riding school drainage

[LittleMouse]

Hiya,
we are building our own riding arena and i just need some advice on drainage. i need a simple, cheap DIY way to drain the school. the surface will preferably be sand or rubber. also, do i need membranes and things, and what surfaces shal i use????. ive heard of road scalpings and stuff....but i dont know what to do. simple step by step please....any advice welcome!!!
thankies!!!!! xxx

 

[LittleMouse]

also...the ground isnt quite level. do we need to level it first or level it with the base by putting more in certain areas etc . :/ there not puttin drainage in coz its gonna be above ground and will aperently drain itself...what do you think???

 

[Rob Lakeside]

Simply I have put to schools in at lakeside. in both drainage is critical one of my schools is in the air by 8ft.

Drainage is easy as long as you follow guide lines.
Soil type ,Sandy,ckalk or clay.
Sandy the hardest to drain as the sand moves and clogs the drainage up.so you need tosheet the drainage trench and all the site to.
chalk easier but drains are required.
Clay easy to drain, often the clay will remain in one place.

Use a good woven fibre, terran is the one most recommended
This keeps the soil from filling up the drainage and so blocking up the air gaps needed for drainage .

French drains.
This is a 300mm x 300mm trench filled with 20mm-50mm stones and laid under a school at 5-7 metre distances

Drainage pipe in the bottom of the trench 100mm dia.

Drainage gradiant or drop, water flows down hill so 300mm-450mm over 60metres if pipees are running lenght wise through the school.

Do not forget friench drains out side the school to stop surface water from the fields around flooding your school.

Finally use a screeding layer or terrame before putting the sand down to prevent thesand contaminating your drainage.

Must not`s
use hard core in a menage and broadcast it over the site, simply you can have to much drainage and this will cause it to dry out to quickly.

Quallity drainage materials is essential please do not cheapen this.

Finally if in doubt call an expert in, Bill kear is in Surrey, ask them to put the ground work in.
good luck and read up on it first befor hand.

Remember if you get the drainage wrong, you will regrete this forever it is not about the surface, beleave it or not, that is secondary and not the most important factor, their are many bad stories on this forum of persons who have broken these rules, try telling you horsey ladies out there
Rob

 

[meesha]

good advice from Rob - my arena involved ground levelling - drains digging - terram - pipes putting in covered with clean stone and then loads more stone (rubbish stone in my case) then top terram and topping (pics in my album) you can do it on the cheap but i wish i had bought good stone which would have cost prob 2k more (which I just didnt have at the time so have odd stone coming through terram which have had to sort and stitch ripped terram) I will probably end up one day taking up topping & terram and putting layer good stone on top bad and levelling. Total cost including all labour/materials 7k and it is still good 3 years on.

Also levelling sooo important I do mine once a week regardless of use (only me on yard) and this stops the stone coming through terram issue.