Building a Wall Plymouth

Building a wall is a fairly easy task, building a wall well is a lot tougher. Bricklaying is a job that can only be mastered by practice. Building the odd wall here and there does not make you a bricklayer. However, building walls under about 12 courses (1 metre) high is definitely within the realms of DIY.

Permission

Before adding to your home (extending) or partitioning rooms, you will need to seek planning permission and will be subject to a check by the building inspector. Internal walls rarely have any problems getting planning permission, but extensions can be more of a minefield. As a rule of thumb, have a look at the rest of the houses in your street/area. If other houses have extensions similar to that which you are planning, the chances are that permission will be granted. For details of how to apply for planning permission, Click Here .

Single or Double thickness?

Whether you build a single or double thickness wall depends greatly on what structure you are building. A brick barbeque need only be one brick thick, as there is little chance it will have to resist any sideways force. A wall holding back large amounts of soil will need to be double thickness to stand up to the pressure.

Single thickness walls should be built using a 'stretcher bond' system. This simply means that each course of bricks should be offset to the ones below by exactly half a brick, or so that two joints never line up on adjacent courses. Because there is always half a brick difference, making corners is easy. The end of the wall, however, will involve cutting bricks in half to fit.

Double thickness walls should be built using stretchers and headers. Headers are bricks that are laid across the depth of the wall to tie the two layers together. The easiest method is the English bond method shown here. This is made of alternating courses of stretchers and headers. Flemish Bond is an alternative method and involves alternating stretchers and headers in each course. This method also require bricks cut in half lengthways, called Queens Closers. Less common in the UK is American Common Bond. This is made up of 4-5 courses of stretchers followed by one of headers.

Laying Foundations

Unless you are building onto existing paving or concrete, walls should always be started with proper concrete foundations. Again, the depth and width of foundation needed depends a lot on the structure it needs to hold. A low, single skin wall (under 1 metre) only needs foundations 150-200mm deep and around 300mm wide. However a double thickness wall of the same height might need foundations at least 50% deeper and wider. House foundations vary depending on the composition of the ground upon which they are to be laid. The most common kind of house foundations are strip or raft foundations and although you are unlikely to try building your own house DIY style, these kinds of foundation can be used for garages, sheds, etc.

The First Course

Once you have a nice solid found...

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