Building a stone wall

[Don1357]

I don't know if this is the right place but let's stick it here for now.

I have an abundance of river rocks and would like to build a stone wall. This would be a fairly short one, around 18 inches, maybe 20 feet long. This is what I'm working with:

• I'm in Alaska, the frost line is around 4' down. That ain't happening.
• I'm on glacial wash. meaning that my 'soil' is basically sand and river rocks. Actually mostly rocks, the reason I ended up with so many river rocks to begin with.
• Said 'soil' has 0% organic matter. It is also as compacted as it can be; disturbing the soil requires a pickaxe, a breaker bar, and a few hours for little gain. We are talking days of rain and not leaving tracks while driving my F150 on it.

Just about every 'diy river rock wall' page on the internet is a vague set of instructions mostly there for its value as holding ads for the page owner. It also starts with 'dig down bellow frost line a trench 2 feet wider than the wall'. Which again it ain't happening, and I find hilarious that they throw that in there offhandedly as if it was as simple as throwing the trash out.

Are there some guidelines as to how to built this? I figure if I built it 12" fat and reinforced with rebar that it won't be going away anytime soon.

 

[budget76]

in the Northeast I see plenty of 12-18" fieldstone walls with no "foundation". as long as you've got a semi-sturdy base IMO it will not go anywhere. Sounds like you're planning a stone/mortar mix and not just stacked stone?

 

[Don1357]

I'm working with pretty much river stone, not that big but round and thus not prone to stack well. I figure the rebar would be reasonably cheap insurance.

 

[velocipede]

You might want to build it with Gabions. You can make your own out of cattle/hog panels, if you have those available. Round rock does not lend itself to stacking nicely without help.

 

[Walkers]

Do you have a backhoe, or a way to dig at all? Any footing is better than no footing. If it really is that compact drive a rebar in every foot or so and tie in some horizontal bars, then mortar you stones in. It takes a **** ton of mortar, so plan on mixing your own out of sand and portland cement.

 

[Don1357]

You might want to build it with Gabions. You can make your own out of cattle/hog panels, if you have those available. Round rock does not lend itself to stacking nicely without help.

That is interesting! Not where I want to go with this one but certainly nice to be aware of it. Thanks.

Do you have a backhoe, or a way to dig at all? Any footing is better than no footing. If it really is that compact drive a rebar in every foot or so and tie in some horizontal bars, then mortar you stones in. It takes a **** ton of mortar, so plan on mixing your own out of sand and portland cement.

I do have a small cement mixer. I'm also considering dry laying railroad ties. It is on a slope so it would still require a good amount of digging so the railroad courses are parallel but on the long run it may be the easiest approach.