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So as you can see the bank retaining wall has failed and now the earth is being eroded by the river. As you can see the garage is pretty close by and at the worst point the bank has been undermined to withinn about a foot of the garage wall. Problematic getting a digger in.
Original retaining wall is 6" round timber posts with membrane behind and then backfilled with concrete. Done about 10 yrs ago. Obviously failed due to age and recent flooding.
You can see a large lump of concrete in middle of stream and water rushing around this obsticle is forcing water into the bank at speed resulting in erosion. Water between concrete and bank is currently about 600mm deep so i suspect it has washed away base of stream in this area due to high flow rate. Back upstream a few metres the water is calm.
Client wants a new wall along similar lines but i cant see how to do this with the current volume of water coming through.
Gabions have been mentioned.
Ideally you would do all this work when the river is low but we don't have that option as at the moment the key point is to protect the garage.
I think a priorty is to fill in the hole with stone or similar to displace the water and create a buffer for the water so we at least stop the erosion. I think gabions could be a good idea here but the issuse i see is getting them to sit on a flat and level surface as the ground is 600mm below the surface. Also you would not be able to place the stone in them due to the water level so you would be left with just throwing them in. Once we have done this we could look to reinstate the timber posts but not sure how to sink them in as i think we would need a machine of some sort to push/bang them down and acess for this is a problem. Is there a handheld machine option?
Interested to hear if we are looking at just safeguarding at the moment with final solution to be implemented once water has subsided or if we can do the whole job in current conditions.
I'm open to any and all ideas.
One of our sites has a similar issue but on a smaller scale and sheets of ply / old doors have been used to divert the force and the majority of water away, then used 50+ sandbags bags filled with "postcrete" mix (which sets in 10-15mins) stacked in bonded pattern to stabilize the bank while the Insurance /.final solution is sorted out.
There is now a 'vold' in between the 'temp sandbag wall' and the remainder of the bank which is no longer being eroded - so initial worry has been dealt with while a decision is made on the final fix.
I'm on scour works with the railway what we do with scours fill hessian bags with dry mixed concrete lay like bricks two wide or wider pin with bars works a treet
Great ideas chaps. I'd thought of sand bags already but postcrete is very clever as is dry concrete. Pin with bars is a great idea too. good. Not too sure what a scour is. Could I just start these in the water and build up from there.
Only thing with this job is client wants to bypass ins. Has sold house and wants fully sorted for exchange in 3 weeks so still have to figure out reinstating timber post frontage to match existing. Then I can fully back fill and bring up to level.
We did a similar ISH job 2 years ago.
water only a few inches deep.
we went gabions, 14.5 metres of them.
you can get (hire( hand held post knockers https://www.bing.com/shop?q=hand+held+post+knocker&FORM=SHOPPA&...
to put in front of the post set bags but that lump of concreate is going to take some shifting
is the digger access problem because of the erosion or elseware
Warning ... I have no experience on this... but
is it possible to break that lump of concrete (with a kango?) in the middle of the flow - the water will then wash it away, and stop scouring into the bank by the garage. The lucky person doing it could be harnessed to the tree? Then put the postcrete wall in, there would be less pressure on it while it sets.
Idea 2 - (you can tell its raining again in Wiltshire and I have nothing better to do :) ) - put the postcrete between the remaining retaining wall and the boulder, effectively stopping the flow towards the garage bank. When the flow is significantly reduced there, it could be infilled with rubble - Of course that would risk the bank that you took the photo from
Thanks for all the input guys.
I have learnt a lot and would be happy to take the job on.
I rang the chap up today to talk things over and outline the suggested spec of works and pricing as i said i would. I only saw the job on tuesday end of the day.
Guess what.....oh i've decided to go with another contractor i know!
Sometimes i find it so infuriating. You put the work in to look at and then research and price a job. Then they don't even have the courtesy to let you know that they have decided to go with someone else. Its like they think it takes you 5 minutes to put a quote together. I know it goes with the territory but this was an urgent job from his point of view and i made clear i would be dropping things to quote it. I could have dealt with other things instead that look like they may have a more positive outcome for me.
All in half a day wasted. At least the knowledge can be filed away in the old memory banks for another time, but boy do clients get under my skin sometimes.