Raising Level of Driveway

Furts

getmore4less wrote: »

Another option is to consider a garage with a basement.

Even if not usable as a garden room masses of storage.

one thing we don't do enough of these days is make use of the space under out houses.

Be scrupulous, and ultra cautious before going down this route. Good structural design, coupled with meticulous workmanship is required, The former is likely to be lacking on the waterproofing/tanking details and the latter is a perpetual nightmare with UK house building. For these reasons, and others such as cost, the volume builders run a mile from this concept.

phil24_7

getmore4less wrote: »

Another option is to consider a garage with a basement.

Even if not usable as a garden room masses of storage.

one thing we don't do enough of these days is make use of the space under out houses.

This is exactly what I did. 8.6m x 3.6m cellar extension with a garage and carport on top, fully insulated walls and roof in case of any future change of use ( the garage is warmer than my house). Cost me close to 40k with all the structural work that was needed (only 1 of the shorter walls did not need to be retaining). If you include planing, building control architect and structural engineers fees then it was over £40k!:eek:

phil24_7

Furts wrote: »

Be scrupulous, and ultra cautious before going down this route. Good structural design, coupled with meticulous workmanship is required, The former is likely to be lacking on the waterproofing/tanking details and the latter is a perpetual nightmare with UK house building. For these reasons, and others such as cost, the volume builders run a mile from this concept.

Indeed. The concrete base has to be near perfect to allow water to drain properly (the one area where mine works fell short) and there needs to be care and consideration given to backfilling (geotextile, clean drainage media, no fines concrete etc). I spent a lot of time and a fair bit of money carrying out remedials like raising (5-35mm) and levelling the internal floor level (so that it was above the bottom cement course where the water was soaking in), tanking the walls (to 1m as a belt and braces aproach) with a tanking slurry, and concreting around the outside (with special care given to draining water away from the structure to provide triple protection) to make my cellar watertight.

It is lovely now and the natural temperature stabilisation of the surrounding ground means that it is always a comfortable temperature in there.

Furts

phil24_7 wrote: »

Indeed. The concrete base has to be near perfect to allow water to drain properly (the one area where mine works fell short) and there needs to be care and consideration given to backfilling (geotextile, clean drainage media, no fines concrete etc). I spent a lot of time and a fair bit of money carrying out remedials like raising (5-35mm) and levelling the internal floor level (so that it was above the bottom cement course where the water was soaking in), tanking the walls (to 1m as a belt and braces aproach) with a tanking slurry, and concreting around the outside (with special care given to draining water away from the structure to provide triple protection) to make my cellar watertight.

It is lovely now and the natural temperature stabilisation of the surrounding ground means that it is always a comfortable temperature in there.

I had the task of doing a one off for one of the volume house builders. It was a prototype with the view to rolling out the design across the country. The workmanship involved meant the finished result was too expensive for the bean counters and the design went no further. The person who bought the one off got a lovely house, and probably does not realise the significance and story behind it.