Decking over grass - simple foundations

[donnyb]

Afternoon all,

I'm thinking of fitting some decking in my garden. The area to be covered is fairly level grass and I don't want the deck to be raised.

My neighbour recently did something similar, he used stacks of broken paving slabs to level and support the deck frames, lined the underside with weed proof membrane. The stacks of slabs much simpler than digging in posts, is this advised or do they have a tendency to sink?

Essentially I'm looking for a simple alternative to digging and concreting in posts. Thinking something along the lines of digging in some breeze blocks to rest the deck frame on, without raising the level considerably above the grass (happy to dig the grass level down if required).

Any thoughts please ladies/gents?


Regards,

Donny

 

[Naduska]

For what it's worth, I'm by no means an expert, that said, I'm building a below ground level decking area, if I was to be constructing what you are proposing, I would make sure the ground is well compacted, if your lawn has been down a good few years, then the ground will be compacted, and any subsidence will probably have taken place, I will say this from experience, the more you disturb the ground from digging, you will need to compact it again.

For peace of mind, removing the lawn might be for the best, however during my research, I did see many deck foundations, simply levelled and laid directly on top of grass using concrete piers, slabs or blocks, it all depends of the overal bearing weight, just make sure you have enough block support, I always over engineer, better to be safe than sorry.