Hi,

Ive got a week off next week so im going to attempt to sort out our
back garden (god help me)

Its currently covered in slabs and some really dodgy crazy paving,
along with a plethora of weeds and other unwanted fir trees and stuff.
So basically all that is coming out. We have very clayey soil (Luton
area) which no doubt has been compacted by the slabs/paving and will
have virtually no drainage capabilities.

What we want to do is to seed a new lawn with some good quality grass
seed. Its about a 6x15m area.

My question is about ground preparation. We would like to add about 3
inches of topsoil to this part of the garden to raise it up a bit, but
dont know if we have to prepare the clay soil below this. It seems
pretty obvious to me that we need to do something to aid drainage all
over this area, but im not sure if the 3 inches of topsoil will do this
on its own.

Is it advisable to dig in a tonne or so of sharp sand to aid in
drainage, or is it really not worth it. We are on a pretty tight budget
so if we can do without it would be beneficial, but i dont mind
spending a bit more on sand just to make sure that we arent going to
end up with a bog in winter.

Also, any links to hand cultivators in the uk ('Garden Weasel'??) would
be helpful, cant really afford to go the whole hog with a rotovator
(and i think it would be hard work in our soil anyway, probably just as
hard to use a fork/hand cultivator).

Many thanks

Mark