Where can I get limestone chips?

[damia-b]

I am installing a soakaway for the condensate from the condensing boiler. The original installer did not install a soakaway and this got picked up by the gas board technician when he serviced the boiler last year. He issued a notice requiring a soakaway to be fitted. I have got the McAlpine kit and prepared the hole and thought that the required 10mm limestone chips would be easy to find.

I have now been round quite a few garden centres and builders merchants in Renfrewshire and Ayrshire without success. Does anybody know where 10mm limestone chips can be obtained, preferrably near Paisley, or at resonable cost via internet?

Ken

 

[clf-gas]

B+Q

 

[damia-b]

Thanks for the quick response. I did try B&Q a while back and they had none at the time. They did have "white chips" which were actually quartz "chuckies", which have no neutralizing properties.

It must be limestone I think, though I did wonder if marble would do. They are both calcium carbonate aren't they?

 

[Paul Barker]

plumbers merchants, but also it's vertually free at some quarries they can't seem to get rid of it. I knew a builder who mixed it with his concrete as it was given to him where he gets his sand and ballast.

 

[dextrous]

Would ordinary gravel not do the trick, or does the soakway need the alkaline limestone to neutralise the acidic condensate?

 

[clf-gas]

The lime is to nuetralize Dex, but drainage also

B+Q do stock it as thatsw where I get mine when required

 

[damia-b]

Limestone is specified in the McAlpine kit instructions. It is required to neutralize the acidic condensate and prevent it attacking the house foundations. I believe that the alternative to a soakaway is to lead the pipe to a field drain at least 1 metre from the wall but I would have needed to take up a trench across the patio to do that, hence the soakaway.

 

[damia-b]

Thanks Craig, I'll try B&Q again. I hope it not just Lancashire stores that have it as I will not be down that way for a week or two!

 

[kirkgas]

i used to get them from Grahams in Hillington Ind Est, you wont get much closer than that, unless you have already tried them

 

[holty]

the only place i seem to get it from is plumbase.

 

[damia-b]

Thanks all, I got them this morning in B&Q. When I was in before, I think I was looking for chips that were more of a white colour, thus did not notice the racks full of bags of grey limestone chips (10mm). so no problem in the end.
Thanks again,

Ken

 

[glasgowgas]

how big is the bag and how much?

 

[dextrous]

how big is the bag and how much?

http://www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.j...y&fh_refpath=facet_159016185&ts=1246745696578

 

[damia-b]

A 25 kg bag did the job (thought I bought two to be on the safe side) at a cost of just over £2 per bag. I can't remember if it was exactly the £2.18 as per the link above or if VAT was added.

 

[Agile]

Another mad mod mistake!

This is a heating specific requirement and the posting has been answered by heating people just because it is totally related to heating!