Laying Limestone Patio

My gardener is laying some limestone slabs for me on Friday. So far he has cleared the garden of all the old paving slabs, but he left a few behind. He has smashed them up into quite small pieces and spread them over the garden. He says he will lay the slabs on top of this, (and the cement).

Is this the right way of doing it? I'm going ask for more of an explanation from him tomorrow, as to what the bits of old slab are for, but if anyone has any ideas please let me know! Some of the bits are quite large so I'm worried the paving will be really high..

 

Can you post some photos pls?

 

You can kind of see on the right hand side of this pic..

 

I would think it needs a sand bed on top ?, then lay slabs, the sand should even it all out, ask him what the finished height will be before he starts, then he can remove some of the pieces if you want it lower.

 

Is it where the slabs were before (new ones, replacing old ones)? or a new area? and if so was it cultivated, or hard packed (like lawn)?

If it is where the old ones were I expect it will be fine, but for a new area it needs to be well compressed, having first had a few inches removed, and Type 1 aggregate (or similar) laid (in place of the soil that was removed) and that compacted down well. His broken paving slabs is sort of doing that job but, on its own, I doubt it will be enough (hence if on top of existing I think it would be fine)

Paving Expert is a great site - technical, but I think relatively easy for a layperson to get the hang of what the concepts are. Might be worth a read so you have an idea of the "ideal" and can then decide whether the proposed work is going to be OK, or "shift all over the place" in a year or two
http://www.pavingexpert.com/layflag1.htm

 

Hmmm...That's not how mine was laid, I'm sure mine was laid purely on a bed of sand or sand/cement. I'm having the front path done at the moment, I'll ask the groundworker (he's a neighbour who is doing it in the evenings)

Limestone is relatively fragile so could easily crack if not laid correctly so if this is a cowboy, stop him before he costs you a fortune in replacement stone!

 

Thanks for the replies. Yes, the cement/sand is going to go on top of the hardcore.. I'm pretty sure he's not doing spot-bedding! He said he will be 'pointing' the slabs.

Whether or not this guy is a cowboy is what I'm trying to figure out! I needed to keep costs down so I found this guy who quoted me half the price of another landscaper. I'm not looking for a designer pristine finish, but it needs to reasonable.

He's laying turf now at the end of the garden, and he's emptied several bags of new soil on the hard soil that was already there. Is that OK? I expected that he would raise the hard soil a bit first to enable drainage..

 

That's the bit where they fill in the cracks between the slabs (e.g. with cement - if it is left as, say, sand then weeds would grow in it). Doesn't tell you whether the slabs will be spot-bedded, or not ...

I wouldn't say so ... Turf requires the ground to be prepared first - dug or rotavated - then levelled, then firmed, and then turf laid (if you were going to sow seed you would start with exactly the same preparation). If the level needs changing then you could add topsoil of course, but if not there is no need for topsoil - other than to provide some fine material on top of prepared ground to make it easier to get a level (if ground is very stony / lumpy).

Sounds like he has skipped the soil preparation stage and intends to just put topsoil over hard packed soil, in which case it won't drain well and the grass won't establish well. The resulting lawn might be "good enough", but given that turf costs £X the difference between proper preparation and "skimped" is not all that significant in the total cost.

 

No, laid directly onto compacted ground? The previous patio had been laid in the same way and that hadn't moved?

 

This is how the paving is looking at the moment -



Looks ok i hope! It's all going to be pointed afterwards to fill in all the gaps. Not sure what colour pointing i should have..

 

I noticed in the above picture soil is being put into the raised bed. With the amount of rubble in there very little will grow as the soil isn't deep enough. Personally I'd empty it completely of rubble and fill it with soil.