How to Build a Block Wall with Cap

hi david o'dell here we're on the job site first day here what we're going to be doing is removing this portion of the block wall because it's only a four inch block and it's you can see how it's shaky so the way these are designed back in the day is the four inch wall is really all held together within columns these are this particular block is the a block and these blocks slide inside and that's what really holds this whole run there's usually about 12 to 15 feet in between each column so the this is going to be hollow this whole middle the only thing that's solid grouder would be that the a's on both sides and then when you get into the middle you have h blocks so the interlocks on both sides but we're gonna remove this we're gonna go with a six inch wide block and we're gonna epoxy down to the existing footing and run some new dowels up and then we're going to grout it wherever we we put the steel we'll probably put the steel every 24 inches vertically and then we'll also have a horizontal across probably right here right here between the um top cap and the second second one down we'll put a solid bond beam right here solid concrete with a horizontal bar in this area and then verticals coming up out of the epoxy dowels and this thing will be solved as a rock but the main reason we're chaining is because if you look over here on this side this whole run which is about 100 feet long it's all been redone they got they've got tan block tan grout it runs all it runs all the way down also we're going to be on the top of this wall right here it's already been you know completed so we've got to just add a two inch cap just like this side over here so we're gonna add the two inch cap and uh kind of finish this project up basically all right let's get down to business and start breaking up walls so what we're going to do first before we could even utilize that existing footing is we're going to expose it on both sides and then i went ahead and i drilled did some pilot holes in that foundation first i dug on both sides got the width of the existing footing then i drilled to see how deep it was and i found that this footing was about 18 inches wide and about 18 inches deep so that's plenty big enough to build off of so we're going to utilize the old footing and we're going to clean off all the block chip it off of that footing clean it really well so we can get a good bond to the old footing and we're gonna dowel in every 24 inch on center half inch three while we're going to use 5 8 or you could use 9 16. all right we got some of this wall down now and uh since we got into a little discovery here on this column and why it was so wobbly normally these columns are pretty pretty snug and tight but in this case what happened was the rebar if you take a good close look at this rebar it rusted and when it rusted it actually cracked the block off of uh the fill in the middle in the middle so um that's what still does if you if you're off with steel at all anywhere in that concrete this is what you got so fiberglass is just more forgiving to be honest with you anyway let's get back and do some more demo yeah so that's that's interesting point about the rebar and uh you know you don't really have much room for error in a four inch piece of concrete and a half inch pieces so it's got to be perfect to get a lot of concrete around all sides of that bar so it can't rust hi this is david odell we're going to be giving away these two mechanic tool sets away the nice thing about these and i just use this set this is actually the one i'm going to give away i just used it yesterday working on the trailer it had everything i needed in it but the nice thing about these you could stack them together that's the one go to face my facebook page comment we're gonna post a picture of this that's the video you'll comment on um to get this mailed to you free here's the interesting part about these tools when you get them you're gonna get the signed approval let me go ahead and sign it for you and we'll go ahead and sign this one too [Music] that means with that signature there that means that i've used it i used it once in my trailer and i approve this set you're gonna like it good luck comment on the facebook post of this tool set to get entered into the drawing have a good one now we're using the cordless dewalt roto hammer that thing packs a punch too it goes right in there real nicely we're using a 5 8 inch hole we're going to drop a half inch rebar in there also i have the dewalt vacuum it's got a fleece bag and hepa filters on it that's cordless as well we're gonna brush and vacuum out the dust so we got a good clean hole that we we're gonna hit that with some xp-22 simpson epoxy it's a two-part fill it up with some epoxy and we'll put the dowels in there we're gonna put uh 30 inch dowels so six inches in two feet out and then we'll drop the full length all the way down once the wall is up in this particular segment here this is a another part of the wall that's coming up three courses so that's two feet because they're eight inch high block and they're eight inch wide also so we gave this one the same treatment brush and vacuum whenever you add on to a block wall it's real important that you dowel and epoxy down otherwise that whole cap is just gonna fall off especially if someone were to try to climb over it or do anything up there it could be a real disaster right here i'm just determining whether this wall is level with the wall behind it so because i want the grout joints to line up with one another so i'm just trying to find out if it's gonna happen or not i mean i can't change it so if it's not level it's not level but i'm gonna try to establish a level point so i can pull a line down and start setting that bottom course so what i found out is the two walls are level the side wall in other words is level with that front wall so i just went ahead and drove a mason uh nail into the grout line there tied a line then did the same thing back here eight inches over so now i'm on one side of the block now here's some glue i've already uh swept and blowing that clean speed set time and add strength to the concrete calcium chloride that way i can get this stuff set up start building uh right away on top of this [Music] here's the old dust in the face trick let's see what's looking like now in there oh that's looking pretty good huh we'll do a half a cup [Applause] yeah i put the accelerator in there that way i can get this first core set and i can go ahead and start building off of it right away the footing that they have in there they just threw it in there it's not stepped down it's just on an angle and what they did is they just started breaking blocks until they kind of got it to the right angle so it would set down on the mud without having to bury them because i was chipping the old blocks out i kept just finding random pieces because they didn't step or level the footing they just chopped at the block they didn't cut them they just kind of hit them made it fit and i'm kind of doing the same thing but i'm using a saw to cut them to fit instead notice how the first couple are about four inches and then i get thinner as i go back that first course is uh crucial you get that level because everything's gonna build off of that oh by the way that johnson level that you see me using the laser level that'll be the last time you see it in my video because it got stolen out of my truck along with a couple other items in this video it'll be the last time you see [Music] so the rebars that i have in there right now those uh verticals those are just uh in the loose hole that we drilled and the reason they're just i haven't placed the epoxy in there yet because i don't have the epoxy gun on this particular day forgot it at home so what i do is i just put the bars in there temporarily to keep the hole clean that way i can just pull those bars out on the next day and then i'll put shoot the epoxy in there and then drop them back in so i figure i can go up about three courses uh maybe two and a half before and and still get the epoxy gun into the hole through the middle of the block so because that footings on on a grade you notice i just did a little step with the block this is tan mortar that we're using it matches the block that bottom course we're going to leave open so there's no head joints there and we call them weep weep holes for the water to weep through them at the base what i did is i set both ends nice and plum and level and then pulled the line across and i did that with each course because it's only a 20 foot run in a longer run you could probably um build your leads on both ends all the way up and stagger them in and then just keep raising your line off of those and keep filling the middle but in this particular case i just uh went one course at a time all the way up we were able to salvage a couple of the bars on the previous footing you can see this one on the far left that's the original bar that was in the pilaster or column it wasn't rusted so we salvaged it the ones that were arrested i cut off completely and then one on the left here that's original but the top portion of it was rest as i cut it all the way down to there same type of system you'd use if you're trying to remove a cavity in the tooth you just remove the decay and then build it back better hmm [Music] [Music] this is the second day of this job right now we've got the first two courses set and the wall demoed on the first day so now we're back on the second morning we're gonna finish this wall up before we went up we went ahead and put the epoxy in and dropped the dowels back in so those are already in once we get to the top here then we'll drop the full lengths down [Music] [Music] now i came around the other side of this wall because it's actually higher on this side [Music] if you look closely at that block right there the one below it at that head joint you'll notice that i ran a crack chaser on that joint just to give it enough space so the grout joints were all equal because we're meeting we're in between two walls spacing is uh you know not always perfect but if you got a riding you got a right angle grinder with a crack chaser you can make all the joints whatever size you want [Music] that's almost the top course but within that course right there is the bond beam and the horizontal steel that'll tie into all the verticals at 24 inch center so when we fill it with concrete we'll fill just the cells of this wall that have the steel every 24 inch and the bond beam all the way across the top all right this is third day on the job site so far what we've accomplished is we've got this uh 20 foot spanner block built up to its height all we have to do is drop our vertical steel in one horizontal across the top and the bond beam and then the two inch flat cap that wraps up this wall and we also have to we're going to add one more coarse on this wall plus the flat cap you can see here with the rebar dowels with the epoxy that's what's going to hold that top cap on there and we also have one other wall we're gonna add two at that end a little three like a five foot area there we're gonna add three courses on top of each of those little short five foot walls three courses on that inevitably what's gonna happen is along this whole alleyway here it's gonna get a two foot high of vinyl fence on top of it just to uh get a little more privacy because you can see that this this lot is a little more elevated than the alley or the street so we've got to come up with vinyl um that's the whole plan so let's get back to work now as we continued through this process adding blocks to walls we found out that the block on the other side of this gate was about four inches higher than this side they just started at different levels with the foundation so what we're going to end up doing doing on this is uh adding a half block on top of this block and then the cap on this end of the on this side of the gate that way the top of the block will be level it'll look a little funky because you have a split on top but they'll be level across so once you wrap it around with vinyl you know from a distance everything looks at the it looks like it's at the same level because it is but you have the split there which is no big deal i mean especially if you stuck with in the future so there's the doggy door and this is kind of the area where the dog is going in and out at will they have the hosing down station here hot and cold water the whole works real nice little setup for the animals we're just going to add three blocks to this 24 inches okay there's those split blocks i was talking about we just cut the blocks in half and we're utilizing both sides of it do [Music] [Music] [Music] fourth day on the site and now uh i brought in chacon just to finish it up finish the last of these splits hola mucho cemento huh you got the blend huh had to throw a little spanish in there you know that comes in real handy occasionally now i'm just striking the joints cleaning them up filling any voids knocking off the excess and smoothing it out here comes the grout mix and like i was saying in the uh in the mixer what that is when they get that blend it's already the sand and the rocks already pre-mixed so all you have to do is you add the cement to it in water and you have concrete mix so at the bottom of that split that's your bond beam that top of that second course down is completely notched out so that bomb beams probably about uh five inches by five inches for the whole length of the wall with a half inch steel in it and then every three cells of the block is a vertical steel so [Music] there's your finished product you can see the wet spots down the wall that's where the concrete is it's absorbing the moisture is actually absorbing into the grout and block so you can see right where the concrete went [Music] well thanks for watching this video if you ever need to do some block now you'll know how to do it make sure you like share subscribe hit the notification button you'll be notified as soon as we upload our next video oh and by the way don't forget to go to the facebook page to enter into the drawing for the dewalt mechanic tool set have a good one

Channel: Odell Complete Concrete

Views: 70,782

Keywords: odell, odell concrete, odell complete concrete, how to build a block wall, how to build a retaining wall, how to build a block wall foundation, how to build a wall, building a block wall, how to, how to build a block wall lay the blocks, how to build a concrete wall, how to lay block, how to block work properly, how to build a breeze block wall, how to build a cinder block wall, how to build a block retaining wall corner, block wall, how to lay concrete block, diy block wall

Id: svTsrGv9mSY

Length: 26min 2sec (1562 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 19 2022