Thread: Securing sleepers to ground

Assumiing the sleepers are laid length-wise to form the path you could place a concrete haunch near the middle of each sleeper on the lower, or downhill, side of the path.

Drill a holes through the sleeper and drive lengths of reo rod through in to the ground (12.5mm x 500mm long or so).
Reo should be tight in the wood so don't drill too big a hole.

Even better than reo use 25mm gal pipe as it is stronger and wont rust.

Here is an idea I was contemplating a while back to solve this issue:

1. You drill and screw a couple of long galvanised coach bolts into one side of the sleeper (which will be the underside), leaving a large amount of the bolt exposed.

2. You then flip the sleeper over on the intended ground location, to mark on the ground the position of the two coach bolts. You could also accomplish this with some measurements.

3. Now you have the (rough) location of the coach bolts marked on the ground, you dig a couple of oversized holes in the ground that the coach bolts will eventually go in to, slightly deeper than the distance that the bolts protude from your sleepers.

4. Pour some concrete into the newly dug holes, filling to the top. Then place the sleepers over the holes so the bolts go into the concrete, move the sleepers around into position, wait for concrete to set. Voila. Solid sleeper with no visible fixings.

Comments?

Sammy: Good if architectural benefit. Might be more complicated than needed here.

David & Bleedin: Cut ends of pipe rust anyway. Boost rebar (US terminology) by about 6mm diameter (not sure of metric sizes) for corrosion allowance.

Joe

your local gardware will sell you large diameter galv nails up to about 18 inches in length, I'd recommend these.

Hi Zed
I'll check out Bunnings for the gal nails. They sound like the way to go.
Otherwise it'll be the reo route. Thanks for all your contributions.
Cheers
Rob

Nails are $1.5 or so
Reo about 50c unless you scavenge it from a tip or building site

Mate a nail... GMAB!!

It has to go through your sleeper then your bedding sand and will only just touch the surface of the soil. If you think that will hold a sleeper go for it.

Reo bends unless you use N16 or greater then it still rust unless you go gal.
By this time you realise that 25mm gal pipe is cheaper.

Dont just take my word for it go for a walk in any national park in Australia and see what they use ......gal pipe.

BTW you might as well go the cheap nail option as your sleepers will start to curl up within a month and within a year or two you will want to chuck them away because they will look like @*#% and will be dangerous.