Suitable Projects
- Terracing a sloped yard into usable levels
- Holding the grade beside a driveway or parking pad
- Raised beds and planters in stone
- Walls at the edge of a lawn or along a property line
Services / Armour Stone Retaining Walls
Armour Stone Retaining Walls
Large quarried blocks set in courses to hold back a grade. We source the stone, prepare the base, build the wall and drain it.
An armour stone wall does its work through weight. Each block is heavy enough that the wall holds the soil behind it without mortar, and the joints let water out. Built on a proper base with drainage behind it, it holds its line.
We handle the whole job: sourcing natural, guillotined or sawn armour stone, getting it to site, excavating for the base, setting every course and backfilling behind the wall.
What We Provide
- Armour stone sourced to the size and face the wall needs
- Excavation and a compacted granular base under the first course
- Setting each course by machine, with the face and batter checked as it rises
- Clear stone drainage behind the wall and backfill to finished grade
Site and Access
- Machine access along the full line of the wall
- Room to stage stone close to where it is set
- Buried services located before any digging
- Overhead wires, septic beds and trees near the wall line
Base and Drainage
The first course sits on compacted granular base, and clear stone goes behind the wall so water drains out instead of building pressure. Taller walls, and walls near a road, a structure or a property line, may need an engineered design or a permit. Check whether yours does before work starts.
Equipment
Wall building needs a machine with the reach and lifting capacity for the heaviest piece in the wall. Larger armour stone pieces weigh well over a tonne each, so the machine is chosen for the stone, not the other way round.
What Drives the Price
Every job is quoted on site conditions, so no price is published here. These are the things that move it:
- Wall face: length times height
- Stone type: natural, guillotined or sawn
- Depth of excavation and base
- Drainage and backfill behind the wall
- Access for the machine and the delivery truck
- Delivery distance
Materials
- Natural armour stone
- Guillotined armour stone
- Sawn armour stone
- Clear stone and drainage gravel
- Granular base and crusher run