Flag stze

[scotty78]

Ok so this is subjective but thought I would ask you guys as you will have seen a lot of jobs and have a lot more experience.

My patio is wide and narrow, roughly 10.5 metres wide and in the main 2.3 metres between my house and a large garden retaining wall.

In your experience what looks better having a 4 size patio pack with a random layout or say a 600 x 900 slab laid staggered.

Also curious as to if there would be any benefit going with a 600 series patio pack or a 560, both would need cut as depth from house to retaining wall is 2320mm.

Thanks

[Tony McC]

Random always looks better on smaller areas.

Absolutely no difference between 560s and 600s in terms of quality but I prefer 600s for silly reasons explained here

[scotty78]

Thanks for the reply, yeah I have been working my way through the guide! Last used this site 10 years ago to learn how to do monoblock, house long sold but driveway still perfect with no sagging. If only the colour hadn't washed out it would still be perfect or perhaps the new owners used some sort of acid cleaner. Anyway great site!

Another little query I seen an advert local to me asking for free slabs for an allotment, I didn't intend to lift my ancient council slabs for a few weeks as I want to repair walls, get the rest of garden up to scratch before doing my new paving.

However if someone is willing to take away my old slabs I would be silly not to let them. If I put in my type one base and wack it would I be ok not to lay the new paving for a few weeks or are you best just doing the base straight before doing the new paving? Would doubt leaving the base exposed to rain etc could cause any probs but thought better to ask.

Thanks

[blackspaven]

My brother in law came to 'help' with my patio, was overconfident when it turned out he thought he knew more than he did and I hadn't done one before so trusted him, f*cked it up by making the bed way too dry and every slab could be lifted quite easily, SOoooo I would say you'd be fine with a whacked type 1 bed just being left as that's what I had for about a month at least until he could come back and redo with ME giving the orders this time: patio is solid as a rock this time round!

Only annoying thing was every time someone or the dog walked in, I had sand come in, but this was cos the sand from the old bed was on top of the type 1 so you probably won't have that problem.

Just my opinion though.

[Tony McC]

Type 1, once compacted, will just sit there quite happy until you're ready for it.

Just make sure it doesn't get contaminated with, say, soil or litter.

[scotty78]

Thanks for the replies