Making a mold for a garden path with your own hands and a path along it. How to make a mold for filling garden paths with your own hands Homemade mold for paths

Garden paths are an integral element of the design of a personal plot. When building concrete paths, you can use both purchased and homemade molds to create tiles. As practice shows, self-made stencils are in no way inferior to expensive store-bought counterparts.

Make your own template for garden tiles can be made from scrap materials, for example, from sheet iron. The galvanized material is cut into strips of the required width and length, the ends of the resulting “strips” are bent using a hammer like a roofing seam. Iron hoops removed from leaky wooden barrel– just bend or stretch the metal rims at your discretion. Alternatively, a stencil for tiles can be assembled from thin wooden slats suitable size. The boards are folded into a frame; metal staples and screws/screws are used for fastening. The tiles are cast in such forms directly at the place where the path is paved.

On a note! The presence of several similar forms will significantly speed up the process of constructing a concrete path.

Preparing the base. Before casting the tiles, you need to properly prepare the site for the concrete path:

To begin with, wooden/metal stakes are installed along the perimeter of the future path.
Then a thick wire or nylon cord is pulled between them.
Next, remove the turf layer from the marked area with a shovel and deepen the trench by 15-20 cm.
After this, the bottom of the trench is alternately lined with sand, crushed stone, geotextile and sand again, the formed “cushion” is carefully compacted with a hand tamper.

Preparation of the solution. After preparing the base, you can begin mixing the solution. First in plastic container pour washed sand, fine crushed stone and cement in a ratio of 3:2:1. Then add water little by little to the thoroughly mixed ingredients. The “correct” solution should be fluid, but at the same time have a fairly thick and viscous consistency.

Note! To increase service life garden path, the composition of the solution can be supplemented with reinforcing fiber fiber, a plasticizer and a hydrophobic additive - the first will give the concrete strength, the second will increase its frost resistance, the third will make the tile masonry moisture resistant.

Filling homemade molds. Before directly pouring the stencils, it is necessary to generously moisten the base with a spray hose - otherwise the soil will “pull” moisture from the concrete, and the tiles will turn out brittle. After this, the mold is placed on a sandy floor and tightly filled with the solution using a trowel or small spatula. Excess concrete is removed with a spatula or flat lath. The filled forms are kept for 30-40 minutes, then carefully removed.

On a note! To homemade stencils easily separated from the solution; before pouring, they are lubricated with inside machine or regular vegetable oil.

Decorating garden paths. Immediately after pouring, concrete tiles can be decorated with porcelain tiles, shells or pieces of colored tiles. Decorative elements gently melt in the damp mortar, then the surface of the tile is leveled again with a spatula. The gaps between the tile puzzles can be filled with fine expanded clay or filled with soil mixed with seeds lawn grass, or vice versa, fill it with a liquid cement-sand mixture to prevent the germination of greenery. Hardening the path. To ensure that the path lasts as long as possible, the surface of each tile is covered with “cement laitance”. It is very simple to prepare such a fixing solution - just mix a small amount of dry cement with clean water. The mixture should be homogeneous and liquid in consistency. To apply the milk, use a wide brush or roller. This process of strengthening the tiles is called “iron ironing”.

On a note! After the fixing coating has dried, the color of the tile may change slightly - most likely, it will become grayish-brown. You can give the path the desired shade using coloring pigments or acrylic paint- they are added to small quantity into the prepared mortar mixture.

Having decided to improve her garden, FORUMHOUSE member _KM_ had my eye on construction market forms to create concrete paths. This option is several times cheaper than purchasing, and in the picture such paths looked very aesthetically pleasing. And, most importantly, this mold for garden tiles allows you to cast products directly on site; after hardening, there is no need to lay them. True, the forum member still had doubts about its durability.

KM_ Member of FORUMHOUSE

Plastic garden path molds are nice, but I'd like to talk to someone who has had at least a few years of experience using them. Simply making road tiles so that they do not crack or chip is enough difficult process, which requires precise adherence to the proportions of the mixture, and thorough mixing, and vibration compaction, and steaming of the product... I want to somehow bring the quality of my homemade product closer to this, but I doubt that this is real.

D e Indeed, many participants of our portal have already poured concrete into figured plastic molds, some ready-made, others home-made. However, for some, garden paths “under paving stones” have served faithfully for five or six years, while for others, they fell apart into small stones in the first season. According to FORUMHOUSE participants, the first factor influencing the durability of any structure is the quality of foundation preparation.

Preparing the base for the paths

First you need to mark out the area in the garden: draw the boundaries of future country paths or areas that are supposed to be concreted, paved with homemade concrete tiles. It is important that the base is level, without significant differences in height. Member FORUMHOUSE igo131019671 gives the following recipe for preparing the base for concrete paths:

igo131019671

The base, geotextile (dornite), then crushed stone, on top - a 5 cm layer of sand. We compact everything well and only then fill the tiles.

However, it is worth considering that at this stage a lot depends on the type of soil.

Here's what they say about this on our forum:

Helga Member of FORUMHOUSE

In our garden on clayey hard soils, such paths “sit like a glove” without any preparation from below. Preparation “wisely” for such a small one paving slabs will not help.

Krysya Member of FORUMHOUSE

And at my dacha there is gorgeous high-moor peat throughout the entire area. I will have to make this base longer than the tiles.

If country cottage area covered with a thick, well-kept lawn, it is tempting to lay path forms directly on top of the grass. But nothing will work out that way. Member FORUMHOUSE Just Grandfather advises removing the turf before filling the path.

Just Grandfather

I did it very simply: I placed the form in the place where I wanted to see my tiles. Using an ordinary plaster trowel, I cut through the turf around the perimeter of the form. The turf was removed, the base was slightly leveled with sand and compacted with a masher if necessary. I installed the mold and then filled it with solution.

Mixing concrete

The next stage is perhaps the most important in the process of making tiles for garden paths - preparing concrete. This will require a number of materials: cement (not lower than grade M400), sand, crushed stone (fraction 5-20), plasticizer. The latter allows you to reduce the volume of water during mixing and reduce the number of pores in concrete, which prevent its destruction during freezing and thawing. The plasticizer will help make the surface of the path smoother.

Pay attention to the date of manufacture of cement and do not buy it for future use, because this material, even proper storage loses up to 10% of its strength per month.

On our portal there is another topic dedicated to, where participants also willingly share their accumulated experience in arranging beautiful and comfortable garden paths.

Nuwa Member of FORUMHOUSE

Concrete is prepared from a mixture of cement, sand and crushed stone (fraction 5-20) in a ratio of 1:2:3 by volume with the addition of a plasticizer (1 liter per 1 cubic meter). It is also advisable to add fiber fibers (600 g per 1 cubic meter) to the solution, which provides plastic reinforcement of the layer.

It is best to use a concrete mixer to prepare concrete, as this will greatly facilitate the work and save time. You may not have a concrete mixer at your dacha, but you can prepare concrete by thoroughly mixing the ingredients in a trough.

The exclusion of at least one ingredient from the concrete composition will significantly reduce the quality of the coating.

Place the forms on the prepared base

It's time to pour the solution into the molds. Since the tiles are cast on site (that is, unlike factory paving slabs, after drying they will no longer need to be laid), we place the forms directly on the prepared base - a cushion of geotextile, compacted sand and gravel. The form for making garden paths with your own hands must be lubricated so that in the future it can be easily removed from the hardening concrete.

Strekoza Member of FORUMHOUSE

Cement molds must be lubricated several times with drying oil or machine oil before use.

Placing concrete in forms

When pouring concrete into plastic molds for garden paths, it is important to make the surface smooth, without grooves or bumps, using a trowel to level it. Concrete must be poured quickly, and action must be taken carefully.

After the concrete has set a little, the templates must be removed - some do this 4-5 hours after pouring, when the density of the concrete becomes comparable to the density of plasticine, others wait one and a half to two days.

To increase the strength and hardness of concrete, as well as protect it from moisture penetration, by removing the form, they resort to the ironing procedure.

Ironing is a method of improving the quality of the external surface of concrete by rubbing cement powder into freshly laid concrete. Concrete will become more durable.

Painting concrete

If natural grey colour concrete seems boring to you, or the site design requires bright colors, concrete can be painted. Here's how summer residents, members of our portal, add color to garden paths:

nuwa

The dye is evenly scattered onto the smoothed concrete layer so that it completely covers the entire area to be treated. The dye penetrates deeply into the pores of the layer and not only colors it, but also strengthens the surface. Within a few minutes, the dye powder absorbs moisture. After making sure that there are no dry areas left, it is smoothed with a trowel, removing grooves and irregularities. Then the procedure of adding dye and leveling it is repeated again.

And here's what interesting way FORUMHOUSE participant suggests painting country paths using “folk” remedies b_l_e_f

b_l_e_f

I used ferric chloride. A tablespoon per 2 liters of water, spray through an ordinary sprayer. You need to spray fresh concrete (I did this on the 3-4th day), it doesn’t work so effectively on old concrete. I don’t know how this color will behave in cold weather, but mine withstood the autumn showers.

Also, participants in our country forum decorate fresh concrete with homemade mosaics, laying out the design with pieces of colored tiles different sizes, carefully pressing them into the solution. The tiles left over from renovations in a house or country house will come in handy here. It is first broken into pieces with a hammer. The use of large beads, bottle glasses and other decor is allowed.

Checking the readiness of concrete

During the first week, the concrete will actively gain strength; this process lasts 28-30 days. In hot weather, the tiles are moistened during the setting process by watering from a watering can. Also, to reduce moisture evaporation in the first days, you can cover the products with plastic wrap.

Can I make a mold for a garden path with my own hands? What materials can be used to create it? What concrete composition should I use? In this article we will try to give answers to these and some other questions.

Monolith and mosaic

The shape of the garden path should be determined by the method of pouring it.

What options are possible?

A mosaic path is, in fact, homemade paving slabs laid on a sand base. Its installation takes quite a long time; however, the result looks very impressive.

Hint: its appearance is especially impressive when the seams between the tiles are wide enough for grass to break through.

Mosaic tiles can be cast on site, directly onto a substrate of sand or crushed stone. In this case, the mold for filling the garden path is filled cement-sand mortar or concrete and bayoneted; After the solution has set, the mold is carefully removed and used to form the next section.
Finally, the monolithic walkway can be cast in full-size formwork; the recesses, symbolically dividing it into individual tiles, are formed by pressing the mold.

As a result, if the concrete cracks, it does so along the dividing lines - simply because it is thinner there. In addition, the moderate depth of these lines allows for full reinforcement of the track with mesh.

Making molds

For tiles

The simplest case is when the goal is to establish own production paving slabs. The motives are quite obvious: the components are much cheaper than finished tiles; Moreover, its production requires only a certain amount of free space and time.

The simplest form for rectangular tiles is assembled from 15 mm plywood and consists of a square or rectangular frame divided into cells. The plywood walls are butt-joined using long self-tapping screws with pre-drilled holes.

Which plywood should you choose? First, let's find out what it is like.

Our obvious choice is FB or, in its absence, FSF (by the way, its price is significantly lower). In the latter case, you will have to take additional care of the water resistance of the form by impregnating it with drying oil. Impregnation is performed at least twice; while drying oil for more deep penetration in the veneer is either preheated in a water bath or heated construction hairdryer already after application.

How to make a mold for filling garden paths with your own hands? If it needs to form square or rectangular elements - exactly as described above.

But in order to get tiles of complex or irregular shape, you will have to take up welding.

Cut 3mm steel sheet into strips 50 mm wide. If you have access to guillotine shears, it is better to use them; in other cases, you can use a grinder with a cutting wheel for metal.
We weld a box of square, rectangular or more complex shape.
We bend the strips into arbitrary arcs and fill the box with them.
We grab each connection at two or three points.

The photo shows a form made of steel strip.

For the monolith

Surprise: designed for drawing on monolithic concrete Do-it-yourself molds for garden paths are made from the same steel and using exactly the same technology. The whole difference is in the width of the stripes: it should not exceed a couple of centimeters, otherwise there is a risk that the dividing lines will expose the reinforcement.

By the way: instead of steel strips, in this case you can use a round steel bar with a diameter of 8-10 millimeters.

Making tiles

The process looks like this:

Mixed in a concrete mixer cement mortar in the proportion of 1 part cement to 3 parts sand. Water is added in minimal portions: the mixture should be semi-dry. When using large forms, fine crushed stone can be added to the solution at a ratio of 1:3:3.
Purchased or homemade forms for garden paths are laid out on top of dense polyethylene on a flat floor.
tightly clogged with mortar or concrete. Bayoneting is mandatory; the excess is removed from the surface of the mold with a straight strip.

After 6 - 12 hours, the molds are carefully removed and can be filled again. The tiles are ready for installation in about a week; It gains full strength in a month.

Important point: maximum size tiles that do not need to be reinforced - 15x15 cm. When large sizes tiles 5 cm thick easily chip when there is an uneven load on its surface. For reinforcement you can use steel mesh or fiber - chopped fiberglass added to the solution.

How to pour tiles directly onto the surface of the path? Yes, exactly the same. The leveled area is covered with sand or crushed stone to a depth of 5-8 cm and compacted; further is no different from the technology described above.

Please note: Whether you are laying tiles or grouting them in place, the joints should be sanded as tightly as possible. Otherwise, inevitable displacements will quickly disrupt the strict geometry or the picturesque disorder of the drawing.

Drawing on a monolith

In essence, we have to pour an ordinary monolithic concrete path.

Agree, walking on ground muddy from rain is not very great pleasure. Making a path like this with your own hands is not too difficult and much cheaper than buying ready-made tiles and hiring workers who will lay them. No special equipment is required, just as the professional skills of a tiler or builder are not required. Any average summer resident can do everything. DIY garden path using a form is easy to do and in this article we will reveal several secrets.

DIY garden path using a mold

Garden path - where to start?

Before you start building a garden path, you need to take care of creating tiles. In order to speed up this process and spend as much as possible less funds, you should listen to our advice. For example, it is better not to purchase ready-made forms, but to accumulate them throughout the year, leaving, for example, used plastic food containers. If you plan to make large elements, you can knock them down yourself for this purpose wooden frames with bottom. And if you need forms round shape, you can cut off old pots or basins.

You can cast the molds as follows:

1. Mix sand and cement, gradually adding liquid.

2. To make sure that the structure of the contents has reached the required condition, you need to put the mixture on the trowel and make sure that it does not flow from it.

3. You do not need to fill the form completely; one third must remain empty, but after you are convinced that there are no voids left, you can fill the form completely.

5. If the temperature in the room is above twenty degrees, then the next day, future tiles can be opened.

6. After two days, the tiles can be removed by folding them in even rows to dry completely.

So, the tile is ready, now you can start laying it. It is best to divide this process into successive steps.

Stage 1. First you need to choose a place for the path; it is advisable that the soil here is already compacted and has not been dug up for several years. There should be no possibility of flooding of the selected location. The entire surface of the future path must be sprinkled with sand, at the rate of seven buckets per path half a meter wide and two meters long. Along the edges of the path, you need to remove the weeds and dig in pegs, to which a string is then tied, which will determine the border of the path and its required slope.

Stage 2. After sand is poured on the surface of the path, it needs to be watered with water through a watering can, and so much water needs to be poured so that the sand stops absorbing it. Now you can fill the future path with specially prepared screenings, which are also filled with water. Now you can start laying the tiles, carefully focusing on the stretched string. In order for the tiles to be level and on required height, it needs to be tapped a little with a special rubber-based hammer.

Stage 3. After all the tiles have been laid out, the joints between them need to be filled with sand by spreading it along the finished path. Do not step on the tiles until all seams are filled with sand. Now you need to again pour water from the watering can over the entire surface of the path.

Do-it-yourself garden path care

Maintenance of a tiled path in the garden does not require much physical activity. The whole process comes down to performing several tasks:

Timely cleansing of fallen leaves.
Snow removal in winter period, preventing it from compacting;
Removing emerging weeds in summer.

So, DIY garden path using the form– the task is simple and doable. We hope that our tips will be useful to you.

See also video:

Garden path mold

How to make soil mixture for different types seedlings...

A garden path can become not only necessary element site, but also its decoration. You can make a path in the garden from different materials, for example, from concrete, and it is very convenient when you have a special form on hand for pouring the cement-sand mixture. In this article we will tell you how to make a mold for a garden path with your own hands and how to create a beautiful path in your garden.

Why are garden paths needed on the site?

Those gardeners who pay due attention decorative design their plots, they will definitely take care of creating interesting and neat paths. Paths, harmoniously integrated into the overall landscape design, perfectly emphasize the stylistic direction of the garden, giving it a certain elegance and well-groomed appearance. That is why their main function is aesthetic. A site that looks neat and presentable testifies to the cleanliness of its owners.

The second function of garden paths is practical. Paths laid through the lawns connect all the buildings on personal plot and create a single architectural ensemble from them. They also divide the lawn into separate sections, outline the boundaries of flower beds and flower arrangements. Among other things, the tracks highlight stylistic design garden, focus attention on it.

Advantages and disadvantages of forms for garden paths

A garden path can be made from any available materials: wood, wild or processed stone, brick, various artificial materials. Filled concrete paths are considered a relatively cheap, but quite practical and attractive option. Forms for them can be purchased on the construction market or made independently. In any case, it will not hurt any gardener to have such a form on his farm.

Matrices for the manufacture of concrete elements have many advantages, let’s look at them in more detail:

A form for pouring garden paths makes it possible to quickly and easily extra costs make a path with a beautiful and neat pattern.
Concrete paths made in this way look much better than usual cement-sand screed. In appearance, they resemble a path paved with stones. After hardening, the material can be additionally coated with a layer of special paint, which will make it even more decorative.
The durability of the forms is another of their advantages. These designs can be used many times, and when not needed, simply be stored in suitable place. It is worth noting that purchased forms are most often made of plastic, which is not afraid of moisture, cold, heat, frost, and does not corrode. Such structures are quite durable; during work, you can safely use a rubber hammer on them without fear of damaging them.
Another advantage of forms is their low cost. You can make the structure yourself from available materials, without spending significant money. The finished product will not cost much more. For example, a standard mold for a garden path measuring 600x600x60 cm, made of plastic, will cost you about 700 rubles.
The strength of paths made using such forms is beyond doubt. Concrete can be poured to any depth, for example, 20 cm, its upper part can be made in the form of cells, and then you can not only walk along the path, but also drive a car.
Almost anyone can create a garden path using a tile mold. These designs are easy to use and do not require special skills or physical strength. The whole process will not take much time and will be completed faster than in the case of laying paving slabs, bricks or stones.

As you can see, the forms themselves and the paths made with their help have many positive aspects. But before you decide to purchase materials for making concrete paths, it is advisable to familiarize yourself with their disadvantages:

By appearance garden paths made of concrete are much inferior to other decorative materials: tiles, bricks, wood, natural stone. Even if you try to give concrete the appearance of any of these materials, you are unlikely to achieve complete similarity.
Spraying used to cover cement-sand composition after it hardens, it is prone to abrasion and is short-lived. The path will not look beautiful for so long, and to keep it neat, the paint will have to be renewed at least once a year. Some solve this problem by using special pigments that are added to the liquid solution and paint the entire thickness of the concrete. It should be noted that the cost of such substances is quite high, and the final result is not so attractive.
When pouring large areas, the process will progress slowly, since it will take some time for the concrete to dry. You can solve this problem by purchasing or making several molds for the paths. In this case, the work will be completed faster, but additional forms will entail additional costs.
It will be possible to walk along the concrete path only 20 days after it is poured - this is the time it will take for the mixture to sufficiently harden. It will be possible to drive a car on such tiles no sooner than in 30-40 days.

Making molds for garden paths with your own hands

Many people prefer not to waste extra time and buy a ready-made form for the path at the construction market or in a specialized store. This option is really simpler in terms of saving time, and besides, the factory forms have geometrically accurate dimensions. But parts made by yourself will cost you much less. A path poured into such a form is unlikely to turn out perfectly smooth, but this will be its individuality, originality, and originality. A do-it-yourself shape can be absolutely anything, while factory-made products are made according to the same templates.

You can make a shape for a garden path different ways. Let's look at two simple methods for making such a structure.

Wood block mold

To create such a matrix for concrete tiles, you need to stock up on wooden blocks measuring 5x5 cm. Four such boards are fastened together in the form of a square or rectangle. The parts are connected using special grooves, which are cut out on the end sides of the beams. Instead of grooves, the structure can be fixed with steel brackets, attaching them to the wood with screws.

The bottom of the mold is made of an iron sheet or a piece of plywood. If the form for the path has large dimensions, it is advisable to reinforce it when pouring concrete metal mesh. Concrete tiles are sometimes decorated various elements: pieces of ceramics, small pebbles, crushed stone, glass, etc. To do this, even before pouring the cement-sand mixture, lay out the decorative material, after which the matrix is filled with concrete. You can do it a little differently: glue pebbles or stones onto a sheet of paper water-soluble glue, then place the paper on the bottom of the mold and fill the structure with solution. After hardening, the product is removed from the matrix, the paper is well moistened with water and removed. Ready tiles iron on top.

Metal mold for garden path

A mold for pouring concrete can be made from old barrel hoops. If you have such hoops on your farm, thoroughly clean them of rust and dirt, treat them with an anti-corrosion agent and dry them. Then give the hoop any shape you want. If you have several hoops, bend them in different ways and the details of the path in the garden will look like natural stone. Laying the hoops on the prepared base, they are poured concrete mixture, allow the solution to dry, then metal part removed.

If you don't have a hoop at hand, metal mold can be made from a strip of galvanized iron about 5 cm wide.

Creating a garden path using a form

Having decided on the place in the garden where the path will go, the first step is to prepare the base. If the foundation is done according to all the rules, the path will last long years and will not become deformed or destroyed.
To create a kind of foundation for the path, a trench is first dug along its entire perimeter, removing approximately 10 cm of soil.
The resulting ditch is filled with crushed stone, making a layer up to 3 cm thick. Then the crushed stone is properly compacted and covered with a layer of gravel and sand.
The elements of the path can be laid on the prepared base. If the tile was made in advance, it is placed on a sand cushion, tightly joining the elements together, and then compacted with a rubber hammer.
Having paved the path, it is compacted. To do this, pour sand onto the path so that it fills all the cracks and gaps between the tiles.

If the tiles were not cast in advance and the path will be poured with fresh concrete, the base of crushed stone, gravel and sand does not need to be made in advance. Let's consider the second method of creating a garden path step by step:

To begin with, in the place where the path will pass, remove a layer of soil about 5 cm thick. Place a mold in the prepared base and deepen it slightly using rubber mallet. You can do it differently: deepen the mold to the desired level, and then remove it from it internal space a layer of soil equal to approximately 5 cm. The indicated figures are approximate, since concrete can be poured to both greater and lesser depths.
The soil inside the matrix and the walls of the mold are moistened with water, and then a small layer of crushed stone is poured onto the bottom. After this, a cement-sand mixture is poured into the matrix.
The solution for pouring into a mold to create a garden path is prepared from sand and cement, the ratio of the components is 4:1. Sometimes crushed stone is added to the mass to make the concrete more durable and hard. The consistency of the mixture should not be too liquid.
When forming concrete tiles, they are given a slightly convex shape so that water does not stagnate on the path, but flows off it.
The surface of the path is leveled with a trowel, and then ironed with a solution of cement and mineral dye. After a few minutes, when the solution has set, the mold is removed and the production of the next part begins.
In sunny and hot weather, the tiles are covered with film and periodically moistened so that the material does not crack during the drying process.

A finished and neat look to the garden path will be given by a border, which can be made of a variety of materials. For example, a plastic border will become inexpensive, but practical option for your garden. This border along the path is almost invisible; it goes well with different styles and types of coatings, prevents the growth of lawn grass.

A wooden border looks good in areas rustic style, and you can make it from any suitable wood, including from waste boards. Please note that wood deteriorates greatly from moisture, so it is advisable to treat it with antiseptics and protect it with paint or varnish.

The concrete curb goes well with paths made of crushed stone, pebbles or the same concrete. You can also decorate the borders of the path with brick or wild stone. You can use other materials, the main thing is that the fruits of your imagination ultimately please you.

In a garden of almost any style, walking paths will look very cute and elegant. Individual elements Such paths are placed at some distance from each other, resulting in a kind of chain. Tiles can also be placed in a checkerboard pattern.
When creating garden paths, you can combine different textures and materials; sometimes even the most daring and unpredictable combinations look not only original, but also quite appropriate.
It is better to make a path in the garden when it is dry and warm weather, especially if we're talking about about pouring concrete. In rainy weather, you should not build a path, because if moisture gets into the prepared trench, the path will not serve you for long.

Forms for garden paths, photo: