Second try at dry stack retaining wall

Sean and Matt hope you will comment.

Dig some stones out of a hole. This hole will be used to make an underground dome water tank. Some parts of my land has this rock a meter down.

Then you get a pile of rock. These are not the greatest, too roundish, but what i have. Costs me about $6 per m2

Elia is a mason we brought in to speed things up. He did this wall. he gets better as we go left.

As requested some side shots.

For the cap I expect some dirt and grass will hold the back few pieces in place.  Along the edge are big flat pieces.

From the other end of the wall where it is shorter.

And the last part being built,  the stones left are smaller.  Lots of ruble put behind.

A

 Some detail of the top pieces.

How I make the wood floor

Cut a tree down, preferably a sustainable harvest.

 I had some grevilia robusta trees, a semi hardwood about 40 years old.  I took a few out.

 Hire someone to cut the logs into lumber. Next time I will use the guys who do it by manual 2 meter saw. This time it was chain saw. too much loss, too uneven

Movie cutting logs by pit method. Very cool

run the boards throw a shaper to plane to uniform thickness

then they look something like this

Then rip with this table saw

Then I cut the strips into 50cm lengths

Floor almost there

First mistake was cutting the trees into planks with chain saw. I thought it was pretty even but now realize they are not very uniform and I lost too much in the cut. I thought I would get 50m2 of 2cm thick flooring. I got about 31m2. Some the wood was not mature and there is alot of waste and maybe i calculated wrong, or some dissappeared. I have 3m2 left after i glue the last pieces. I have some odd pieces to match up. After cutting i have 50cm strips 2cm thick 4-4.5 wide

Every Structure is a unique statement.

watch this video

Wood flooring upstairs.

Dry stack retaining wall

Retaining wall for new driveway. First major drystack attempt. Stones came from hole 30 meters away. Hole is for water tank.

Back filling on the road. Needs to come up another meter.

"The architect of the future will construct by imitating nature, because it is the most rationale, durable, and economic method."    D. Juan Torres ~1870

Rafael Guastavino was his student.