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Need Advice on Backyard climbing wall (Updated design)

Original Post
Mike Sun · · Unknown Hometown · Joined May 2020 · Points: 0

Hi All,
  Thanks all for the advises. The retaining wall is made of hollow bricks and it is about 2 inch thick. It is supposed to have steel cables inside and some foundation in order to hold the back earth, but no way to check the construction record. Adding additional posts will enhance safety for sure. The drawback is that the posts will take some space from my relatively small backyard.
 The word "earth" by TLyons just reminds me the Earth Anchor, which gives me a new thought, also a bit inspiration from angled training walls. Here are some draws. Those earth anchors (e.g., 18", 26",36" long) into soil seems to be able to hold thousands lbs or at lease several hundreds lbs even on lose ground.
 I added ground anchors to the three main 4x4s attached to the retaining. As a result the main weight will be on the hillside earth anchors and bottom ground anchors. Those tapcon screws are still there to secure side way shears.
However, a new question is that looks like I am now pulling the earth and the potential will be applied onto the woody frame again?
Again, please see if metal earth anchors coupled with steel cables or some additional woody on the back could be an alternative to front supporting posts. Really appreciated!





Hi, basically I plan to build a 105-110 deg overhang wall (8ft w. 10 ft h) for my daughter. I have a Cindy brick retaining wall (8 ft H) in the backyard holding its backside hill. The retaining wall itself is not perfectly vertical, ~94 deg. I am not sure how the foundation of that retaining wall was made before. Is it safe to attach a slightly overhang woody climbing wall to the brick wall? Last month, I build a simple wall (8ft H 12ft W) completely attached using tapcon concrete screws and a  few 4 by 2 studs as you can see in the photos. For a overhang wall, should I add two more 4 by 4 posts in the front?
The retaining wall itself seems very sturdy though. I also saw some campus board and training walls attached to a straight wall without additional posts in the front. Does the overhang angle determine the usage of addition supporting posts?
Any thoughts and advice will be greatly helpful..
I attach a few photos with my two designs.
The three red posts will be fixed to the retaining wall using concrete screws and the rest frames will be jointed either by screws or metal brackets.
The empty space on the Cindy brick retaining wall will be used for a overhang wall, the highlighted yellow on left side is used to prevent from landing on the concrete stair base.

Please help advice. Thank you very much.
Sean G · · Indiana · Joined Apr 2012 · Points: 575
Mike Sun wrote: For a overhang wall, should I add two more 4 by 4 posts in the front?
The retaining wall itself seems very sturdy though. I also saw some campus board and training walls attached to a straight wall without additional posts in the front. Does the overhang angle determine the usage of addition supporting posts?

I'm no engineer, but id add the 2 4x4's like in your last photo.  Seems like having the overhung angle would place a lot of leverage on the top cinder blocks without them.  It might not matter if your daughter is really light.

Looks like a great setup....post some pictures whatever you end up doing.
Mike Sun · · Unknown Hometown · Joined May 2020 · Points: 0

Thanks Sean. Yeah, will definitely post pictures once I set it up.

M Mobley · · Bar Harbor, ME · Joined Mar 2006 · Points: 911

Flare the supports out so nobody hits them.

Rich Farnham · · Nederland, CO · Joined Aug 2002 · Points: 297

I would not hang an overhanging wall off of that wall.  It is already working plenty hard to resist the load of retaining 8' of soil.  Attaching a vertical wall probably doesn't add that much load, but I definitely wouldn't attach an overhanging wall without those additional supports that you have in the bottom right photo.  I agree with "A non" - see if you can flare the supports to keep them out of the way of the wall.  But maybe that will get in the way of the stairs?

Timothy L · · New York · Joined Aug 2015 · Points: 110

If that wall is holding back all that Earth there is no way one person climbing on a slightly overhanging want will rip it down. Supports are probably unnecessary

Eric Howe · · Cleveland, TN · Joined Mar 2019 · Points: 15

That retaining wall is probably made of hollow block, in which case I don't really trust securing it with tapcons... Their tensile strength in hollow block isn't great, especially one that is constantly experiencing shifting loads.

I'd throw the legs on like in your diagram so it can support itself if the tapcons failed

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

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