Retaining Walls - How to Avoid Costly Mistakes and DIY your landscaping Walls with Great results!

Contractors across the country are building retaining walls wrong. So today, I'm going to show you some of the most common mistakes I see being made, like retaining wall failures that are part of entire landslides. Educating yourself is the first step to avoid simple, easy mistakes like this. You can't put vertical joints in walls. It creates weak points. This retaining wall is only 3 years old and it's already started to separate. So whether you're a contractor or you're a homeowner, don't let anybody do these things on your property. That looks right. So if you're wondering what I'm doing, some of these batterypowered tools claim to be weather resistant. In an upcoming video, we're going to be putting that theory to the ultimate test. And now would be a good time to subscribe. Just reach up, hit that button. You can do it. Emmy is less than 3 years old and what you see is not uncommon. Unfortunate truth is a lot of landscaping companies and concrete companies build a terrace retaining wall. This wall should have been engineered, built as one unit. So the reason most people will design a terrace retaining wall is cuz they're trying to cheat the system. They think by separating the retaining walls, they don't have to engineer. But nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, when you terrace a retaining wall, you put more of a searchcharge on the lower wall from the upper wall. It's simpler and easier to build a single retaining wall, but you got to get it engineered. You got to put geog grid in it, and you got to get city approval. Most contractors try to avoid those things. Designing the retaining wall right out of the get-go is an important factor, but also noticing the types of soil you're using. We're doing a soil correction. this stuff gets hauled away. The problem is it's over optimum moisture. It's too wet. That's what she said. Getting the right mag fill is critical to the long-term success of your retaining wall. But even more critical is getting the right amount of drainage aggregate. Now, the industry standard is to put 12 in behind the retaining wall. But I'm going to tell you to deepen that to 18 even more in just cheap insurance. Is going to ensure you long-term success. Let's This is a new one. Tim and I have never usually seen the drain tile installed at the top of the retaining loft without any drainage aggregate. Exactly. We found one row of geogrid placed in this wall. Right where we found the geog grid was the only place on this site the wall still seemed to be intact. That's how important it is to get the geo grid right. When you're designing a retaining wall, you have to take into consideration the kind of soil that you're going to be working with and the load directly behind and above the retaining wall. So, some of the basic changes you're going to see us make today on this retaining wall is we're going to build one wall. We're not going to build a terrace wall. We're also going to engineer this wall and fortify it with geog grid. We're going to accommodate for the load that the driveway places on it. The driveway places a search charge onto the retaining wall. So, we install extra geog grid to compensate for that. It's time to go to West Virginia where we bust myth number two. One of the myths is when you see a retaining wall collapse, you don't see the drainage aggregate. The drainage aggregate actually is one of the first things that usually gets washed away. If the drainage aggregate is going to be on this site, it should be in this virgin soil. So, when I come into a site like this, I look for the drainage aggregate at the bottom of the retaining wall in the storm sewer system or in the virgin soil behind the retaining wall. If we're going to find it, this is where we're going to find it. And we got nothing. And that's the problem. Most companies are either going to use the wrong drainage aggregate or worse yet, none at all. Is this the footing material they use? Yep. This is the footing. It is. We've got inch and a half, maybe down to an inch in places. Some companies prefer to pour a footing, but if they do, it should be at least 4 in thick. I've found the best footing material is 3/4 in rock laid in at least 6 in thick. I think you're going to get the sense that this next retaining wall gets me a little irked. Anchor wall. Again, another anchor mess. The sign of a cheap landscaper is using anchor block. Anchor is the go-to block for a lot of contractors because it's fast. There's no pins to connect. It has a simple lip system that you slide in place. You're done. It's also light. The blocks are hollow from the bottom side and they're a cheaper block. Costs less to buy them initially. But these are also all of the same reasons why you're never going to find one of these blocks on one of my job sites. I hate this. This just gets me so mad. Homeowners don't know how walls are supposed to be built. When they hire a contractor, they just assume that they're hiring a professional. If a contractor is using cheap block, he may be using cheap construction methods as well. Now, let's see. $2 for baloney that look at zero drainage aggregate impacted with dirt. I'm surprised they didn't use filter fabric behind the face of the wall because landscapers like to do that too. I've heard of that too, man. Why are you laughing? Cuz it just defeats the purpose of a free draining wall. And you've only installed quarter of a million square feet of retaining wall. Yeah. And had how many fail? Zero. Zero. Some companies still think you should put fabric behind the face of a retaining wall, but nothing could be further from the truth. And I want you to see what's behind it. You'll see fabric. You can see it protruding through here and it's tapering down behind the retaining wall. that fabric, it gets basically plugged up. That can't handle any more silt or sediment. The water comes down, it can't weep through the face of this wall. This wall is meant to have water come evenly through it. It can't do it. This wall is bellying, boowing out, and it's in a state of failure because they put filter fabric behind the wall. If this video has helped you guys out, let me know in the comments down below or hit the like button. Make sure you stay tuned to see how this test turns out.