Laying the sidewalk in the yard on your own is not at all difficult

The sidewalk next to the house is a very necessary and useful improvement. After all, even in bad weather you have to leave the house and more than once. But the shoes remain clean. And walking on the sidewalk is much more pleasant and comfortable than walking along the footbridge.

Selection of paving slabs

The sidewalk had to be laid between the house and the garage, along the terrace, under the pool and on the path to the bathhouse. It turned out almost 90 squares. We took into account all the turns, angles in order to accurately calculate the amount and not take too much. Indeed, for each square you need to pay 250 rubles, and also a border of 50 rubles each.

If you hire a team to build a sidewalk, you would have to pay 55 thousand, 600 rubles per square meter. This is together with the foundation pit, the installation of curbs and backfill with sand. The amount is not small and therefore my wife and I decided to make the sidewalk on our own. Therefore, when choosing a material, the complexity of its installation was also taken into account.

We really liked the paving stones. But due to the thickness of 50 mm, a large volume of material was obtained and therefore expensive. We stopped at 30 mm thick paving slabs.

The drawing was chosen taking into account the overall design of the house, where light, almost white walls were combined with a dark brown attic pediment and roof. Large white 20x20 tiles were stacked with black small 10x10 tiles. And to make the drawing more fun, half of the black was replaced with yellow.

Site preparation

The construction of the sidewalk was carried out according to all the rules. They dug a pit to the depth of a bayonet shovel, this is 30 cm. All the soil was taken to the edge of the land and poured into the lowland. Dornite with a density of 200 was laid at the bottom of the pit so that the sand did not mix with the ground.

We measured the distance from the house taking into account the number of rows of tiles and did not forget to add 3 mm for the gaps. High precision made it possible to do without cutting the tiles for laying in the last row, near the wall of the house. At this distance, along the entire perimeter, sidewalk curbs were installed on concrete. We waited 5 days for the concrete to get stronger.

Then they covered it with sand and rammed it with a vibration machine. In the place where on the site it was supposed to drive the car into the parking lot, more sand was laid on top of the sand so that the tiles did not sag under the wheels.

Laying tiles

Now we started laying the tiles. We started from the far corner so that the entire coating would consist of solid tiles. The drawing was chosen with color symmetry. Although asymmetric does not look bad either. But laying it down is somewhat more difficult.

A fresh 5 cm layer of sand was poured onto the top of the compacted sand. The upper loose layer made it possible to sink the tiles and level them along the plane. They deliberately refused to add cement to the sand. After all, there will be few people walking on the sidewalk, this is not a city street. But rainwater through clean sand in the gaps will go very well. Which was later confirmed.

To form the correct slope, for the drainage of rainwater, guides for the leveling board were laid, using a level of 1.5 meters. They equalized the sand with a long board, and then removed the guides.

The tiles were laid diagonally, so it was easier to maintain a gap of 3 mm. At first, crosses were used, but then they became superfluous. To level the tiles on a plane, rubber hammers of 1 and 2 kg were used. From time to time, the slope was checked by the level. In order not to move or collapse the tiles, a long wide board was laid under the feet.

Care and use of the sidewalk

Every 5 - 7 rows were covered with dry sand and swept into the gaps with a brush until they were completely filled. Then they poured water from a watering can. And at the end of laying in a day, the laid out sidewalk was spilled from a hose, through a sprayer, so as not to wash out the sand from the seams with a jet. The water compacted the sand well in the joints and under the tiles. And the tile stopped loose.

Initially, the sidewalk was not bright in color. White tiles were gray, while black and yellow tiles were closer to brown. But after the first few rains, the tiles cleared and returned to their final color, as the manufacturer said.

And now the courtyard has acquired an elegant look, thanks to the laid sidewalk. And our family enjoys using it.