Hi guys....I would greatly appreciate any help/experience you have with this.
We have poured our concrete footings for a rear cantilever retaining wall and I have painstakingly jackhammered/cleared a drain behind the footing into the solid sandstone.
http://imgur.com/iV2UaRj
I am now deciding on the wall system....I have been impressed with a Dincel type system due to waterproofing factors but am not sure if the footing is wide enough behind bars to accommodate a Dincel wall as I am under the impression I need to install a wood beam either side of the wall base to hold the base of walls in place to enable the internal concrete core fill. Also with bracing a Dincel type wall only one side is really open (internal side) as the rear side is sub ground. I am also concerned about the waterproofing of the bottom seam on the earth side of the wall using Dincel. There will be internal inhabited rooms on this side of the wall including a bathroom as seen in photo at far end.
I am also tossing up whether to just go with a traditional Besser block rear wall but have seen a few sub ground walls of inhabitable spaces have issues with water seepage/mustyness through the block wall either.
Drainage wise I will use geotech fabric on the earth/rock face to reduce sediment falling into drain base in combination with a PVC slotted pipe (french drain)/ clean crushed rock with pvc pipe turn ups for clean out every 5 metres....in total the wall runs 30 metres and there are also corner sections (it basically runs 15 metres then a 90 degree turn and runs back 3 metres then another 90 degree turn that runs another 8 metres followed by another turn etc).
The crux of my question encompasses the following points:
*How do you adequately seal the bottom seam of a Dincel wall to ensure that the cold joint is waterproof (especially as I don't think there is an adequate footing edge to install the base beam on the earth side)
* Would I be better off installing a traditional block wall and if so what sort of waterproofing measures can I take considering I have very little space to work on the earth side of wall (maybe 150mm...its almost vertical in sections)
* Cost of Dincel/core fill vs. blockwall/waterproof membrane/core fill
Thanks !!