Driveway drains

[thesaint]

Sometime ago I had a drive laid with tarmac. They put a small drain in, but it doesn’t really soak away that well. I am guessing it is just a pipe through the tarmac rather than a soak away.

I want to do something about it before winter as the house now houses my wife’s childminding business and it is not that good to make customers and children walk through big puddles/ice.

It has puddles in two areas (one above the existing small drain and one in another area). Is there any way to put in some drainage without damaging the drive too much? I have seen various gully drains, but presumably they need to run to a soak away or a drain? I suppose I am just after a way of fixing the problem without having to redo the drive.

Any ideas welcome.

[Mikey_C]

have you tried having a look in the existing drain gully to ensure it is just blocked with leaves etc. did it ever work? As for the other puddle redoing that part of the area will cause the water to run elsewhere, when it then needs to be dealt with. Without knowing the size of the area to be drained it is impossible to say how much area will be required to install a soak away, however the likelihood is it will be significant.

[thesaint]

Hi Mickey_C, thanks for the reply.

As a rough guide the area is the size of 4 large cars 2 placed behind 2 with one of those spaces taken up by my garage.

my crude diagram of the space...
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There are two puddles,one on the existing drain area 'a' and one next to the garage area 'b'

The drain is in area 'a' and has always had a puddle. To be fair I should have got it sorted at the time, but there was a lot of other things going on at the time.

The other puddle is in area 'b'

The rest of the drive drains fine into exisiting surface level drains.

I must admit that I am a beginner when it comes to this kind of work, but I am really keen to learn.

[thesaint]

One more thing I have just been reminded of. The drive was finished and the the drain in area 'a' was put in afterwards.

[Dave_L]

Sounds like a proper bodge job.

You only get one chance and one chance only with a tarmac finish.

No invisible repairs are possible.

Can you post up some photos of the problem areas?

Either way, I don't see a quick or cheap option to this - it's either rip it up and install drainage in the puddles or have the driveway overlaid after regulating out the puddles etc.

[thesaint]

"Sounds like a proper bodge job." - Yeah I think you are probably right there Dave.

They did dig it out quite deep when they did it. Everything under the tarmac looked quite solid (from my untrained eye), but I guess you just have to trust people to do the job. I didn't just go for the cheapest quote either. Still lesson learned.

I'll post some pictures up later today (there has been no rain, but I will mark the areas on the pictures.

If I have to rip it up then I will, but I'd rather do the work myself if possible. More for the learning experience than the money factor.

[thesaint]

Pictures as follows....

[Dave_L]

Thanks for posting up the pics, it makes advice so much easier to give.

The only solution is to relay the driveway and introduce some falls to get rid of the puddles.

Draining the driveway to the exisiting grey water drains as you are currently doing is frowned upon......a proper soakaway and Aco drainage would be the way to go, to satisfy the recent front garden/driveway legislation.

[thesaint]

Thanks Dave.

I was having a think about other options and quite like the idea of having a bit of grass out there again.

I have attached a rough pic again of the area I could put back to grass. Am I right in thinking that if I could sort out the drianage in that area I could drain the puddle area onto it sloving the problem?

[seanandruby]

Why would you want to put grass there, more work cutting it. think you would be better off solving the drainage problem with a drainage channel.

[Dave_L]

Agreed; whatever you do other than relaying the drive to get rid of the puddles is going to be a messy compromise.