Buyers scrutinize the surface sample for weeks before they sign. Then the stack beneath decides whether that sample ever performs. Two installations of the same roll can behave like two different products. The blades are identical; the handoffs between the layers of artificial turf are not.
We build carpet for a living, and we have watched great samples die on bad stacks. So read one turf as two flows: water descending from blades to outlet, load descending from shoe to ground. Every layer below the face either passes each flow on or quietly keeps it. That is the story this page tells.
Two Pathways Run Through the Layers of Artificial Turf
Every installed surface carries two invisible flows through it. The water path starts when rain hits the blades and ends at an outlet somewhere under the field. The load path starts when a shoe lands and ends in the ground. Five cooperating layers relay those flows, and each one has a duty the next depends on. When a handoff fails, the layer above drowns or bruises, no matter how good it is.
- Blades and tufting: the first interface of traffic; appearance and rebound start here.
- Backing and coating: anchors the tufts and leaves water its holes.
- Infill layer: ballast, support and cushion in one bed of grains.
- Levelling and base: spreads load and drains continuously.
- Subgrade and outlet: the last layer of the system, the forgotten one.
This page explains each layer by mechanism, because the mechanism is what you are actually buying. For a layer-by-layer shopping list with budget framing, the companion guide covers each layer in turn. The two views do not compete. Here you learn what each layer hands over, and why a spec that ignores the handoffs can pass every single-layer check yet fail as a system.
The Water Path: Every Layer Is a Handoff
The water journey through the layers of artificial turf starts at the blades. Each layer only hands water to the next, and any layer that refuses delivery turns everything above it into a catchment. Designed and maintained well, the whole system drains. Built or clogged badly, the same roll can behave semi-permeably, the failure mode documented for poorly performing installations in the MDPI sustainability study.
Pile and Infill: The First Handoff
Rain first runs down the blade films into the infill bed. The pores between grains are the first buffer, and the grain system defines the pore structure. Per the EPA federal field study, recycled tire infill particles predominantly range from 0.25 to 4 mm, with wide variance inside that range. Pore structure, and therefore the first handoff, is a distribution question rather than a label.
Backing Perforations: The Throttle
Below the infill sits the backing, a holed fabric-and-latex structure. How many holes it carries, and how wide, sets the throttle of the whole water path. We perforate every roll on our own line, so the throttle bore ships with the carpet rather than improvised on site.
Base and Outlet: The Final Handoff
The base gathers what the upper layers release, and a pipe network carries it away. Where that gathered water finally exits is a site decision, and it sits outside the carpet entirely. No outlet, and every handoff above still works while the system quietly fills up.
The same roll, two verdicts. In a vertical-drainage system the carpet is a permeable surface. In a rimmed depression with no outlet, it is a liner. Water-path performance belongs to the system, never to a single layer.
The Load Path: Impact Travels Down Before It Disappears
The load path runs downward too. Footfall impact crosses the blades, the infill, an optional pad and the base, dissipating stage by stage. Per the Loughborough study, a shockpad exists precisely to absorb boot-surface impact and reduce the stress on athletes. The handoff logic that moves water through the layers of artificial turf moves force as well: each stage relays the cushion, and none absorbs alone.
