Basic questions..........

[matt1986]

Dear All,

After reading this invaluable site I have decided to pluck up enough courage and block pave my front lawn. This hopefully is a relatively simple job, compared with some of the complexity of some driveways i have seen

Outine: I currently have a single block paved drive which slopes away from the main house towards the road. I already have Aco Rain Drains installed at the bottom of the drive. Directly next to my drive is a shared lawn with my neighbour (half mine half theirs). I'm looking to increase my existing drive and block my front lawn.

Basic questions:

1) When digging out the lawn and going up to my neighbours boundary. Is it common practice to lay the edging inwards of the perimeter to allow for haunching or do I effectively dig into my neighbours side so the haunching is underneath their grass so the finished edging is on the boundary?
2) Do you lay the edging and the aco drains on top of the sub grade or sub base?

3) Because I already have existing edging for my current drive (just standard concrete slabs about 50mm wide level with the paving). Do I remove this edging so the new block paving will be combined with old or just leave the edging in place? i presume it would be easier to do the latter with the down side of grey line going down the middle of the paving. What is common practice?

Sorry for the stupid and obvious questions, the devil is in the detail and i want to make sure i do it right and do it once.

[mickg]

1) we always allow 50mm - 75mm in from the boundary and the back side of the haunching actually on the boundary but you could ask you neighbour if its OK to install the edging actually on the boundary line and the haunching being under their lawn on their property

2) the edgings and drainage channels need to be bedded on a minimum of 100mm deep concrete which can be on top of a thin layer of compacted sub base material

3) purely for aesthetics its best to remove this existing concrete edging and to bond the old paving and new paving together but without seeing a photo of the old paving and new paving together its hard to decide which way is best suited for your driveway and only you can decide that

[Tony McC]

I can't improve on what Mick says, other than to point out that it's often easiest to install edgings and drainage fittings immediately following excavation, so before placing the sub-base, as they can then act as a level guide and a retainer for when you start spreading the granular material.