Pile up the stones and set up a dry stone wall in front of it

Hi,

I would like to build up the slope in front of our house a bit to have a somewhat "straighter" surface. At the edge of the street, I would like to build a dry stone wall about 1m high to hold back the slope a little.

The attached sketch shows the project - the area to be built up is marked in red.

Since I have never done something like this before, here is my plan in brief:

It is only topsoil that I would build up. No special soil, as the conditions do not require it. I can provide an excavator operator and an excavator from my circle of acquaintances. That means I will order a truck with the soil material and have it distributed by the excavator operator as shown in the sketch. At the end or intermittently, everything will be compacted with a compactor. According to my calculation, it is 2m³ of soil per "linear meter of slope" to be built up. Am I imagining this too simply, or will I fail due to numerous additional things that need to be considered?

Once the soil is distributed and compacted, I will build the wall at the front. Stones for it, foundation and drainage - that's all.

What do you think of my ideas? I would assume that I do not have huge structural requirements now, as the slope and the amount of soil I want to build up are limited. Therefore, doable for me as a layman + acquaintances, without causing high costs by hiring professional companies. Do you agree?

Best regards

Simon

You need a drainage system to drain moisture. Wet and muddy soil exerts a completely different pressure than the topsoil as it currently stands. If you build a dry stone wall, you either need a lot of mass or some inclination against the slope. Of course, it can be done yourself with some guidance. If I were to do it myself, I would probably stack crushed greywacke blocks with an excavator. If the individual weight of the blocks is between 200 and 1000 kg, there are no problems with the statics. The dry stone wall is finished.

Hi,

I quite like stones like these:



Then instructions from the internet – the wall will be a maximum of 1m high anyway – I think we can manage that!

However, I wonder what gives a wall like that the necessary stability. Because even if I don’t pile up too much and build the wall slightly inclined – the dry stone wall stones just “lie” on top of each other, right? They are neither mortared nor anything else (at least according to some instructions). Does that hold? Maybe I just can’t imagine it.

Where I’m also unsure is whether I need drainage at all. I should actually find that out by checking the type of soil in the soil report, right? Because drainage apparently isn’t always a must – especially since my wall won’t be very high anyway.

I wonder, however, what gives such a wall the necessary stability.

1. A good, wobble-free placement (without experience, it’s a test of patience) 2. Mass (machine assistance indispensable) 3. Optionally, a level surface at the top that is grouted to hold the uppermost stones. (this is very difficult, as each stone has to be carefully fitted) We did not build the greywacke retaining wall at our driveway (picture). However, a neighboring dentist managed to build one-meter-high walls quite well with a rented excavator.

Hello Hampshire,

thank you for your reply.

Your wall is gigantic - looks like the Colosseum

Compared to that, what we are planning is a piece of cake. Can you tell me something about my thoughts regarding drainage? I am not sure whether I need one or not.

Regards

Simon

Your wall is gigantic - looks like the Colosseum

The parking lot for the cars is 10.5 meters above street level, so you need a stable driveway. What can you do...

Drainage:
The purpose is to prevent too much moisture from accumulating in the soil behind the wall. Moisture in the soil reduces the grain-to-grain tension. You can see this impressively with mudslides or dike breaches.
You don’t want waterlogged soil behind your wall, because it starts to press with a lot of mass and can become potentially uncontrollable during a dynamic impact.
A simple pipe drainage should be sufficient: moisture is diverted to another area and that’s it.
Depending on the design of the wall (mass), you may also need a frost-protected substructure. But that’s no problem either.