Oily drive? - Most suitable surface for a car nut

[big john]

Great site which I have just discovered!
I love working on old cars, so the driveway normally gets oily or muddy most weekends.
Due to the road being lined with trees ( nearest 5 ft from the drive) the surface of the crazy paving drive now resembles a mountain range. I want to resurface the drive with something suitable bearing in mind I use trolley jacks and axle stands and will probably have to pressure wash the drive on a regular basis.
I have had one quote of £10000 from a firm who suggested block paving and a large soakaway as we have heavy clay soil at this location, bearing in mind the new regs any suggestions please?

[cookiewales]

what size is your drive john length by width. granite setts are bomb proof but not the cheapest .concrete is a no no with oil cheers cookie

[lutonlagerlout]

i thought most petrol stations and car workshops have concrete floors?
the problem with modular paving is the oil running through the gaps and contaminating the subsoil/water table
IMHO setts /concrete/tarmac would be the way forward
cheers
LLL

[Dave_L]

Concrete driveway would be ideally suited to this application/use.

Forget tarmac.

[cookiewales]

sorry should have said concrete block paving .breaking news am geting my trowel out and working next week yip he :p

[lutonlagerlout]

i was on the phone to the gaffer today and i mentioned some setts he was filming that really could do with your attention cookie
anyway welcome back into the minority m8,we picked up another 4 days today,this is getting ridiculous
LLL

[Tony McC]

The great advantage of CBPs for this type of project is they are easy to replace when they get too dirty. Yes: some oil will penetrate the jointing and reach the laying course, but it's nothing majorly significant as long as it's just a private driveway.

Longstanding members of The Brew Cabin will recall my own driveway, that had so much oil on it that there was a real danger of George W Bush invading, yet when I lifted the block to replace them, only a shovelful or two of the laying course had any oil contamination....

[big john]

thanks for the quick replies.
I have had a talk with the local building control officer as I have just noticed that the garage floor is starting to crack from the tree roots.
bearing in mind that the drive is 6.3M wide and 8.1 M long, the cracks are appearing 10M from the tree. The house was built in 1932 so the trees must be 60+ years old and about twice the height of the house (20M?) As usual, the official line was we can't remove the tree and if you damage the roots your liable. The Everest salesman has been in touch and said he can do it in block for £6850 but if head offic ring tell them you want flagstone as they don't do this. Somehow I smell a large furry rodent.
Noted the pic of the oil stained driveway. Looks clean compared with my crazy paving after I did a service on a friends armoured personel carrier, 10 litres of 3 year old oil shure makes a mess.
Anyone know what sort of weight a CBP will support as I am wondering if my 10 Ton rating axle stands would damage them?
Thanks again gus and I hope the work picks up soon

[lutonlagerlout]

I wasnt sure if the OP was doing cars regular or just occasionally , maybe if he has any drainage it should go to a sealed pit that can be drained,maybe flowjoe can advise on this
LLL

[Mikey_C]

the "PARESES" I'm picking on up here from OP are

"my friends armoured personal carrier"

"10 Ton axle stands"

and the WORST of all the "EVEREST salesman" !!!!

[mickg]

domestic block paving and 10 ton axle stands don't belong in the same sentence either

[big john]

the service on the apc was a one off, his humber pig started running rough on the way back from a military vehicle rally and as my house was closer than his we ended up there.
normally it is my 4x4 I do most work on, especially after an off road weekend. The 10 ton axle stands I use because it gives extra clearance for working under the truck, I need it at 6ft 7 and 19 1/2 stone.
dad and I must have done something riight when we did the crazy paving, as the driveway has lasted over 30 years despited my attempts to wreck it.

[seanandruby]

Hi john you should seriously think about installing a gravity oil separator. you may need permission from your water company, if you get caught washing oil straight into the system you would get caned mate. I know it's an expensive option, but what about oil spillage kits? If you are contaminating the area a lot you really need to look into prevention of spillage before, rather than trying to clean up after.

[GB_Groundworks]

get a bund kit for oil changes, you can get in serious trouble for oil contamination, we just did a job and were sheet piling 7metre piles into sand. the bloody hose came off the 2inch hydraulic connector just as the sheet went in, 6 metres up in the air holding the high pressure line open spraying hydraulic oil everywhere, everytime the machine even ticked over litres and litres of oil spilled out. luckily its was hired in machine and running bio hydraulic oil but still had to muck away 20 tons of sand as contaminate land fill at a cost of about £1000.

we have big sets like cookie said, we run 20 ton excavators, 40 ton wagons and 4x4 tractors over them all day no problems.