Masonry fence in Florida

[ordpete944]

I have decided it's time to make a little more privacy on my lot. I live in central Florida, outside of city limits, in Polk county on just under two acres. I want an 8 ft tall privacy wall/ fence since I'm 6'4" and can easily look over 6 ft tall fences. I have done the home Depot wood fence panels, board on board garbage at my last house. I have even made my own with 2x4s also. They are too just much yearly maintenance and warping.

A neighbor has a really nice 8 ft white vinyl fence. I know they say they are hurricane rated but I always see pictures of these style fence just obliterated after storms. They are also super expensive. I want something stout but classy and timeless.

So I have come to the conclusion that a masonry fence will be the proper option. I'm thinking stucco'd CMU block with 16" square pilaster columns faced with stone every 16 feet-ish. I built my attached block garage in 2015 so I'm comfortable doing block work. Here's the problem.... I can't find anything in the building codes that talks about a cmu privacy wall. I see a lot about loose stacked walls, retaining walls and concrete wall construction for houses, but nothing for privacy walls.

I have seen plenty of 6 ft tall walls around town, but would like to do 8 ft tall so I can't see over them. I have an incredibly nosey neighbor that is on the HOA and she constantly looks into my side yard. I have about 70 ft between our houses but I don't care to look at her windows anymore.

No, I'm not going to bang her as she's old as dirt but still kicking. I will not be building her a deck either.

Has anyone in Florida done this before? I figured a good footer with rebar would be needed, just like a garage wall. My usual design firm that did my other garage plans won't even bother answering questions. They are only interested in new construction, million dollar homes. Lol.

I would appreciate any input. Also, I don't want to wait 5 years for a hedge to grow up. I'm looking for faster results, even if it is expensive.

Thanks everyone.

Pete

 

[Nthill93]

What are the hoa rules for fences? That’s the first thing to check into. I’ve never heard of any building code for fences. You doing this work yourself or hiring it out?

 

[quickfarms]

Check with the HOA and the building and zoning.

Typically walls and fences are limited to 6’ tall

 

[Old Man Roger]

Check with the HOA and the building and zoning.

Typically walls and fences are limited to 6’ tall

I was gonna say the same thing, especially with an HOA.

 

[fourjeepin]

Build it six feet high then add some type of vine to the top? I built an 8’ high fence across the back of my old house. Code said 6’ max but none of the neighbors complained since they liked my idea. I organized a group buy and a big work party. In one Saturday we knocked out the fence for four houses.

 

[slimpickins]

What's your budget? An 8ft masonry fence is expensive. You'll save a lot doing it yourself but the materials are still quite pricey.
Our city has a bylaw that limits fence height to 6 feet except you can go 8ft on any side that faces a freeway/highway.
Have you looked at VersaLok blocks. They are designed for retaining walls but you can split the back face off and build vertical walls.
Here's a curved wall I built at my acreage driveway entrance. This is just one side of the gate. Identical wall on other side of gate. The beauty of these is they are finished as soon as you place them. This wall is about 6 1/2 ft high and 15ft long. My cost was about $12K for materials including concrete piles and footings and electrical. Wrought iron gate was another $8K


Colums are made with the same blocks just split.
For vertical walls the blocks are just glued with PL Premium.
SP

 

[driftpin]

By all-means, your first responsibility is to find out the height you're legally allowed to build. Second, this needs a set of engineered plans because of the wind load, principally. You're going to need footers.

You might look into pre-cast walls. A neighbor did a ~300 linear feet permitted 6 ft. masonry wall in a HVHZ zone. We're about 1 mile inland from the high tide line on the Atlantic Ocean. His product came-out looking great, and it was installed quickly. It was not cheap. It has weathered well.

On the same block, I had a 6 ft ht. wood fence I built, 4 x 4's 4 ' o.c. and three 2 x 4 stringers, all P.T. lumber. Some of the boards were cedar, some were 1" x 6" P.T. The 4 x 4's were in 3' deep holes with ~10" of concrete around them. That's what code called for then and that was probably nearly 40 years ago. The fence lasted 25 years until I think it was Hurricane Wilma, which flattened most of it. I had 340 linear ft of fence. I didn't bother re-building, I'd done some planting, and what was in there as mature growth, obviated the need to replace the fence.

 

[brownbagg]

i want 12 foot around my whole 1/2 acre

 

[Jinks]

I had an enclosure built off the back of my house several years ago. Volusia county limited the height to 6' which was what I wanted anyway. It required a footer with rebar, rebar columns every so often, & a row of channel block on top with rebar & concrete all around the rim. I may have been able to get a variance for the height if I'd wanted. Your biggest problem will probably be the H.O.A. I had mine stuccoed & painted. It matches the house & my wife has me mount her art work & lawn decorations on it.

 

[ordpete944]

What are the hoa rules for fences? That’s the first thing to check into. I’ve never heard of any building code for fences. You doing this work yourself or hiring it out?

The HOA allows fences. It states " fences must be made of masonry, wood or any other acceptable material.". There is an eight foot tall vinyl fence at my neighbor's across the street. I spoke with him about the HOA approval process and he said he just did it and no one said anything because it was allowed in the covenants.

I should have stated that I was going to start on the front exposure of the lot first and go in stages. 40 ft. Sections at a time. I would be doing the work myself. I have a friend that used to lay block for a living and he enjoys helping.

Codebook says any fence over 8 ft tall or any masonry fence requires a permit.

 

[ordpete944]

What's your budget? An 8ft masonry fence is expensive. You'll save a lot doing it yourself but the materials are still quite pricey.
Our city has a bylaw that limits fence height to 6 feet except you can go 8ft on any side that faces a freeway/highway.
Have you looked at VersaLok blocks. They are designed for retaining walls but you can split the back face off and build vertical walls.
Here's a curved wall I built at my acreage driveway entrance. This is just one side of the gate. Identical wall on other side of gate. The beauty of these is they are finished as soon as you place them. This wall is about 6 1/2 ft high and 15ft long. My cost was about $12K for materials including concrete piles and footings and electrical. Wrought iron gate was another $8K


Colums are made with the same blocks just split.
For vertical walls the blocks are just glued with PL Premium.
SP

No set budget, which is dangerous. It could get out of control fast. I would be doing it in sections of 40-50 feet at a time. I don't want to take out a loan to do it.

I like what you have here. This is almost exactly what I want across the front of the house, set back on the sides of the lot. Hoa doesn't allow fences past the side of the house.

I have never heard of versablock. I am looking it up now. Thank you

 

[reader2580]

It appears you can build short unsupported walls with Versa-Lok, but Versa-Lok says you must provide support above three to four feet. No idea how you would build a fence eight feet tall with them. You could contact Versa-Lok if you really want to pursue this option. The blocks are much more expensive than CMU blocks.

I, and my parents, have used Versa-Lok several times. They work great for retaining walls. Unfortunately, it appears Versa-Lok blocks may not be sold in Florida, or would have to be shipped a significant distance from the nearest Versa-Lok plant.

 

[strutaeng]

Should be doable. Look up screen wall out of CMU in west coast. Lot's of cities out there even have engineered designs. I think most are 6' out there.

8' tall and hurricane wind forces will obviously make the footing and reinforcing/grouting spacing more robust. May have to be 12" CMU wide to resist forces...

I'm sure you can find a local engineer that can design something for you. CMU construction seems very common in Florida.

 

[slimpickins]

No set budget, which is dangerous. It could get out of control fast. I would be doing it in sections of 40-50 feet at a time. I don't want to take out a loan to do it.

I like what you have here. This is almost exactly what I want across the front of the house, set back on the sides of the lot. Hoa doesn't allow fences past the side of the house.

I have never heard of versablock. I am looking it up now. Thank you

I did an extended post on the gate walls on page two of my 2 Garages Thread. (link in my signature).
@reader2580 said you can build short unsupported walls with Versa-Lok which is partly correct. You can build the shorter walls without a footing and I think the limit they state is about 4 ft. Higher than that they state you need a footing and an engineer stamp. My walls are made into a serpentine curve which self-reinforces the wall. You could probably do larger columns every 10ft or so to add stability to the wall, but you would still need an engineer stamp.

Versa-Lok has extensive information, design drawings and photo galleries on their website. Versa-lok website

Here's the link to the wall build on my thread if you want to see more of my wall construction.

In the past couple of years when I wasn't posting, there's been a few changes around here. I've sold the Nova. It was causing friction as it was "an eyesore" according to the boss. My friend sold his Ventura, and we have also sold the camper. That has cleared out some of the space and I may be able to start on finishing the pole building - probably not til next spring tho.

Losing the Nova was a bit sad, however I;m not sure I have the skills to take on a restoration of that magnitude. It needed a lot of work.

The project that caused (or contributed) to my rotator cuff problems was building our gate wall. I installed the gate in 2004 and don't have a lot of pics from that install, but I took quite a few while building the wall.
Here is the driveway shortly after we bought the place.
View media item 62934
We hired an earth moving company to build an earth berm at the front of the property because we live on a busy highway. This is part of the earth berm getting built.
View media item 62935
Then we installed the gate. Each side of the gate weighs around 800 lbs. To ensure the gate did not sag, I sunk 18" footings 10 feet deep with rebar and cages. The gate posts are 8" square 3/8 steel, powder coated black. As a side note, I designed the gate and all of the posts and hardware and had it welded up by a neighbor in the business. He does fantastic work. The leaf patterns along the top of the gate are pre-cast pieces you can buy through local suppliers.
View media item 62936
Here's a shot of the actuators and the way they are attached to the post and the gate. In this shot you can see the S-curved foundation I made for the eventual brick wall ...
View media item 62937
The S-curve foundation is 18" deep and is supported with 3 additional 12" diameter x 10 feet deep footings along the curve. That gate ain't moving! And it hasn't in 12 years! I guess I made the footings just right! Or as NuttsGT says "Too much is just enough". Oh, and the whole thing is poured out of 4000 psi concrete!

I built the brick wall in 2013 with Versalok bricks. The S-curve was designed to exactly match the natural curve of the Versalok. See http://www.versa-lok.com for info on the bricks. Each brick weighs 70 lbs +/-. There's about 40,000 lbs of brick in the walls.
View media item 62933
As you can see the trees have grown a lot in 12 years.

Anyway, Hope I'm not boring everyone. If anyone is interested I can post some pics of the gate wall build.

 

[driftpin]

https://www.suncrestshed.com/HvHz%20map1-1.pdf

Looks like Polk Co. is Hurricane Zone 1, 110 mph gusts. If I was doing something like you want, a tall wall, I'd be building above the minimum prescriptive code. Yes more $ but when that 500-year storm comes through, you won't have the wall collapse onto someone, or at least have a better chance of withstanding it. I was working fire-rescue when Andrew hit south Florida, and the damage that caused was simply not to be believed. Here's a good pic of why building above code is a good idea, from a FL Panhandle hurricane not long ago. Which part of that neighborhood would you want to live in?

 

[NUTTSGT]

No set budget, which is dangerous. It could get out of control fast. I would be doing it in sections of 40-50 feet at a time. I don't want to take out a loan to do it.

I like what you have here. This is almost exactly what I want across the front of the house, set back on the sides of the lot. Hoa doesn't allow fences past the side of the house.

I have never heard of versablock. I am looking it up now. Thank you

Seriously, you can have a fence past the side of your house ? No fencing in your back yard ?

Should be doable. Look up screen wall out of CMU in west coast. Lot's of cities out there even have engineered designs. I think most are 6' out there.

8' tall and hurricane wind forces will obviously make the footing and reinforcing/grouting spacing more robust. May have to be 12" CMU wide to resist forces...

I'm sure you can find a local engineer that can design something for you. CMU construction seems very common in Florida.

Probably what I would consider, 12" block with core filling and rebar. You may be able to set first course in the wet concrete of the footer.

 

[4xdog]

If you're looking mainly for privacy and to block sight lines, is there a chance that separate, staggered/overlapping panels might be an option? I would expect wind loads to be greatly reduced if there were regular gaps in the wall.

 

[ordpete944]

Seriously, you can have a fence past the side of your house ? No fencing in your back yard ?

Probably what I would consider, 12" block with core filling and rebar. You may be able to set first course in the wet concrete of the footer.

Maybe I worded that poorly. No fences are allowed past the side of the house in the front. So the sides and back yard can be fences, but nothing in front of the house.

 

[reader2580]

I did an extended post on the gate walls on page two of my 2 Garages Thread. (link in my signature).
@reader2580 said you can build short unsupported walls with Versa-Lok which is partly correct. You can build the shorter walls without a footing and I think the limit they state is about 4 ft. Higher than that they state you need a footing and an engineer stamp. My walls are made into a serpentine curve which self-reinforces the wall. You could probably do larger columns every 10ft or so to add stability to the wall, but you would still need an engineer stamp.

What I meant by short walls was short freestanding walls. I should have been more specific. Versa-Lok blocks are typically used with earth or rock behind the block. You can certainly build a tall retaining wall with a stone base, but it has to be engineered. Professional landscapers who build tall engineered walls with Versa-Lok often prefer rock as a base because they can level each block easily unlike blocks on concrete.

I have my doubts that any engineer would design a freestanding eight foot tall wall made of Versa-Lok without some sort of connecting system better than loose plastic pins. Versa-Lok specifically states not to use mortar.

 

[ordpete944]

https://www.suncrestshed.com/HvHz%20map1-1.pdf

Looks like Polk Co. is Hurricane Zone 1, 110 mph gusts. If I was doing something like you want, a tall wall, I'd be building above the minimum prescriptive code. Yes more $ but when that 500-year storm comes through, you won't have the wall collapse onto someone, or at least have a better chance of withstanding it. I was working fire-rescue when Andrew hit south Florida, and the damage that caused was simply not to be believed. Here's a good pic of why building above code is a good idea, from a FL Panhandle hurricane not long ago. Which part of that neighborhood would you want to live in?

I am definitely on board with over-building. When I did my last garage, (CMU attached 23x24) I tripled the rebar in the walls and poured the walls solid. Combined with a CAT5 hurricane garage door, my garage became my hurricane shelter. It never saw anything worse than 100 mph, but it didn't even flinch.


I have always thought of the building codes as the shittiest you can legally build it and still pass inspection. It only takes a little more time and money to do it way better.

My parents have a home on a barrier island near ft Myers. I got to see the damage from Charlie firsthand. Poured concrete house on cassons. The house was standing, but the flat bitumen roof peeled off like a sardine can lid. Highest gust reported was 185 mph.

 

[Nowater]

All the white vinyl fences I see are green shortly, and not in a good way.

I have seen a stuccoed fence made with steel posts with foam panels suspended in between. The whole thing is covered with stucco. Call that $tucco.

 

[slimpickins]

What I meant by short walls was short freestanding walls. I should have been more specific. Versa-Lok blocks are typically used with earth or rock behind the block. You can certainly build a tall retaining wall with a stone base, but it has to be engineered. Professional landscapers who build tall engineered walls with Versa-Lok often prefer rock as a base because they can level each block easily unlike blocks on concrete.

I have my doubts that any engineer would design a freestanding eight foot tall wall made of Versa-Lok without some sort of connecting system better than loose plastic pins. Versa-Lok specifically states not to use mortar.

No worries here @reader2580. I was referring to freestanding walls too because that's what @ordpete944 was wanting, so I think we're on the same page. Here is the link to the versalok engineering page and you can download a zip file here with 62 pages of drawings on how to build everything, including 3 types of freestanding walls. (The max on grade height is 3ft. without engineering) And they basically say anything beyond that is up to the builder to get engineered drawings.
After you split the back face off to get the textured finish on both sides, the blocks are only 10 inches wide. There are several options to strengthen the wall - two walls back to back so the wall is 24" thick, bigger columns spaced closer together, etc.
Good luck with your build. Be sure to post some pics when you get started!
SP

 

[billconner]

Perfect place to dry stack block and use surface bonding cement.

 

[ZRX61]

What's the difference between a masonry fence & a wall?