infilling a raised patio

[alfiesdad]

I am creating a raised patio at the bottom of the garden. I have a hole to fill inside retaining walls approx 300mm deep, 3m x 2m. Am I besr filliing with hardcore or is there something better/cheaper. Also, what's the best way to compact it? Do I need to do 100 mm and compacti it for eg? And how much should I need?
Cheers

 

[r896neo]

Your best off using clean rubble or clean stone as it will not compress at all and therefore will not settle. The best bet would be 20mm clean or bigger if you can get it.

You obviously need a solid thoroughly compacted base under it all such as 100mm of type 1 MOT for this to go onto but filling and compacting the whole thing with MOT will be very tedious and prone to minor settling.

I have just done my own recently using lots of rubble and blocks from demolition inside the house.

The only drawback to this method is that you need to lay your paving on the top on a mortar bed which is fine for most types but if you wanted to lay block paving for example you would need to use a geotextile membrane on top then a thin layer of maybe 50mm of compacted hardcore and then your sand and blocks

 

[alfiesdad]

Thanks for that. I have a brick built outhouse on the area now whig I am going to demolish. Is irt worthfilling the area with that then or will bricks etc be too big and cause voids. Cheers

 

[r896neo]

Try and smash them up a bit. the secret is to do it systematically to try and avoid large gaps.

I put concrete blocks in an organised layer about 2 inches apart and trhen poured on a layer of 20mm stone to infill the gaps between them and provide a layer maybe 40mm deep above them this then gives you a nice flat bed for the next layer of blocks