Hi

My house is on a hill and the garden slopes from left to right and
from front to back. The back right hand corner is currently a kids
play area with bark laid over a weed control fabric. The area gets
quite soggy/muddy though so I thought I might turn it into a patio
which hopefuly should make better use of the space.

I've looked at Cormaic's excellent site but jsut want to confirm that
I won't need a sub-base. Do I just lay a 40-50mm bed and place the
slabs directly onto this ? Also should I remove all the bark and
fabric first ?

Cheers

Jim

In article ,
Jim wrote:
My house is on a hill and the garden slopes from left to right and
from front to back. The back right hand corner is currently a kids
play area with bark laid over a weed control fabric. The area gets
quite soggy/muddy though so I thought I might turn it into a patio
which hopefuly should make better use of the space.

I've looked at Cormaic's excellent site but jsut want to confirm that
I won't need a sub-base. Do I just lay a 40-50mm bed and place the
slabs directly onto this ? Also should I remove all the bark and
fabric first ?

Having had a bit of experience with patio slabs, here's some thoughts
of mine:

1) Patio slabs are *heavy* (even for blokes). The ones I was saddled
with (existed previously) were 60cmx90cm ones, and I'd recommend smaller,
much easier to manoeuvre.

2) Consider what's going to happen to the water. If that's an area
where water tends to collect, that's not just going to stop because you've
got a patio there. Can the water drain elsewhere? Will it sit on top
of your patio causing puddles? Or will you just have slabs on top of
an unstable soggy site?

3) You only want to lay each slab once. Taking care to have a nice
flat smooth sand bed for the slab to go on is much needed. If the
slab can find a tiny unevenness to wobble on, it will!

4) The top end of my patio is slabs laid on a little layer of sandy
gravelly soil (well I don't know what it was originally but that's
what it looks like now) with dabs of mortar underneath. It has been
absolutely fine not laid on a subbase.

5) Consider the cracks in between paving slabs. If you have gaps,
even a few mm, soil *will* get in there and you *will* have to weed
frequently.

Sharon

In message , Jim
writes
Hi

My house is on a hill and the garden slopes from left to right and
from front to back. The back right hand corner is currently a kids
play area with bark laid over a weed control fabric. The area gets
quite soggy/muddy though so I thought I might turn it into a patio
which hopefuly should make better use of the space.

I've looked at Cormaic's excellent site but jsut want to confirm that
I won't need a sub-base. Do I just lay a 40-50mm bed and place the
slabs directly onto this ?

As I understand it yes, it's in general fine for a patio to be laid onto
the sand bed (I assume that the ground here is level enough - if it
slopes much you would need to use some sub-base material to bring it up.

I like to use a weak sharp sand/cement dry mix to lay them onto.

Don't forget to allow for drainage from the patio.

Also should I remove all the bark and
fabric first ?

Certainly the bark, you could leave the membrane down if you want, but
it would serve no purpose I'd take it up and use it elsewhere.
--
Chris French and Helen Johnson, Leeds
urg Suppliers and References FAQ:
http://www.familyfrench.co.uk/garden/urgfaq/index.html

"Chris French and Helen Johnson" wrote in
message ...
Also should I remove all the bark and
fabric first ?

Certainly the bark, you could leave the membrane down if you want, but
it would serve no purpose I'd take it up and use it elsewhere.


Bark: agree take it away. in situ it would rot and leave cavities = wonky
base fro paving

Membrane: Actually better to leave in situ. A geotextile membrane is a good
idea in such situations to keep the soil ans sand separate - the current
membrane is prob not a true geotextile but it is bwtter than nowt!

pk