Pine Sleepers how much?
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
Your local timber yard should deliver for free if you spend over say £50 (which is what my local policy is). I suppose it depends how local it is though.
- Yorkshire Kris
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Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
About 3 milespdid wrote:Your local timber yard should deliver for free if you spend over say £50 (which is what my local policy is). I suppose it depends how local it is though.
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
Does £99 spread over the number of sleepers you need still look like a lot (per sleeper)? I've enquired locally and the folk in Corby still look to be a lot cheaper.Yorkshire Kris wrote:I need rather a lot....
I want to put a "wall" around a concrete pad where we have farmyard manure delivered (and sometimes sand / aggregate) to stop it wandering off the edge ... I reckon the cheapest way will be RSJ's vertically into the ground and then drop sleepers into the "H" slots - easy to "repair" if a front loader biffs them too ... so I will shortly be in the market for quite a few sleepers, and I won't be able to go and collect that number!
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
its a lot of money, but hardly extortion.kata wrote:Pure extortion..£100 delivery...
Sleepers are not the same thing as a regular parcel ... they have to be loaded on, and off, by crane. It takes time, so you are paying for that too. Plus they are blinking heavy ... so you are paying a lot more for fuel compared to a lighter parcel.
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Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
True, initially I'm going to order 35 for the framework of my raised beds.Kristen wrote:Does £99 spread over the number of sleepers you need still look like a lot (per sleeper)? I've enquired locally and the folk in Corby still look to be a lot cheaper.Yorkshire Kris wrote:I need rather a lot....
I want to put a "wall" around a concrete pad where we have farmyard manure delivered (and sometimes sand / aggregate) to stop it wandering off the edge ... I reckon the cheapest way will be RSJ's vertically into the ground and then drop sleepers into the "H" slots - easy to "repair" if a front loader biffs them too ... so I will shortly be in the market for quite a few sleepers, and I won't be able to go and collect that number!
How high will your"wall" be?
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
you could save on sleepers by stacking them on their sides like I have. stability might be an issue if its a freestanding wall though
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
less than £3 each then ... worth seeing if you can get them for that much extra locally then, otherwise its still a bargain I reckonYorkshire Kris wrote:True, initially I'm going to order 35 for the framework of my raised beds.
Or ... around about 50 sleepers is carriage free ... carriage is about the same as 5 sleepers so if you can find a use for another 10 sleepers you'll get 5 more for free. Or flog them on eBay - to local folk who only want a couple?
Waist high, probably about 15M long ... call it 4 high x 6 long ... maybe I could collect them, I don't think it is any more than I had for my raised bed.How high will your"wall" be?
I'm sure you have thought of this, but do take into consideration the width of the sleepers for your raised beds - they take up quite a lot of width. People often want to use them for raised beds for vegetables - max width for a vegetable raised bed is 4' (reachable from either side without walking on it), and allowing 18"-24" for a path between, if you use sleepers to "frame" the raised beds then after you have made 3 x raised beds you've used up the space that could have made a 4th one just in the width of the sleepers
I lined my vegetable raised beds (only 9" high or so, using decking boards) with damp proof membrane (keeps the preservatives in the sleepers out of the soil that the veg are growing in too), to increase the life of the timber, and my sleeper raised beds are lined with some spare pond-liner that I had lying around.
I've done that, and drilled them through and banged rebar through the sleepers and a good 2' into the ground below. They aren't going to fall over, but they have bowed out a bit.fieldfest wrote:you could save on sleepers by stacking them on their sides like I have. stability might be an issue if its a freestanding wall though
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Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
Kristen wrote:less than £3 each then ... worth seeing if you can get them for that much extra locally then, otherwise its still a bargain I reckonYorkshire Kris wrote:True, initially I'm going to order 35 for the framework of my raised beds.
Or ... around about 50 sleepers is carriage free ... carriage is about the same as 5 sleepers so if you can find a use for another 10 sleepers you'll get 5 more for free. Or flog them on eBay - to local folk who only want a couple?
Waist high, probably about 15M long ... call it 4 high x 6 long ... maybe I could collect them, I don't think it is any more than I had for my raised bed.How high will your"wall" be?
I'm sure you have thought of this, but do take into consideration the width of the sleepers for your raised beds - they take up quite a lot of width. People often want to use them for raised beds for vegetables - max width for a vegetable raised bed is 4' (reachable from either side without walking on it), and allowing 18"-24" for a path between, if you use sleepers to "frame" the raised beds then after you have made 3 x raised beds you've used up the space that could have made a 4th one just in the width of the sleepers
I lined my vegetable raised beds (only 9" high or so, using decking boards) with damp proof membrane (keeps the preservatives in the sleepers out of the soil that the veg are growing in too), to increase the life of the timber, and my sleeper raised beds are lined with some spare pond-liner that I had lying around.
I've done that, and drilled them through and banged rebar through the sleepers and a good 2' into the ground below. They aren't going to fall over, but they have bowed out a bit.fieldfest wrote:you could save on sleepers by stacking them on their sides like I have. stability might be an issue if its a freestanding wall though
It might sound crazy but I'm going to put decking over the sleepers that will make up the raised beds. The sleepers will negate the need to put in loads of posts and wooden bearers for the decking paths. The paths will then be raised above the ground and flush with the top of the raised beds giving the effect that the whole area isn't raised at all.
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
So the decking will span the gap / be over the path, between the raised beds?Yorkshire Kris wrote:It might sound crazy but I'm going to put decking over the sleepers that will make up the raised beds. The sleepers will negate the need to put in loads of posts and wooden bearers for the decking paths. The paths will then be raised above the ground and flush with the top of the raised beds giving the effect that the whole area isn't raised at all.
That sounds like a smashing idea
Planning on something to "assist" drainage from the bottom of the raised beds onto the "paths"? I put a perforated drainage pipe in the bottom of my raised beds. I block the outlet end in Summer and fill it with water for bottom-irrigation, and in Winter I take the "Bung" out to allow better drainage.
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
You don't want pine sleepers, they are rubbish and don't last 5 minutes. You want old rail sleepers made from exotic hard wood and covered in preservative. They last a lifetime. Were you can get them from is another matter.
Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
The Corby outfit sell them (well, 2nd hand ones). I wouldn't want them anywhere near my food crops though, and they can weep tar in the summer, so I wouldn't use them as an edging that I might sit on ... but they are cheaper than new ones and I have been considering them for my "wall"jungle jas wrote:You want old rail sleepers made from exotic hard wood and covered in preservative.
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Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
jungle jas wrote:You don't want pine sleepers, they are rubbish and don't last 5 minutes. You want old rail sleepers made from exotic hard wood and covered in preservative. They last a lifetime. Were you can get them from is another matter.
Pressure treated pine should last a good long time if not cut through.
OldRailway sleepers are not good as they exude tar etc and I woudn't be able to plant edibles in the beds
Last edited by Yorkshire Kris on Fri Sep 27, 2013 1:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
- Yorkshire Kris
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Re: Pine Sleepers how much?
That's the plan anyway. I will divert water under the decking towards the yet-to-be-created stream.Kristen wrote:So the decking will span the gap / be over the path, between the raised beds?Yorkshire Kris wrote:It might sound crazy but I'm going to put decking over the sleepers that will make up the raised beds. The sleepers will negate the need to put in loads of posts and wooden bearers for the decking paths. The paths will then be raised above the ground and flush with the top of the raised beds giving the effect that the whole area isn't raised at all.
That sounds like a smashing idea
Planning on something to "assist" drainage from the bottom of the raised beds onto the "paths"? I put a perforated drainage pipe in the bottom of my raised beds. I block the outlet end in Summer and fill it with water for bottom-irrigation, and in Winter I take the "Bung" out to allow better drainage.