How to build a Retaining Wall

so today we've been called into the backyard of a prior customer that we worked on this project a few years ago what he wants to do is he wants to take the upper yard and lower it down to create more usable flat space coming right off from his back door right now we have an upper and a lower Terrace and this retaining wall divides everything in half a few years ago we built a versalock modular retaining wall for what we're going to be doing is we're going to be pulling that retaining wall apart and then we're going to actually Stitch it together so this is going to be a great example of how to add on to an existing retaining wall and make it strong one of the things that I want to point out in this video right now is how that we how we have these built currently and how we're going to redo it to make it better now we have a verse lock wall and a Chilton wall and you can see that we have to have a Splat seamline that's not the best situation to have but we're unable to stitch these two different types of materials together So the plan is is to remove this this Chilton wall and then to add on with more versalock and what we're actually going to do is pull this apart and seam them together in a stitch fashion you'll never know that it happened or occurred and it's going to be strong as just as if the retaining wall had never been modified in the first place we're going to bump this wall out and then we're going to haul out the majority of this hill creating the flat flat space at the customer looking for so we're back at the site there's a couple things I want to point out on this project one is we've Tak taking the time to enlarge the lower area we call it the courtyard effect what we've done is we've given this customer more space directly off from their back door they have more room to entertain to barbecue just to have guests and company over giving it a much bigger feeling one of the other things that I want to point out in this job is how we are going to add on to an existing retaining wall and make it blend if we look at this wall that we have here we have stair stepped it back or bead it down this is is the bottom course this is the buried course we've taken off all of the rest of the retaining wall so that we can match directly into and add on to this wall making a cohesive seam that's going to be strong we really can't do it any other way and know that we're not going to have an interruption in the strength of this retaining wall the other thing that I want to point out on this project is the base since we're at this point I want to point out what we use for base material we use 3/4 clear uh angular Stone the reason we use 3/4 clear angular Stone over a p rock or a class 5 is for one simple fact strength when we put these Stones together what happens is their angular nature locks in place we then do a light pack over the top of it and then this rock can't go anywhere if we used the P rock or we use a different type of rock for the base material if we had a lot of water going through it what can happen is those P rocks or those circular Stones can tend to roll and shift and when those stones are moving they're loosening up all the soil around it that can create differential settlement in the retaining wall and that's something we want to avoid a simple trick to avoid that is to use the same material behind the wall for the drainage Zone as we do for the base zone so that's what we use for the base we have this all set up we're going to give it a light compaction and we're going to be ready to start basing onto the old wall we're back at the site and the thing that I want to show you is how we've Stitch the wall together and this has been a couple year project so when I say that that means the first part of the wall was built a few years ago the last part of the wall as you know we just recently completed the thing to notice is although we're able to stitch these walls together seamlessly we are not able to match colors the reason we can never make the colors match exactly is simply because the aggregate from different types of the Season changes the color of the blocks themselves weathering is also another factor and if the wall has been sealed or unsealed the existing wall has been sealed for salt graffiti this wall May match a little closer in color after the wall gets sealed but you can see the difference in color although subtle is still a factor and something to consider when you're going to be doing a multi-year project this job is complete everything is wrapped up and done and we can move on to the next phase which is restoration