On 8/2/11 3:16 PM, wrote:
On Tue, 02 Aug 2011 12:44:14 -0400, X -
wrote:

On 8/2/11 12:20 PM, wrote:
On Tue, 02 Aug 2011 10:32:49 -0400, X -
wrote:


I'm going to put a stone paver patio in under part of the deck at the
rear of the house. About 130 square feet. Going to use J.P. Henry stone.

The rough part is excavating out about 7" of compacted soil, so I'm
going to contract that out. The rest is a lot of work, but not
back-breaking...layer of geo textile, 4" to 5" of base that I'll compact
with a rental compactor, then an inch of sand as a screening bed, and
then the pavers. Also have to rent a ditch witch to dig 50' trenches for
two downspouts and a trench for electrical conduit for wiring to power
up a fountain.

But not until the temps drop.

We have about 2000 square feet of quartzite granite stone in the
screen cage and around the yard. It is over concrete tho. Of you just
set stone in the sand you will be fighting grass forever. I suppose if
you don't mind spraying poison around every few months you can hold it
down

We have been doing this over a period of 20 years, a new patch every
few years so it wasn't horrible to do.

http://gfretwell.com/electrical/addi...0them%20in.jpg

The problem with concreting in pavers is the freeze-thaw cycle up here.
Even when the concrete is thick enough and reinforced and there are
expansion joints, the freeze-thaw cycle sometimes rears its ugly head
and large chunks of the paved area rise up or drop down. If pavers on a
bed of sand move, it is easy to reposition them.

This is a reinforced 4" slab so cracking has not been a huge problem.
Up there, if you are building on that "bank run gravel" and clay
substrate cracking was never a problem for me.
I had a huge driveway there that never cracked. (my ex still lives
there)
When I set these stones I used a latex modified mortar that has a bit
of give to it so the cracks are not really that bad. The only place I
have one is in a section that was destablized when they dug the pool.
The crack followed the line of the stone. I keep saying I will grind
out the mortar and regrout it now that it stabilized again but it is
not very high on my list. The rest has held up fine.

The important thing, if you did want to set this on concrete up there
is to be sure there are no voids in the mortar that would hold water.
I would lay down about an inch of modified type S and bed the stone
in, being damned sure I got all the air bubbles out. Then you screed
off the excess, wiping down the top of the stone as best you can with
a damp grout sponge.
Once it has set but is still green, you can detail the stone getting
the rest off. After a month or so you can finish it with your pressure
washer, getting off anything you missed.
I have to say, with 2 decades of service out of this, it is the
perfect patio/pool deck. It gives very good footing when it is wet.
It is pretty much maintenance free. We pressure clean it once or twice
a year but with the wide fan spray so it goes real fast.


Too much work. As I said, I've built patios before, pavers on sand, and
had no serious problems.