I had my driveway/parking area replaced about 5 years ago - old drive 
removed, membrane put down and scalpings laid and compressed. I didn't 
have washed stone laid at the time because I wanted to sort out a mowing 
edge first.

The driveway is now full of weeds and investigations by a builder who 
looked at replacing it again shows there is only a couple of inches of 
scalpings laid, looks like I was conned :-(

I am considering one of these honeycomb driveways with a soil in-fill and 
grass seed. At least I can mow it then and the weeds will get chopped off.

Does anybody have experience of this type of driveway? It gets light use, 
my car and occasional visitors. It would need to take a skip lorry and 
skip though, I have lived here 8 years and had 12 skips so far and that's 
unlikely to change in the future.

I will need to get it done, it's about 200 square metres and so will need 
the use of a digger rather than a pick and shovel.

Many thanks.

-- 
Jeff Gaines Damerham Hampshire UK
All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand.

Jeff Gaines wrote:
> 
> I had my driveway/parking area replaced about 5 years ago - old drive 
> removed, membrane put down and scalpings laid and compressed. I didn't 
> have washed stone laid at the time because I wanted to sort out a mowing 
> edge first.
> 
> The driveway is now full of weeds and investigations by a builder who 
> looked at replacing it again shows there is only a couple of inches of 
> scalpings laid, looks like I was conned :-(
> 
> I am considering one of these honeycomb driveways with a soil in-fill 
> and grass seed. At least I can mow it then and the weeds will get 
> chopped off.
> 
> Does anybody have experience of this type of driveway? It gets light 
> use, my car and occasional visitors. It would need to take a skip lorry 
> and skip though, I have lived here 8 years and had 12 skips so far and 
> that's unlikely to change in the future.
> 
> I will need to get it done, it's about 200 square metres and so will 
> need the use of a digger rather than a pick and shovel.
> 

Mm. I have all sorts of driveways here..

Ultimately what is the problem? I had a place where people drive over my 
grass verge. I simply laid MOT in the mud pile, and let them. Under 
light use MOT will grass over well. Under heavy use it crushes down to a 
fine chalky dust track.

I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again it 
grasses over.

Gravel is similar, in time it grasses over. But its dustless. But not so 
permeable ..once it fills with mud, it loses the drainage..

Guess what. lay a layer of tarmac over that to stop weeds,and you have a 
british standard road!


The tarmacs seals it.The gravel makes a wear surface and the 
chalk/limestome substsrate spreads the load and drains the upper layers 
and prevents road collapse.

scrapings are almost a waste of time, laid thin. You need at least 4-6" 
of substrate to work in wet clay.

Pick the technique you want for what you want. I don't think honeycomb 
is worth it unless you like the looks.



> Many thanks.
>

The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> 
> I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again it 
> grasses over.
> 

MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)

Andy

Andy Champ wrote in


> The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>> 
>> I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again
>> it grasses over.
>> 
> 
> MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)

Roadstone to Ministry of Transport spec.

As at: http://www.cmltd.uk.com/mat_stone.asp

-- 
PeterMcC
If you feel that any of the above is incorrect,
inappropriate or offensive in any way,
please ignore it and accept my apologies.

PeterMcC wrote:
> Andy Champ wrote in
> 
> 
>> The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>> I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again
>>> it grasses over.
>>>
>> MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)
> 
> Roadstone to Ministry of Transport spec.
> 
> As at: http://www.cmltd.uk.com/mat_stone.asp
> 
Sorry; thought everyine knew the term.

As above. essentially limestone 'gravel' that compresses down into a 
sort of chalk.

The absolute best material for making tracks across bogs.

The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> PeterMcC wrote:
>> Andy Champ wrote in
>> 
>>
>>> The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>>> I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again
>>>> it grasses over.
>>>>
>>> MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)
>>
>> Roadstone to Ministry of Transport spec.
>>
>> As at: http://www.cmltd.uk.com/mat_stone.asp
>>
> Sorry; thought everyine knew the term.
> 
> As above. essentially limestone 'gravel' that compresses down into a 
> sort of chalk.
> 
> The absolute best material for making tracks across bogs.

Better than expanded polystyrene?

<http://www.pharmaceuticalonline.com/article.mvc/Expanded-Polystyrene-EPS-Some-Basics-0001?VNETCOOKIE=NO>

(Odd place to find the article.)

-- 
Rod

Hypothyroidism is a seriously debilitating condition with an insidious 
onset.
Although common it frequently goes undiagnosed.
<www.thyromind.info> <www.thyroiduk.org> <www.altsupportthyroid.org>

PeterMcC wrote:
> Andy Champ wrote in
>> MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)
> 
> Roadstone to Ministry of Transport spec.
> 
> As at: http://www.cmltd.uk.com/mat_stone.asp
> 
Ah, thanks.  Might go under my drive extension soon, which is why the 
interest.

Andy.

The Natural Philosopher <a@b.c> wrote:

>PeterMcC wrote:
>> Andy Champ wrote in
>> 
>> 
>>> The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>>> I've laid MOT into muddy sections of lawn, and made them dry. Again
>>>> it grasses over.
>>>>
>>> MOT?  (Obviously not MoT, but what is it?)
>> 
>> Roadstone to Ministry of Transport spec.
>> 
>> As at: http://www.cmltd.uk.com/mat_stone.asp
>> 
>Sorry; thought everyine knew the term.
>
>As above. essentially limestone 'gravel' that compresses down into a 
>sort of chalk.
>
>The absolute best material for making tracks across bogs.


It compresses down into a sort of *concrete*.  

The grading of the sizes of the pieces of stone is such that the
medium-sized pieces fit in the gaps between the larger pieces, and the
smaller pieces (down to dust) fill in the gaps between the small and
medium pieces.

The end result is a graded stone that has very few voids in it.  It
can be remarkably strong if compacted in place while around its
optimum moisture content.  

The concept of careful grading of stone sizes in order to obtain a
strong mass of stone was developed by a fine Scottish engineer called
John Loudon McAdam in the early 19th century.  The graded material
became known as "Macadam".  The material was used unbound, however the
advent of the motor vehicle almost a century later required an even
stronger and more durable material.  

For this, the stone macadam was bound together with tar, giving it
excellent waterproofing properties and good resistance against the
formation of ruts.  This was tarmacadam, or 'tarmac' for short, which
gave its name to the Tarmac company who specialised in road building.

Macadam can also be bound together with cement.  The resulting
material is called cement bound macadam (no surprise there!).  It is
little used nowadays but was quite a useful material when bitumen was
expensive or difficult to obtain.