Block paving repairs
In short
Broken, sunken, stained or displaced blocks lifted and put right — usually with the original blocks, so the repair is invisible. The important part is establishing why they moved, because in most cases the answer is somewhere else on the drive entirely.
Also called: Replace broken block paving · Loose block paving · Fix block paving · Cracked paviours
Signs you need this
- Blocks that rock or tip underfoot
- Joints that are visibly empty of sand
- One or two blocks sitting lower than their neighbours
- Cracked blocks in the wheel tracks or in a line across the drive
- The outer course leaning outwards with a gap opening behind it
- A stained or oil-marked area that would be better swapped out
Repairing block paving is the easiest job in this trade and the one most often done backwards. Lifting a few blocks, packing sand underneath and dropping them back takes twenty minutes and lasts about a season, because the reason they moved has not changed. The blocks are the symptom. The interlock, the restraint, the jointing sand or the base underneath is the cause, and that is what a repair should be aimed at.
The commonest fault is empty joints, and it usually starts with a pressure washer. Blast the kiln-dried sand out of the joints — which a surface cleaner at full pressure does in seconds — and the blocks lose the friction that holds them together. They then start to move independently under load, the movement widens the joints further, and rain washes the bedding sand out from beneath them. A drive can look immaculate the week it is cleaned and be visibly loose six months later.
The second is edge restraint, and it explains the movement people find baffling. If the outer course has been pushed out or was never haunched in concrete, the whole field of paving has room to spread. The blocks that go wobbly are often nowhere near the failed edge — they are simply where the accumulated movement has ended up. Which is why a repair to three loose blocks in the middle of a drive starts with a look at the perimeter.
Broken blocks are usually a load problem rather than a material one. A cracked block under a wheel track means the base beneath is not spreading load properly, or a bin lorry or a skip lorry has been on a drive built for a car. Cracked blocks in a line usually follow an old trench. Individual chipped blocks near an edge are normally just impact damage, and swapping them is genuinely trivial.
Matching is where block paving is unbeatable. The affected blocks come up, the ground beneath is corrected, and the same blocks go back — so the repair is invisible, which no other hard surface manages. Where blocks genuinely have to be replaced, the trick is to take the replacements from an inconspicuous area, such as under a car or against the house, and put the new, unweathered blocks there instead. A brand-new block dropped into the middle of a twenty-year-old drive announces itself for years.
There is a good argument for dealing with this early rather than living with it. Loose blocks generate more loose blocks: once the interlock has gone in one area, the movement propagates outwards each time a car turns on it. Catching it at three blocks is a morning's work; catching it at three square metres is a re-lay. That is not urgency, it is just how a flexible pavement behaves.
What the job covers
- The cause established — jointing, restraint, base or load
- Affected blocks lifted and set aside for reuse
- Bedding and base corrected and compacted, not packed from above
- Original blocks relaid so the repair is invisible
- Replacements taken from an inconspicuous area where blocks are needed
- Edge restraint checked and rebuilt where it has failed
- Joints re-sanded and vibrated across the affected area
What it costs
We don't publish a price for this yet, because a number pulled out of the air is worse than no number at all — your contractor has to honour it. On driveways it would also be close to meaningless: the groundworks are usually the biggest single factor, and how deep the dig has to go varies enormously house to house. You'll get a firm price for your actual job when they ring you back, before any work starts. The quote itself is free and there's no obligation either way.
Common questions
Can you match my existing blocks?
Usually there is no need to — the same blocks come up and go back, which is why block paving repairs so well. Where blocks genuinely have to be replaced, the best result comes from taking donor blocks from a hidden area, such as under where a car parks, and putting the new ones there instead. New blocks never match weathered ones straight out of the pack.
Why did my blocks come loose after the drive was cleaned?
Almost certainly because the jointing sand was blasted out. A surface cleaner or a lance held close will strip a joint in seconds, and joints are what hold a block pavement together. Cleaning is fine at a sensible pressure and a sensible distance — but the drive must be re-sanded and vibrated afterwards, every time, without exception.
Just a few blocks are loose. Can I leave it?
You can, but it tends to spread. Once the interlock has gone in a small area, each turning wheel moves the boundary of that area outwards a little further. Three loose blocks is a short job; three square metres is a re-lay. There is no urgency to it and no reason to be pressured, but sooner is genuinely cheaper here.
My drive is stained where the car parks. Can that be sorted?
Often, and there are two ways. A dedicated block paving degreaser will lift a lot of oil staining, particularly if it is recent. Where it has soaked in, the simplest permanent fix is to swap those blocks for donor blocks from a hidden part of the drive and put the stained ones back where they will not be seen. It is one of the underrated advantages of block paving.
Need this doing in Macclesfield?
Tell us the job and it goes straight to our local contractor — one call back, usually the same day. Free quote, no obligation.