was more to it than a positive attitude and some brawn; get some help is the only advice - if only a muscular migrant - my mate who did most of the digging is russian, and very grateful for the work.

prajacWed 14/05/08 12:09

Thank you all for your advice

I have just had a quote from HSS hire for a power digger to get rid of the turf - £60 for the weekend

Im gonna give it a try

I am only hoping that the stones will stay level. I thought the cement would stop them moving. Sometimes over time some paving slabs recess and you trip over them - how do you stop that from happening?

mintladdWed 14/05/08 12:40

quoting > "ometimes over time some paving slabs recess and you trip over them - how do you stop that from happening?"

If you read quickfind:ollysugar's fact sheet...

By compacting the rubble and sand you'll make sure that the sand cant "drain away" between the stones of the rubble. You don't need a mechanical compactor though...

When my Dad taught me how to lay slabs, he used to put the sand down on the rubble/stones and then with every slab (as part of the leveling process) lift it's edge about 4-6" and bump it down -- I now realise that was to compact the sand into the stones below. This might have to get done more than once per slab checking the level each time and topping up the sand in what ever corner or side will make the level correct (bearing in mind that you don't lay the slabs quite level [all sloping the same direction though!] for rain water to run off). By taking time to make sure at this stage that slabs don't rock either, it's unlikely that they will suffer subsidence of the sand making them uneven later on.