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I would have thought top soil would be fine particularly if its finely graded -- the cheaper stuff will have weed seeds in it but i would think if its just the levels you are concerned about and not the finest lawn finish it would work and save you a lot of money
i think if you shop around you should be able to get topsoil with weed seeds for 40 -50 £ a ton max -- less if you pick it up
obviously it comes with issues but it should be cheap to make up for that
Thanks, John. I can get top soil delivered for about £50. Do you rake it in?
Be careful with cheaper top soil, often lots of big flat stones and unsuitable for lawns - you really need to be looking at premium soil or lawn dressing. Wouldn't worry about weed seed as these can be treated later if need be.
The top soil and foot firming/seeding is the way to go. Apply top soil, level [rake] and compact and repeat in layers until firm and perfectly level.
I prefer the use of my Stiga four wheel drive mower to firm up top soil, although this is when levelling large areas for turf. I level, then roll [every square inch] with mower. I then re-level and repeat rolling. This will take about three runs through before it is both level and firm.
Good quality top soil here in north east Derbyshire is £15 per tonne if collected. You can have it in half tonne amounts for easier transportation and is therefore £7.50. It is £20 per tonne delivered but then there is a minimum of 3 and a half tonnes. Top soil should not be much more than this.
good price - no one around this way would deliver for £15 !!! unless its mega close thats worse than min wage ! I expect delivery to cost a bit extra - i wouldnt even pick it up for £15 off !
The top soil is £15 per tonne cash and carry, they don't deliver it for this price. As I said, it is £20 per tonne delivered with a minimum of three and a half tonnes, meaning a minimum price delivered of £70, locally.
I use my trailer and have half a tonne at a time, for the smaller jobs, which is £7.50. If I need at least three and a half tonnes, then I have it delivered. The firm in question is a proper aggregates merchant.
i think i get your maths -- approx £45 for 3 tonnes picked up -- £60 for 3 tonnes delivered
great price but that makes a £15 del charge -- no one around here would spend an hour loading up and delivering for £15 ! Great price
The top soil costs the firm almost nothing, so pretty much all profit. They do ground works themselves, so the top soil is often a by-product of their paid work anyway. I imagine that on some occasions they are even paid to take it away. They have a digger with a scale in the cab, so they can scoop up a tonne, accurately and very quickly and drop it in the trailer or truck and in all it only takes a couple of minutes. If they deliver, they use a tipper, so are again very quick.
So the minimum delivery amount is £70 within a few miles and for this they use a small Bedford type tipper. It is economy of scale and a product that costs very little, if anything at all. At any time they have a couple of hundred tonnes of top soil on the yard. The lorries/trucks are in and out delivering stone, ballast and various other aggregates all the time, so the odd top soil run is just part of the routine.
I am only a mile away from them and the furthest I have had soil delivered is less than five miles from them. If a longer delivery distance is required then the cost of said delivery would obviously be more.
I have used other firms in the past and a figure of around fifteen to twenty pounds per tonne is standard. What pushes the price up considerably is indeed the delivery, if that is a fair distance.
I have paid about £130 for three and a half tonnes a few years ago, but they were travelling 25 miles to deliver it. This was before I knew about the local firm, they are quite well hidden.
The moral of the story is, use someone as close to you as possible.
Personally I would save the scarifying until closer to the end of the season, then you can get rid of weeds etc with new grass growth all in one go.
On the other hand, by that point the customer may have changed their mind so probably best to strike while the iron is hot!
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