dry stacked natural stone retaining wall

[bricknblock]

I have a client that wants a dry stacked natural stone retaining wall to match the one she has on the other side of the yard...her current wall is very old, and appears to be just the stone itself stacked, and retaining 3 ft of earth... how is this best duplicated? At what degree of angle should I build the wall? How deep in the ground should I begin? thanks in advance for the advice

[skahuna]

2'' batter per foot of height and bury 4'' you will want to make the base about 2' wide and stack all your junk stone behind the face so your capstones will have something solid to sit on

[bricknblock]

thanks for the info, is there a formula for the angle of the wall to be set back at?

[skahuna]

the book that came with your speed square could probably tell you what angle 2'' in 12'' is but offhand i dont know it
you can make a right triangle out of 2x4 3'on one side 6'' on the other if you hold the three foot board vertical at the base of your wall the longside of the triangle is the right batter

[bricknblock]

didn't catch the "batter" term originally, but I can probably find it in the book

[mark allen]

batter is the amount of setback.... Most retaining wall blocks that are manufactured are 6 degree setback....there are ways on blocks to make it 0 degree as well...

as for the flagstone, take a 4' level straight up and down and measure over..... at 3' up ist shoud be back a couple - three inches..... as long as it looks good is what counts..... also take the small 'chinkers' to wedge behind/under stone to ensure stability.
good luck