And there's more ..........it's 2015
I started the year as I had left off, laying granite setts, now alongside the garage. In addition to continuing the 'theme', these setts would indicate the level of the drive around it, and when tarmac would be laid, there would be no need for the roller to be anywhere near the wall, thus avoiding damage. The whole area between the garage and the roadside wall would gently run towards the back corner of the garage, and rain would flow away into the Aco drain, and on to the garden soakaway.
Once all those setts had been pointed, and the shuttering boards removed, it was back over to the East side to build the garden bed that I had planned for that area. Although the concrete base was sloping to the back of the house, and there would be an Acodrain in place there, I thought it worthwhile putting drainage nearer the back door where the paved area was wider, and taking rain from the steps downwards. I dug a trench under where the bed would be and fitted pipework joining in to the system already in place. I also connected up an Acodrain, so that all was in place for when I would start to build the wall here.
It was only February, but a good patch of weather
It was only February, but as the weather was dry and settled, I took the opportunity to build the stone face of the bed at the top of the drive. When I built the boundary wall, levels were a bit of guess work, and in one place the level we had now fixed left a portion of foundation exposed. I moved the stack of granite that remained in the picture right, and excavated part of the footing, and the ground beneath it.
I re-laid a short length of foundation into the cavity I had dug out, and with selected narrow pieces of stone managed to reinstate the wall such that now the alteration is invisible. Next....over to the West side to build the blockwork for the kitchen herb bed, on the foundation prepared at the end of 2014. I laid block on side to begin with, to retain then a top course on edge that I would 'front' with stone, as this part would be visible.
Briefly back to front again, this time to lay granite setts around the foot of the front garden bed wall. This would protect both the stone wall and the coping slabs (that would be made later), from being damaged when the tarmac roller would be used.
With all the posts now in position, and the boundary wall of the herb bed blockwork done, I was able to fasten up the rails and put up close boarded fencing to gives us some privacy at last from our neighbour.
I had to extend the concrete base to provide a foundation for the walls, before laying blockwork, which I angled at both ends to provide better access and flow. The palings above the wall were just temporarily tacked in place, I would take them off again to give space to finish building the stone face, and when I finished casting capping slabs, fixing them in place too.
I needed some earth now to fill up both the kitchen herb bed and the bed at the top of the drive. Colin managed to find some good 'stuff' and dropped it off for me....mostly on a tarpaulin! We soon had it where it belonged, and what was left went elsewhere in the garden.
Along with the specially shaped wall cappings, I had continued to make further sets of plain ones, to finish off the stone walls down the boundary from the front wall. Once I had enough, I fixed these in place too.
Although I still had quite a bit of stone left, quite a lot of it was too deep for what I needed. I hired a water cooled 18" diamond disc cutting bench from Brandon Hire, and spent the best part of three days gradually going through every piece of stone I had left. I converted all of it either into usable wall stone of 3"-4" or waste, thankfully not too much of the latter. As the next couple of walling jobs involved building seven 90 degree corners, and the vertical ends of seven steps, I made a large quantity of quoin pieces. This was an extremely messy job, still dusty despite the water spraying on the cutting point, and dust slurry getting everywhere. It did the job though, and it was £116 very well spent.
Having stone to work with again, I turned my attention to the garden bed along the East side. The ground there was rock solid, so after tamping where necessary, I put up some shuttering, and laid a foundation. All the stone I had cut up was stacked within the bed, pretty convenient when I start the face.
As with all the other walls, I built an inner leaf of blockwork, two blocks high in this case. I would build the stonework on the outside of this, extended beyond the block by around 4", this would give give the inside an exposed stone face.
Next for the stone treatment was the ramp wall, this would be a bit trickier, because I wanted to slope the wall to match the ramp, rather than having a horizontal wall with steps. Again a line would be essential, and once the top and bottom corners had been built, I was able to fit guide boards to locate the line.
In between days of stone building, I had been gradually cutting the 100x22 tanalised timber to make the palings, each one individual due to the sloping lines at both the top and bottom of each piece. It was now mid-June and the fence was completed. Apart from making and fitting the capping slabs for the ramp walls, everything was finished along the West side, all but the actual paving itself of course!
Back over to the other side, next job was to face all the steps in stone, all those quoins I had cut were proving invaluable with all the corners here. Whilst you can cut them by hand grinder, there's no substitute for a nice sharp machine cut.
Now for the last bit of stone walling, this bed would be very narrow, and extend from beside the outside tap, through the fence and alongside the 'landing area' out front. It would at least give the opportunity to have a few plants to break up the hardscape.
To get the width of wall I needed, I had to extend the concrete base to provide the foundation needed. The blockwork backing wall completely cleared out every bit of block I had on site, including all the off-cuts, a good clear up job. The stone too was getting very thin on the ground, it gets a little slower to build when you haven't got much stone to choose your next bit from. Nevertheless, there was enough, and very little was left after facing this bed off.
I had three granite quoins left, and these were used in the front corner, to mirror what we had done in the front wall. I made more capping slabs, and fixed them into position, and completed the line of setts from where I had left off, right to the boundary wall. On a bit of a roll with the capping slabs, I carried on until I had enough made for the large bed too, and also fixed them down. Only the front wall and garden bed now needed capping, and quite a few of them would need to be curved.
The sloping areas either side of the steps posed a bit of a problem.....what to do with them. I thought long and hard, and finally decided to use some of the left over cropped granite to sort of...crazy pave it. That is what I did, and I was very pleased with how it looked, There was still some left, which I had hoped would be enough for me to create a 'feature' on the drive. I came up with the idea of having a granite circle in the middle of the drive, outlined by a ring of granite setts, which would serve to break up the expanse of tarmac, and I hoped would look quite smart too. I laid out the granite on the floor to see how much coverage I had, from that area, I worked out how large a circle I could manage with the stone available. I put a pin in the ground at the centre point and scribed a circle with a string and a tin of marker paint. And then I dug it out!
I started with a ring of setts (I was short and had to buy 10 more from a local reclamation yard) bedded in to a good deep bed of strong rough sand concrete. Once I was happy with the position, which sloped downwards as the drive would dictate, I used a levelling board across the circle to position the height of all the centre stones. Virtually everything was used, just the odd couple of bits left which went onto the garden. After pointing, I pulled some of the loose material up against the edge, so that it wasn't too big a bump for the cars. This would later be taken away so that the tarmac had a good thickness whilst being level with the edge of the circle.
Down both sides, and across the back of the house, the concrete base had been left around 9" away from the house wall. We did this for two reasons. Firstly the 'Surecav' ventilation panels needed to be able to circulate air underneath the block and beam floor, and secondly it is good practice to have paths well away from the DPC. The construction of the build, battens on timber frame, had the exterior face around 3" proud of the foundation walls. When rain runs down the wall, a solid paths below would tend to splash water upwards, which makes the walls go green quickly...certainly in moist' Cornwall at least. We hought the best solution would be to lay large (50mm upwards) river pebbles in the gap. It looks very nice, when the rain hits it the uneven surfaces dissipate the water, and the spaces between stones allows ventilation through the Surecav. Economical and perfectly elegant solution if I say so myself!
I now needed topsoil for the beds, I asked Colin, but due to the roadworks on the A30 which had virtually isolated North from South, it was an absolute nightmare to get his digger and trailer from one side the other. I told him not to worry, and eventually purchased three large dumpy bags of very good quality earth from Walter Bailey in Par, delivered by Hiab truck right next to the front bed. Off to the garden centres then...looking for shade tolerant plants, which have all done well.
Late October now, and back to casting the remaining coping slabs.I used large pieces of cardboard, cut to shape, to give me a guide for the moulds. I needed something flexible, and didn't have any timber thin enough that would take the bending. I 'ripped' some thin lengths off some 4"x2" I had, and this did the trick, held into shape by blocks screwed into the ply sheet underneath. Casting them in the garage meant that this could be done whatever the weather, and a set of up to 10 slabs were made every couple of days, allowing for plenty of setting time in between.
I had a stack of 'Saxon' slabs down at the bottom, which I had calculated would pave the steps, all around the raised beds and shed, and the ramp. That was the next job to do, I wanted to keep the lines, so of course this meant rather a lot of cutting. Thankfully, one bit cut of here almost always corresponded with the need for a small piece somewhere else, and wastage was quite minimal. I laid them all 'dot and dab', and used pieces of 10mm thick timber as spacers. By the time I was laying slabs at the top of the ramp, I had a handful of slabs left. With a decent window of weather, I pointed it all.
Well.....where did that year go! It was now early November, and not really the time to continue with the only job left to do, decide what paving to use on the sides and the patio, and then lay it.
That would wait for next year
