Rotavation depth

Hi All,

I am going to be rotavating my garden, but have recently discovered some buried pipe that at point is only a couple of inches from the surface. I suspect that this pipe is a leadoff to a soakaway. Question is, will rotavating my garden smash this pipe ?

All help appreciated.....

Probably, depending on what the pipe is made of.

its a clay pipe, and not really sure how it is functional given its depth so far from the house (I would have thought it was going to be a lot deeper). So it looks as though I cannot rotavate the soil then, are there any alternatives ?

it will probably damage it depending on the type of rotovator it is. The omnly thing to do is to hand dig around it with a fork. Quite easy to do

Thanks all, manual work it is then.....

Don't know about you guys, but I can't stand not knowing what the pipe is in these situations - I can't just ignore it without tracing it back and working out if it can be removed or not. Just naturally curious, I suppose.

oddballodd said:

its a clay pipe, and not really sure how it is functional given its depth so far from the house (I would have thought it was going to be a lot deeper). So it looks as though I cannot rotavate the soil then, are there any alternatives ?

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Presumably if you know where it is (ish) you have a whole other area to rotavate without trepidation, so marking the suspected area shouldn'y be a problem, also test the suspected area with a fork for depth of pipe to verify.

If it's a regular little ryobi type rotavator then you'll be fine as it only does a few inches at a time.

If it's a BIG boy version & you've never used one then it's actually a better idea to scale it down & spend more time and energy getting a finer tilth from the tines (ie fine earth rather than clods) which involves andscaping rakes & redoing the same patches of ground anyhow!

I use a wee rotavator (the ryobi) not the weed-eater attatchment & it's fine for most smalle scale landscaping jobs & can be hung up in the garage afterwards (so small it actually has raliegh chopper style handlebars), easy yo lift & drag backwards or over poor access.
Suggest you find a friend who'se in the local allotment club as they often have a cheap hire of tool service including lightweight rotavators if it's only a typical back garden job.

to wabbitpoo he suspects is leading to a soakaway and i reckon he is right
if someone said that to you, would that make you feel better?

ModernMaterials said:

to wabbitpoo he suspects is leading to a soakaway and i reckon he is right
if someone said that to you, would that make you feel better?

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wtf you going on about?