Home DIY

How difficult is building a brick garden wall? Probably 4' high and a couple of stretches of about 10' long each.

Lost the will to find someone to do it so now pondering doing it myself.

I wanna say well easy, but 10foot is quite a height

Ah yes, that wasn't too clear (now edited). It's two walls of about 4' x 10'.

I've no experience of building a new wall from scratch with bricks. But amateurs who've done it generally say it's not hard-hard, just time consuming.

For something non-structural I'd say give it a go. My assumption is the steepest part of the learning curve will be getting the mix right and how to handle the mix.

Tbh my guess is your only chance of getting someone to do that work is if one of your neighbours is building an extension. If you want someone to do it, I'd really recommend trying to take a weekday morning off and walking up and down all your adjacent streets and asking any builders you come across.

Idk if you've factored this in, but if you're doing a single thickness then you'll only be able to do a certain continuous distance without needing pillars - I want to say 2m, but check that. Either way 10' might be tight in a continuous run. So check and factor it in to considerations.

I'm still kicking myself for not getting someone who'd just finished a job opposite and had excess brick +equipment to do a 2m stretch of our wall at the time. It was a good price and we'll never be able to get it done without it being prohibitively expensive. At the time we just didn't want to drop the money on something with so little benefit.

Can I just sense check here. I’m wiring a new tado thermostat receiver into my Potterton combi boiler.

Looking at the boiler wiring diagram, is this right?

• remove loop from terminals 1 and 2.
  
• Grey tado wire (CH COM) into 1
  
• Black tado wire ( CH NO) into 2
  
  

And how do I connect the tado live and neutral, can I just add those into terminals 5 and 6 with some with the existing external supply? I'm sure someone will say I should use Wagos connectors to join them properly?

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Mostly. Apparently the CH COM should come from 2. Not that it will make any difference.

I did something very similar when I installed my Tado.

I am just some bloke on the Internet though...

I’ve only built one short, very low wall, but I used one of these and it looked more than ok.
https://bricky.com/
Well I used the old version, but these look just as easy.

I can't get enough of this
https://youtu.be/QNL7sHrP-GY

Guess it gives the opportunity to be picky about materials and arty in design bonds etc, if that's what floats your boat,

I need a drill. The thing I've been using for the last decade is a bit shit tbh and the battery barely holds charge. Can anyone recommend one? It'll be used for things like mounting into brick, drilling holes in wood. Nothing extensive.

Do you already have other cordless tools or see yourself likely to buy others in future?

You can do a lot worse than the Bosch DIY (Green) tools in my experience. If you're only going to be using it once or twice a year to fit a new light or put up some trellis, then no need to go to the 'prosumer' level. They do a very large range of tools that you can share the batteries with. No experience of other brands, but I think Worx or Ryobi would also be fine.

@stevo_com I don't own any. I do have a fairly large refurb job on my hands and decking etc on the horizon in the future so it's certainly possible

@chiroshi battery sharing sounds like a big plus

I recently moved away from Bosch Green to Milwaukee Fuel, but you likely don't need the Fuel. The Bosch Green has some OK tools. The drill is fine, but things like the circular saw and jigsaw are trash. I would look at Ryobi as for the not quite entry level, they have a vast range of tools on their platform. And if you do switch in future or get a different brand, they are the one I see battery adaptors for most often.

If it is going to be light use and want to spend a bit more, I would look at the Bosch Professional or Milwaukee Fuel 12V options as they will be as powerful as the likes of Ryobi and Bosch Green 18V but way more portable and easier to store.

Just checked and sadly not available at the mo but I picked up a Ferrex 18V Impact Drill & Driver Set for just £36 last year. Keys to my first home next week so not tested too much but been decent for my occasional use.
In short, worth keeping an aye in the middle aisles of Aldi/Lidl

I have the Parkside (Lidl) 12V planer and mini recip saw and while they are good for the price (underpowered but light and compact), the battery died in under a year and I've yet to replace it. I would recommend going either the Screwfix or Toolstation route as their returns are as close to zero hassle as you can get. Order online and the receipt stays in your account. I've walked in with a couple used and abused tools that died within the first year and they just swapped out for new.

On top of battery sharing, I would look at getting both a drill and a driver.

Not having to swap a drill bit for a cross head bit whilst you're working is great

I've got DeWalt and Ryobi stuff.

Ryobi is a bit cheaper and has a massive range of stuff that comes on sale pretty often.

DeWalt feels a bit better quality and batteries are a bit cheaper but a lot of their cordless stuff (e.g. circular saw, multi-tool) outside of drill and impact driver is quite pricey compared to the Ryobi bits.

If you do go DeWalt they have special offers pretty often and you can often get an impact driver, which is pretty useful, packaged for not much more.

https://its.co.uk/pd/dewalt-dck2062d2t-18v-xr-brushless-2-piece-kit-with-2x-2-0ah-batteries-charger-and-case-_dewdck2062d2t.htm

What do folk think about this? Seems like a decent deal and I like the low/short profile of the driver.

I'm putting the odd obvious thing in here, drills seem to be the bench gateway of multi million dollar , always promotions, DeWalt seem to have either a too large range or exactly what you want. A solid day use on 2ah could be frustrating but that's the deal

That's very similar to what I have (they appear to have shitloads of virtually identical models for some reason). No problems with them. Drill definitely has more grunt than my previous Draper one and it's rare I need the corded one.

Impact driver is good but it's a bit vicious for stuff that you'd often use an electric screwdriver for (flat pack furniture, small screws, etc). Good for screwing into sleepers or big screws into the wall or whatever though.

except this bosch tool. this one is shit.

https://www.bosch-diy.com/gb/en/p/atino-0603663a00

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Get a Makita combi drill with a couple of batteries and a case. If there's a deal with an impact driver included get that as you'll want it for your decking.

My logic:

1. There are good deals
   
2. Bare Makita tools (ie without a battery) are usually the cheapest of the pro brands
   
3. Makita are decent.
   
4. Bigger 2nd hand market in the UK
   

I have the old equivalent of this and it's done a brilliant job over the last 8yrs for all our house diy, including brick work (only recently got a sds). Would definitely recommend.

My only reason for suggesting Makita is the price of bare units vs DeWalt is a bit cheaper. While DeWalt batteries are cheaper if you get two decent batteries in your kit, as an amateur you probably won't need more.

Ignore that link. The dewalt one is better