Patios in Ashley Heath

What the ground gives you, and what it does not. Ashley Heath sand digs easily, drains freely and makes a soakaway a realistic option, not a hopeful one. What it will not do is hold a formation. Sand moves when it is wet and loaded, so everything below the slab has to be built rather than assumed.

The dig and the muck away. Turf, topsoil, old concrete, flags bedded on sand and any made ground are excavated to formation and leave the site. On Ashley Heath ground that is quicker and cleaner than on clay, and it is one of the few places a patio quote gets cheaper rather than dearer. Access on most plots here takes machinery and a skip.

Separating the base from the sand. A geotextile membrane goes down first, and on this ground it earns its keep. Without it the MOT Type 1 works its way down into the sand over a few winters and the sub base quietly loses depth. With it, the hardcore stays where it was compacted.

Base and bed. Type 1 hardcore laid and compacted in layers to full depth, a sharp sand screed to level it off, then a full bed of mortar under every slab with a slurry primer on the back. A proper mortar bed does not go hollow. Slabs on dabs do, and a hollow slab is the one that finishes up rocking, cracked and holding water.

Edges, because sand does not hold one. On heavier ground an edge slab has something to push against. Here it has nothing. Every perimeter is restrained with a haunched kerb or an edging bedded in concrete, a coping caps anything retaining, and a gravel border runs along the wall. Skip that and the outside course creeps outwards and the joints open.

Levels against the house. Most of the housing in Ashley Heath is single storey, so height is tight. We chalk the DPC on the brickwork, set the paving two courses below it with a fall running off the wall, and use a recessed channel where a threshold has to stay flush rather than adding a step.

The paving, and the joints. Porcelain is calibrated and the easiest to keep; sandstone is hand cut and warmer; limestone and granite wear harder; travertine holds water. Joints get a brush in resin compound, a grout slurry or hand pointing in mortar, never loose sand, which on an open plot like these simply blows and washes out.

Water, and the patio you already have. The fall runs into an ACO channel, an existing gully or a soakaway, which on this ground genuinely works, and a permeable build up where the runoff has nowhere else to go. Where a bay has lifted or sunk, or gone slippery with algae and shown efflorescence and staining, we quote the lift and relay rather than a rebuild.

The slabs you pick are usually the cheapest part of the job, so a square metre rate would mislead you.

What comes out first. Old concrete, crazy paving or a raised bed has to be broken up and carted away, priced by the load. Pine and oak roots close to the house slow the dig and sometimes need cutting back or a root barrier.

Sand underneath. The sandy ground in Ashley Heath drains well but will not hold a patio on its own. It is dug out and replaced with compacted sub base, and that depth is where cheap jobs save money and you pay later with sunken slabs.

The level at the wall. The surface has to slope away from the house and finish two courses below the damp proof course. On a bungalow with a low floor, that can mean lowering the whole patio or fitting a channel drain across the doorway.

Carrying and steps. Slabs barrowed through a side gate take longer than slabs a machine can place. Steps down to a lower lawn, or a raised edge with a drop, bring in the work at height rules.

Before you choose, find out from each quote how deep they dig and what goes in as sub base, whether the slabs are bedded fully or spot bedded, which way the water runs off, whether edgings and steps are in, and what fills the joints.

Patios in Ashley Heath and the roads towards St Leonards and St Ives are 7.1 miles from our Boscombe base, all within Dorset Council's area. Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales, number 15471719, is who you contract with. Before you book a visit in Ashley Heath, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

The business belongs to Thomas Hannen, and Thomas comes round, walks the garden and writes the price himself. A verified customer on Checkatrade gave the work a 10 out of 10. Neither the visit nor the itemised written quote costs you anything. On heath sand a driveway at Ashley Heath needs the same membrane and haunched edges, so it is worth pricing both if the front is due.

Most repairs in Ashley Heath need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.