Thread: Cheapest method of non-visible small retaining wall?

yep sure,

used 50 "150 series" bessa bricks @ $2.70 each
used 2 "150 series" half bessa bricks @ $1.60 each
5 bags of motor mix @ $6 something each


I have the concrete calculations at home, from memory I bought
pre mixed sand/aggregate mix and bags of cement and I just asked for enough for 2 cubic metres from memory (I will check this tonight for you) but I think that was about it - I had other stuff to do as well

That cost
2 cubes of concrete blend = $114
20 bags cement @ 20Kg = $110
bling bling heathstone capping stones about 30 @ $4 each

Total $512.20


Now remember my wall is two blocks high and runs nearly 12m from memory - not sure if yours is going to be that big - I also backfilled it with 20mm crushed concrete gravel and put ag pipe behind it - I had that stuff so there was no direct cost.

The thing is I will never have to do it again and I bought this stuff in a big lot of other things, ended up spending $2K from one place so I think I might have got slight better prices.

Prices vary greatly I found in the landscaping game, for example on the heathstone I found a seconds yard that had pallets of stock and would let me go through them and break the pallets down and re pack them so I could choose the blocks I wanted - and sold them to me @ $5 each off $2 less than retail. Save a good deal of money when you buy 300 of them.


Tom

Thanks for the detail so far Tom, really do appreciate it

Out of curiosity how much clearance do you have at the lowest point of the deck? Looks like it gets quite low near the wall......

yeah it does,

At the lowest it would probably be 200mm from the ground to the bearers
I have will be rebuilding the deck you can see there and when I do that I will be digging that out to improve clearance - I want to put a hip off the house out over the deck so I am just getting organised and gettings some drawings done, the I will remove the portion of the deck and rebuild

Tom

I have two ideas
1. Get a heap of old tyres and lay the frist line down and then fill with earth then lay the next row on top and fill and so on. One tyre rests on two of the tyres in the row below, like bricks.

2.Get some old feed bags or some that are miss prints..use the soil on site mix with 10% cerment and wet, just add enouch water that the mix balls together when squeezed in your hand but it shouldn't leave you hand wet. Fill bags and then fold the end over and pin down with a u shaped piece of wire, then tramp the bag down with a tamper. When the frist row is down lay a stran of barwire then lay the next row.Lay like bicks..This method is good if it is to be coverd as the bags break down in sunlight. If the light will be hitting the bags should be covered with some kind of plaster for protection.
For more detail check this links
http://www.calearth.org/
link.http://www.calearth.org/Emerg_files/...EmergShltr.pdf

Hi,

Thanks for the replies,
turns out the wall will actually be about 200mm or so above the level of the deck (so you step up from the deck onto the grassed area), so part of it will be visible after all.

At this stage I will be using bessa blocks I think and bagging the top (visible) course.... either that or I have about 300 odd bricks lying around so might hire a brickie to use those?

Excavation is happening on wednesday so I will have a better idea after that....

Cheers
Joel

HI Backlash,
I use tyres quite a bit to build steps in kids playgrounds but you can build walls too. stack them up and use fence screws to attach them together. fence screws are tough enought to go through the walls. for steps I back fill and compact with road-base (one tyre layer at a time) to just below the lip then put cement stabilised Decomposed granite on top about 25mm to make the exposed tread look attractive. the trick is to use tyres of all the same thickness say 185's or what ever the diametre doesn't matter as much.

Ok a bit delayed but here are the pics,

Like I said it turned out after doing the levels etc that the top of the wall would actually be higher than the deck and in effect become a step to get onto the grass area, so I scrapped the idea of a cheaper method and went with the same retaining wall system I used in my front yard (had some bricks left over so it didnt hurt the pocket too much, well thats what I told SWMBO ......

Progress pics....

Another angle:

I should point out this is an extension round the side of the house from the main deck area........ pic below

great work mate - looks fantastic I am sure you are pleased with the results

Tom

Originally Posted by tcns

great work mate - looks fantastic I am sure you are pleased with the results

Tom

Cheers Tom,

Yep happy with how it all turned out Thanks again for the responses before, helped me make up my mind which way to go

Joel

Originally Posted by JDub

Cheers Tom,

Yep happy with how it all turned out Thanks again for the responses before, helped me make up my mind which way to go

Joel

Too easy mate, happy to help you out - I know I am very happy with my work and glad I don't have to worry about it rotting

Tom