Advice on Ways to brace/block sand

Joined
5 Dec 2023
Messages
2
Reaction score
0
Country
United Kingdom
Before you read on.. join me in laughter at my awful attempt of a “drawing” obviously my architectural skills are flawless.



I hope this makes sense. It does in my head but that’s not always a helpful thing



Initially we were repairing a wall going down into the basement. The wall has a 2 inch bow/bulge so had a Structual guy come take a look to make sure we weren’t going to make the house cave in ‍ from that we were glad that our thinking was correct and what the surveyor told us was on track with what we thought. Happy days. BUT we have now hit another problem.



As per my wonderful doodle-

Behind the wall that’s being repaired/rebuilt it is filled with sand. Not an issue, we had hoped and prayed that there would be a supporting wall further back so we would only be dealing with a 3ft depth of sand. Yes that supporting wall is there and that’s fantastic. The issue we’re now facing is, there’s a gap in the wall (that lines up directly where our kitchen door is on the ground floor) our assumption is at some point this space would have been used and the lay out mimics the kitchen. That means that the more of the wall we take down and the sand comes out… it’s not just the under hallway 3ft void it’s the bloody whole underneath of the kitchen sand that would then start to pour out too. Which is obviously a no go.



Wanting to know of any realistic suggestions on how to brace that gap ultimately blocking off any sand movement from the under kitchen area, allowing us to just deal with the 3ft depth under the hallway so we can rebuild the wall.



My heads swimming with tons of ideas but each one’s met with a “no that won’t work”



So hit me with any words or wisdom, recommendation, options for me to explore and research. I doubt I’d be lucky enough to come across someone who’s had a similar problem in the past but who knows !


*for context, the basement space under the living room is open and useable, we have renovated the whole space and only need to do the cosmetic side now. the space under the kitchen (at the moment) is walled off. Absolute waste in my opinion but currently don’t have the funds to support a big job to open that up. The focus at the moment is rebuilding the wall which has the bulge (using more appropriate brick too) and then replacing the steps going down which again is not going to be an issue.
 

Attachments

  • A47A03FC-4EDF-4605-965E-C89B8D61AAE5.jpeg
    A47A03FC-4EDF-4605-965E-C89B8D61AAE5.jpeg
    187.2 KB · Views: 49
Reallistically, I can only think of a grout imjection.
As a DIY repair, can you fit some form of bracing to support the existing bulging wall? I appreciate that will encroach on the steps of your access to the basement. That bracing will only be there until you can access the under kitchen area.
 
Reallistically, I can only think of a grout imjection.
As a DIY repair, can you fit some form of bracing to support the existing bulging wall? I appreciate that will encroach on the steps of your access to the basement. That bracing will only be there until you can access the under kitchen area.
Ahh now that’s something that I hadn’t considered, simply because I didn’t know it was a thing ! I’d had silly visions of going through the floor with some kind of force to push some kind of sheet wood down to brace the sand back but also knew that was unrealistic haha ! But the theory is vaguely similar (I’m telling myself that for validation of my silly ideas)

But yes I will for sure explore that as an option. As for bracing the original wall issue at the moment, we have only removed a hand full of bricks and removed some of the sand (not by choice, that ran like a river) and at the moment it’s still standing as it is, granted I doubt it will be for very long as the bricks are in terrible condition, the mortar is shocking( we’re talking 1920’s) and as uneven as you can ever possibly imagine so it’s a test against time at the moment. If the existing bricks where in better condition, and the wall had been built to withstand the weight of the sand I’d have looked at alternate ways to support it, but I think replacing the bricks with engineering bricks is the most sensible thing to do. Thank you so much for your input! Truly relieved there are other possibilities that I hadn’t considered!
 
Back
Top