Soakaway Installation

Hi,

Considering having a go at installing a soakaway in my garden. Water builds up in the corner and sits on the surface which I want to fix. The soil contains a lot of clay which I'm currently removing and the plan would be to plant grass on the surface.

I saw a number of designs where people installed a crate with piping but a little unsure if the pipe is required. As a newbie what would you recommend in terms of an approach? The water on the surface isn't huge but it's noticeable. If I do go the crate route how deep would the crate need to be?

 

I cannot be of much help except I know my neighbour extended our septic tank and installed plastic crates. There must be a pipe or hole to take away surplus liquid as we never have the tank emptied so I would guess you would need an overflow pipe somewhere. Especially as we seem to be having so much rain these days.

 

To give you some idea.

Blackstart

 

I think the problem with a soakaway is that you need the surrounding soil to be capable of, well, soaking it away, if it just a water logged area it will still be a waterlogged area.

Dig a hole about a foot deep and see if the water goes away, if it doesn't I think you could be wasting your time.

 

Agree with @pete if its clay on top , likely is more solid clay down under and nothing will drain away from that, so as he says do dig a test hole etc to see whats down there.

Can you put in some form of drain to move the water away from that area ?

The other alternative to make that area home to damp loving plants ?

 

Sorry the notifications didn't come through. Thanks all for your help.

Have started digging out the clay and will replace with soil. I have found that the water does sit in the hole that I have dug but importantly doesn't fill it. I guess...if I replace the clay with soil it may absorb the water meaning I don't require a soakaway. I'll remove more clay and see what happens.

Thanks again for all of your advice.

 

Great video...might need one at the front of the house and certainly gives a lot of insight into how it's done.

 

When you dig, pay attention to the colour of the material you remove. It is likely that you will find at least one layer of plastercine like texture, often due to consolidation while wet.
If you find a layer that is grey/blue/green, that indicates that it contains vivianite, a mineral indicative of aneorobic decay due to impervious strata.Once you breach this, it is likely to be relatively free draining,
- or maybe not.