Each owner of a garden or country house wants to build an original garden path on the site. At the same time, there is a desire to fulfill it with minimal cost. You can make stone, brick paths yourself.
Also a great solution to the problem is a concrete garden path. It is not difficult to do it yourself, you can decorate it in your own discretion and save on the cost of materials and work.
Types of Garden Paths
In order for the track to fit seamlessly into the surrounding landscape, it is necessary to choose the material from which it will be made appropriate to the design and style of the yard and the house. In addition, such a foundation should be durable, practical and not demanding maintenance.
Tracks can be divided into the following types:
- unpaved, cobblestone (cobblestone),
- crushed stone
- grassy
- gravel
- brick (brick),
- stone (natural stone),
- end, tiled (concrete slabs and tiles),
- monolithic concrete.
The first four types require relatively constant care, and hard-coated paths, including a self-made concrete path, serve for a long time, are clean and neat, beautiful, more practical.
The specific type of garden paths is selected based on the functional purpose, the style of the yard and the preferences of the owners.
Concrete garden paths
Monolithic concrete paths are distinguished by high strength, they are resistant to deformation, they are not pressed even when the car moves along them. Therefore, such grounds are excellent for places of arrival of vehicles, from the entrance gate to the outbuildings.
Concrete paths are the cheapest at cost, but require some effort and labor. But it's worth it. In addition, the owner receives satisfaction from the fact that a concrete track is made with his own hands. It impresses with a variety of shapes, colors, patterns. Also, the texture of concrete allows you to combine it with other materials: brick, stone, cobblestone or other finishes.
Concrete Track Benefits
The advantages that a laid out garden path made of concrete with own hands have are due to the qualities of the material used. The positive characteristics of concrete are as follows:
- strength and durability - concrete products are not pressed and deformed;
- ease of use - does not require the use of special equipment;
- low cost - the cost of 1 sq.m. is approximately 25 rubles .;
- high resistance to climatic influences of any kind: frost, heat, moisture;
- resistance to aggressive environments - not afraid of spilled chemicals;
- the ability to withstand large mechanical loads - makes it possible to transport garden loads along paths without fear;
- universality of application - a large site can be built, or a garden path with your own hands without professional masters;
- Different forms can be created from concrete: straight and curved (depending on the formwork), it can be painted and decorated, combined with many other materials.
How to make the width of the path?
First of all, the width of the track is a multiple of the width of the tile, if one is used.
Next, you need to consider the border on both sides with a width of about 6 cm.
A track with a total width of about half a meter can be built on minor roads, for example, on the approach to the greenhouse: there is enough space for one person to pass and one-wheel drive cars.
On a path up to 80 cm wide, a couple of people will be able to stretch out with difficulty, pass a children's bike. But for an electric car there will already be little space. Such a path can be built to the outbuildings.
The central paths need to be made fully functional, from about a meter with a small to one and a half meters wide. Two people will easily pass here, the children will travel on their vehicles, and even a small bench will be placed.
Ready-made concrete tile tracks
Concrete slabs or small tiles are the easiest and fastest way to make a garden path of concrete with your own hands. Reviews say that this is also the easiest method to lay out a track.
The technology of their installation is as follows:
- Prepare the base: level the ground, make markings.
- Spread agrofibre or geotextiles to isolate sand from the ground.
- Cover the base with a five-centimeter layer of river wet (not wet!) Sand, level it and compact it. River sand contains less clay, therefore it is better to pass water.
- Start laying tiles one at a time. So that the plates do not move when walking on them, it is necessary to deepen them, striking them carefully with a hammer through a wooden board, so as not to split. Check the styling level.
- Tile joints are rubbed with cement or sand.
If the slabs are laid end-to-end on sandy soils, then a layer of sand is poured into 3 cm. On loamy and clay soils, gravel or slag 7-10 cm thick is first poured, and then sand is 5 cm thick.
Also, the plates can be laid on a solution that is applied to a sand pad. The solution is placed in fragments in the corners of the tile and in the middle, when laying and pressing it is distributed evenly under the entire surface.
Form Track
Today forms for performing garden paths are very popular: wooden, plastic, metal. They have several cells of different sizes and shapes (squares, rectangles, triangles, hexagons or the wrong configuration) and are used to lay out fragments of the track.
To assess the speed of such work, you need to know that with the help of prefabricated forms, approximately six meters of the track can be built in two hours. Forms can be purchased ready-made, or made independently.
To obtain round slabs for pouring, segments of metal pipes or buckets without a bottom are used, an original garden path will be obtained.
With their own hands, large plates are also cast from concrete with a frame of 7 mm reinforcement laid in the form of a lattice. Before pouring, the mold is lubricated with technical oil or drying oil. The fittings are laid in such a way that the solution covers it from above and below. After pouring, the concrete is compacted.
Materials and tools for casting
In order for a DIY garden path to be made of concrete, the following tools and materials will be required:
- sand;
- agrofibre;
- cement grade M400;
- coarse steel mesh;
- knitting wire 2 mm thick;
- additives for concrete in order to improve elasticity and waterproofing properties;
- pieces of sheet iron, plywood or boards with a width of at least 25 cm;
- wooden or reinforcing pegs;
- rope;
- polyethylene film;
- a container for mixing the solution;
- shovel and bayonet shovels;
- half-meter wide ironer;
- large gavel or sledgehammer;
- small building tools: spatulas and trowels of various sizes.
Material calculation
An example of calculating the required amount of materials for a part of the central track one meter long and 10 cm wide:
- The thickness of the sand layer for the litter is 10 cm. The required volume of sand will be as follows:
- multiply the length, width and thickness, you get 0.10 m3;
- according to reference data, sand with a volume of 1 m3 weighs 2.4 tons;
- counted on the desired volume: 2400kg / m3 x 0.10 m3 = 240 kg.
2. It is important to choose the right composition of concrete for garden paths. With your own hands, the path made will not crack if you use the following proportions for the solution:
- 1 part water
- 1 part cement
- 4 parts of sand.
The volume of required cement is calculated similarly to sand and is equal to the same value: 0.10 m3. According to the reference book, a cubic meter of concrete mixed in the sand weighs 2.8 tons. For one meter of the track, the concrete weight will be: 2800 kg / m3 x 0.1 m3 = 280 kg. Dividing the obtained value by 5 (we do not take water into account), we obtain the weight of cement: 56 kg.
The remaining value of 224 kg is the weight of water and sand, intended for mixing concrete.
Based on the calculation of the weight of materials for making tracks with a thickness of 5 cm or 7 cm, the obtained weight value must be multiplied by a factor of 0.5 or 0.7, respectively.
DIY concrete track: instructions
Casting a monolithic track is divided into the following steps:
- First, planning is done on a piece of paper with the application of all the elements of the yard, buildings, paths, preferably on a scale.
- The next step is to calculate the amount of materials: it depends on the soil. On clay soils, a half-meter layer of concrete is sufficient, and on light and loose ones, a layer of one meter is necessary. For marshy soils, you still need to make a half-meter gravel drainage layer before laying concrete.
- Marking is done by placing pegs according to plan. A thick rope is pulled between the pegs.
- According to the marking, a turf is cut by a shovel and a trench is digging. Its depth should be approximately 20 cm, and if gravel drainage is arranged, then 25 cm. All plant residues must be carefully removed.
- Further, the formwork is installed, which should be 10 cm above the ground. On the outside, it fits snugly against the walls of the trench, and on the inside, it is strengthened by pegs.
- Agrofibre is laid at the bottom of the prepared trench so that the sand does not go into the ground, and sand itself is poured and compacted onto it. This is necessary to drain water. For better tamping, the sand cushion is wetted.
- Lay a plastic film on top of the sand, always without holes. This is necessary so that the concrete does not dry immediately, but acquires the necessary strength.
- Knead the solution by adding waterproofing impurities.
- At the bottom, put a reinforcing mesh and lay out the solution. Seal, level with a shovel and then with a trowel. The middle of the path is arranged elevated by 3 cm for draining water during rain. Through each running meter expansion joints are made, then the laid garden path made of concrete with your own hands will not crack and deform depending on weather conditions.
- The track is covered with film for a couple of days. Then the film and formwork are removed. During drying, the concrete is wetted with water.
- The sides are clogged and tamped. Irregularities from pegs are covered with concrete.
When the path is completed in summer, you can walk along it in five days, in winter - after ten.
Decorating tracks
A do-it-yourself laid garden path made of concrete, photo examples of which can be found in large numbers, can be decorated to give originality.
Such options are suitable:
- at the stage of mixing the solution add color pigment to it;
- dry dye can also be added while smoothing the surface with a smoothing iron;
- after concrete hardens for three hours, pieces of glass, ceramics, brick, natural stone, marble chips are pressed into it;
- in between the slabs or expansion joints, you can sow grass or flowers;
- the surface of the track can be decorated with a relief pattern, which is applied when the concrete has not yet completely hardened;
- to obtain a polished surface, the latter is iron-coated: dry cement is applied with a dry cement layer of 6 mm, then rubbed with a smoothing iron.
Installation of borders
If a made path in the country house made of concrete passes along the flower garden, then it is not necessary to highlight it with a border. Other paths with edging look more spectacular. The border can be made of brick or pavers, or you can cast edging elements yourself.
The border is especially useful when laying concrete tiles, since it requires a limiter. It is because of the role of the limiter that the installation of the curb is a responsible occupation. It is designed to keep the tile from driving under loads. If the border is poorly fixed, then the tiles will begin to diverge over time, and the completed garden path made of concrete with its own hands will lose its original appearance. For strength, the curb is mounted on a concrete strip base (or simply on the ground) and is supported by pegs on the outside.
The distance between the curb and tile should be minimal, and laying - as dense as possible.