How much to build this boundary wall?

[keiron99]

I need a quick price for a boundary wall at the front of the house. The builders are in doing a major extension and the brickies have offered to build a wall at the front of the house along the pavement.

There's already a single course wall there, they'll just have to knock that layer off. So there's no foundations or anything to dig. It will be 27 feet long and 5 courses high (6 courses if funds allow). We also want a small pillar at each end, just 7 or 8 courses high.

How much should this cost, in (a) engineering brick and (b) pinhole brick.

Thanks.

[Phil L]

The bricks will come to around £85, as you will need about 190 bricks (for engineers, I bought some today, I don't think there was much difference in price for the others at B&Q) plus about £15 for sand/cement. One man could easily build it in less than a day, so if I was building it I would charge you about £100 for labour.

It should come to around £200, this is providing you only have it one brick thick, and you don't want cappings on your brick pillars.

[keiron99]

Excellent, thanks, that's really useful. At the risk of sounding like a total numbskull, when you say "one brick thick", that seems very thin to me. Currently we simply have a "row of soldiers" sitting at virtually ground level so I'm assuming it is currently effectively "two thicks brick". If we wanted to build it this thick, it wouldn't quite double the cost would it?

[keiron99]

I mean "two bricks thick", of course :) It's me that's thick as a brick!

[dg]

"2 bricks thick" is 18" or 440mm - a bit much for a garden wall?

A single brick wall (4.5" or 100mm) is "half brick thick" and sizes go up in 1/2 bricks

dg

[keiron99]

Ah, thanks. So single brick thick means the brick's length. With you. Thanks all.

[Phil L]

I meant one brick wide.

A brick is (approx) 9 inches in *length*.

4.5 inches in *width*

3 inches in *thickness*

Ergo a wall which is one brick wide is 4.5 inches, two bricks wide is 9 inch, unless you have a cavity (like most houses) which will usually make it

11 inches wide.

Also your 'soldiers' are just bricks stood on end, and they stand nine inches high, making them the equivalent of 3 bricks high, not two.

[dg]

No, wall thicknesses are described in relation to brick lengths, so a one brick wall is 9" thick.

This comes from when walls were typically in English or Flemish bond and 1 brick was the minimum thickness, and thicker walls went up in 1/2 brick increments.

dg