How do you create a terrace in the garden?

Welcome to your personal oasis of well-being - an inviting patio in your own garden. With these instructions, you can easily build your own oasis of well-being.

1. Select installation strategy
2. Staking out the area in the field
3. Determine excavation depth and carry out excavation
4. Set deep kerbs - only if necessary
5. Create formation level
6. Apply and distribute chippings
7. Carefully smooth the chippings
8. Install plastic lawn grids (honeycomb grids) and fill with chippings 
9. Positioning the first terrace slab
10. Lay out and align centre rows
11. Finish laying the slabs and design the edge area

In the WARCO shop you will find a link to the installation planner for each floor covering. There you can enter the dimensions of your area and simulate various installation strategies.

The laying planner shows you what the tile pattern will look like if you lay from a corner of the surface or from the centre of one side, for example. Or - and this is the best laying strategy in most cases - if you lay from the centre of the surface. Of course, the laying tool also calculates how many tiles are required.

The diagram shows on which side the tiles need to be cut. The remnants of one side can often be used on another side.

The customised installation plan can be downloaded as a PDF. Of course, several variants can also be created.

First determine the dimensions of the new decking. Take into account not only the pure usable area of the finished terrace, but also the overhang of the plastic honeycomb grating and any edging.

Plastic honeycomb grids should be laid a few centimetres beyond the edge of the finished terrace on each side without edging.

If possible, lay out the surface of the terrace in such a way that there is no waste when laying the terrace slabs.

Determine the corner points on the ground and mark them with a post. Then connect the posts with a tightly stretched cord to mark out the outer edges of the terrace.

Check the squareness of the marked out area by measuring the diagonals. If both diagonals are the same length, the corners are right-angled.

The amount of topsoil to be removed depends on the local conditions (e.g. slope of the terrain, existing subsoil, intended use). In general, the calculation is based on the following formula:

Thickness of WARCO panel + 4 cm plastic honeycomb grid + 4 cm chippings = excavation

If the ground conditions are unfavourable, a thicker layer of chippings or a frost protection layer of crushed stone can be added; however, crushed stone is not usually necessary as the plastic honeycomb grids offer a load-bearing capacity of up to 400 t/square metre.

In most cases, the excavation depth is approx. 12 cm. It is therefore not necessary to use heavy equipment; a shovel and spade are sufficient to remove the soil in the marked out area. Make sure that the soil is removed evenly and that no holes or unevenness are created.

The installation of low shelves is necessary for panels of the FS series, but can generally be dispensed with for all series with zip toothing. The installation of the low shelves is relatively complex and requires very careful working methods.

The installation of low shelves is necessary for panels of the FS series, but can generally be dispensed with for all series with zip toothing. The installation of the low shelves is relatively complex and requires very careful working methods.

First, a sufficiently deep and wide trench is dug at the marked edge of the area. The base of the trench is well compacted. Unevenness or a slope can be levelled out with sand and also compacted. Tighten a cord to mark the desired height of the top edge of the deep boards.

Now fill in the earth-moist concrete, place the deep shelves and align them. Connectors help to arrange the low shelves straight and without misalignment. The back support for anchoring the shelves is then created as shown in the illustration.

During installation, it is important to regularly check the alignment and spacing of the low shelves to ensure that they are correctly positioned.

The subgrade is the smoothly levelled, load-bearing and, if necessary, compacted subsoil. The subgrade is the "foundation" of the terrace. Under rubber granulate slabs, the subgrade is usually created without a slope.

If you have worked precisely during excavation and removed the soil evenly and to the right depth, you have an advantage when creating the subgrade. This is because it is then sufficient to level the surface. If the depth is too shallow, some soil is removed (planed off). Dents, i.e. areas that are too deep, are filled in. Use a levelling rod and spirit level to check that the subgrade is really level.

If too much soil was removed during excavation, the backfilled soil must be compacted with a hand tamper or a vibrating plate. The aim should be to achieve even compression over the entire area. Ensure that the subgrade is permeable to water and that seepage water can penetrate into the subsoil.

A layer of chippings is evenly applied to the subgrade. The thickness of the chippings layer is usually 3 - 5 cm.

In justified exceptional cases, if the finished surface is subject to particularly high loads and if the substrate is not load-bearing, a 10 - 20 cm thick layer of gravel (not recycled building rubble!) can be laid on the subgrade first, onto which the chippings layer is then applied.

The grain size of the chippings used should be 2/5. With a 3 cm thick layer of chippings, you only need 0.75 m³ of chippings for a 25 m² patio. This quantity can be easily handled with a wheelbarrow and a shovel.

The chippings can be spread well and evenly with a rake. Use a spirit level and place it alternately on different parts of the surface. Check the evenness and, if necessary, adjust the amount of chippings to level out any unevenness.

Chippings levelling is the smoothing of the chippings surface with a levelling bar. Depending on the size of the surface, levelling is carried out in one or more work steps.

Firstly, two suitable guide rails are inserted into the chippings. The distance between the guide rails must be smaller than the width of the levelling bar. Align the guide rails optimally using a spirit level. Then place the straightedge at one end on the two guide rails and pull it horizontally to the other end of the rails.

Any excess chippings are pushed away from the levelling bar during removal and fill in the areas where there are too few chippings. Once a section has been removed, one or both guide rails are carefully picked up and the process is repeated for the next section.

Work with the utmost precision, as the clean levelling of the chippings surface is the prerequisite for a durable, well-surfaced terrace floor.

Start by installing the honeycomb grille in one corner. Turn the honeycomb mesh so that the sides with the open eyelets face the inside of the surface. Then press the first plastic honeycomb grid with the spikes facing downwards into the removed chippings. Then install the other honeycomb grids one after the other in the same way. The spikes on the edge connect one honeycomb grid to the neighbouring honeycomb grid.

Ensure that the spikes of the honeycomb grids penetrate the chippings completely. Move carefully on the levelled grit surface to avoid damaging it. Make sure that the surface of the honeycomb grids is smooth, even and without steps. The honeycomb grids can easily be cut to size using a saw.

When all honeycomb grids have been installed, they are completely filled with chippings. Excess chippings can be removed. The honeycomb grids should be filled up to the top edge, but not overfilled, to ensure a stable and durable base layer for your terrace.

In most cases, laying the patio slabs from the centre of the surface is the best laying strategy. Because

• you get symmetrical, equally sized edge plates,
• Installation errors only add up over a maximum of half the area,
• An unfavourable laying pattern can be corrected before cutting.

The first step is to determine the exact centre of the surface. The easiest way to do this is with two strings that are stretched crosswise from the corner points. Place the first panel exactly in the centre of the surface and align it.

Important: For the installation of rubber granulate slabs, a day should be chosen when the sun is not shining. The temperature during installation should be constantly below 18 °C. Rubber granulate slabs must be completely dry when laying. In order to achieve an attractive laying pattern, the rubber granulate slabs should be sorted before laying (as with parquet).

Now add more panels to the four sides of the centre panel. Only place whole panels until there is no longer enough space on the surface for a whole panel. The tiles in the centre row form a cross. To achieve an exactly straight laying line, stretch a string lengthwise and crosswise along the outside of the panels.

Now check whether you like the laying pattern. Sometimes it makes sense to rotate the installation pattern by a certain angle, e.g. 45°, to create an exciting installation pattern for the terrace in the garden. In this laying position, all changes of direction are possible without any problems.

Once you have found the desired laying pattern, you can cut the edge panels to size. To do this, usually cut one panel in half per row or cut a strip out of the centre of a panel to create two equal-sized panel sections. These tile sections are then used as edge tiles at the beginning and end of the row.

Now lay the other tiles, preferably in concentric circles around the centre. The whole slabs are laid first. Only when all the whole tiles have been laid on the surface are the edge tiles and then the corner tiles cut to size and fitted.

A circular saw with a saw blade for rubber or wood is best suited for cutting the rubber granulate sheets to size. Both jigsaws and reciprocating saws are suitable for incisions or curved cuts.

Ist die Fläche mit Randsteinen eingefasst, werden diese nun an den noch offenen Seiten verlegt. Liegt die Terrasse in einer Rasenfläche oder ist sie von Beeten eingefasst, sollte der Rand mit Erde aufgefüllt werden, damit ein homogener Übergang von der Terrassenfläche zur Grünfläche entsteht.

If the area is edged with kerbstones, these are now laid on the sides that are still open. If the patio is located in a lawn area or is bordered by flower beds, the edge should be filled with soil to create a homogeneous transition from the patio area to the green area.