The #1 MOST SCREWED UP thing on RETAINING WALLS!

all right uh blaine and i finished building up our wall yesterday so i got all that buttoned up uh so all we really want to focus on today is getting it back filled uh we were obviously we need caps it was weird i'm pretty sure we got somebody else's order because we got two and a half extra pallets of blocks and we needed two and a half pallets of cash somebody messed up over there i think because we got an extra two and a half pallets of blocks and no caps i guess it's not really that big of a deal if i had to choose i'd rather come back to a site to finish something because he didn't have the materials then have to come back to a site because something got messed up so two things are happening we are currently experiencing extreme block shortages to the point where we are ordering our materials one plus month in advance to make sure that they're ready by the time we're starting the job so we've got to be very accurate with our material count when we go in to order it so if you guys are looking at doing your own project in your backyard or doing something for somebody else make sure before you start it that you have the actual right materials on hand the second thing that i'm noticing is is not just something that is a block related i went to one of the big box stores the other day to order concrete just some bags of concrete the entire store had no concrete in it at all 5 000 bags of concrete is what they typically have on hand they had none available that i could walk out the store with and they said they didn't know when the next batch was going to come in do not use p rock if the contractor you hire brings p rock out to your job site you're in trouble so what i'm talking about is the drainage material that we use behind our retaining walls is always the exact same thing it's called three-quarter clear sewer rock that's the technical term for it and basically what it is it's a very very angular stone that we specifically pick out for its size and shape that three-quarter inch rock angular in nature locks together as soon as you lay it in place so any way that it falls is going to lock and that's going to resist movement the reason you don't want p rock is because that p rock with that circular tiny stones if you get enough water flowing through it it can roll and move and if you have rock rolling and moving behind your retaining wall it can mitigate the fines out of the soil loosen the soil up create hydrostatic hot spots which is basically a super fancy word to say channels behind your wall and anytime you get a channel behind your wall you've now created the path of least resistance for water to follow and that can create a wall failure and you don't want that to happen so do not allow any contractor to use p-rock make sure you get the right drainage material because that's the best way to ensure that you get the best product with the longest lasting results out there so pick the right rock right out of the gate and the rock that's in the drainage zone is the exact same material that we use for the base we don't change that up in any way shape or form [Music] we're going a little bit wider on the rock than we normally would so we needed we needed eight yards and we got 12 so they're uh they're gonna be getting a little bit more rock off the back of their wall than we normally would which is not a bad thing to have more drainage irrigate than that i suppose so i'm gonna disagree with sam on this one because we do typically add more than what we're supposed to when our drainage zone let me explain the retaining wall requires 12 inches minimum of drainage rock and the second thing that contractors screw up the most the first thing they screw up the most is they use p rock or the wrong kind of drainage aggregate but the second thing is they don't use enough of it so although the specs for the retaining wall call for a minimum of 12 inches you'll typically see all of our walls doing two foot sometimes even three foot lifts in rock and then we pyramid this massive drainage zone up to where we hit the grid and then it's kind of a reset then the grid goes down and then we go back down to 12 well actually we go wider on top of the grid and then as we come up we pyramid it up so you'll see that our drainage zones act like multiple pyramids laying on top of each other where it's always the very minimum is 12 inches but i have absolutely no qualms going 24 inches sometimes 36 inches and the reason i say that is although it's not bid for that in an earlier video i said my goal is to build retaining walls that last longer than i do and i think getting the right drainage material and not skimping on it are two key components to making that happen good morning everyone last day on our wall so that's kind of cool um what do we have left to do nothing really we're just going to be doing some grading uh i'll tell you what the only thing worse than putting on cold boots is putting on cold wet boots that's how i look at that um joey's not here again today he's he's sick he came in yesterday for a little while you know see see how he thought he was feeling better but not so much there's blaine and he's got the hydro bucket sweet i'll probably bring the skid steer down there that might be the logical next step of that i don't know if you guys caught that but we got a bunch of stuff we got a haul out of here and uh the dump truck or the dump trailer is absolutely 510 full of crap so [Music] oh god get the dog toy [Music] all right so i know a lot of you not in minnesota this probably isn't going to mean nothing but um we're working in saint paul and i swear to you this whole city was built on one big garbage dump which is kind of fun you know you find some kind of neat stuff sometime you know you get some old bottles and like old marbles and stuff i like those old marbles some of those are pretty cool but i just found an oil filter fun stuff [Music] one of our governors got himself in hot water because he said saint paul was designed by a bunch of drunken irishmen i don't know if any of that's true but i'm just saying what he said [Music] you