TIDWELL MASONRY is a certified installer of the PROTO II Wall System. The PROTO II Wall System was designed to save money! Those of you that want a block wall built should take this type of wall into consideration. There is a total of 25% to 40% savings in choosing to have a PROTO II wall built instead of the conventional type. After 20 years and over 20 thousand miles of the PROTO II walls being built in Los Angeles and Riverside County, it has proven itself as a reliable engineered system. Now, the PROTO II POST TENSION MASONRY WALL is a excellent choice for SAN DIEGO! The wall itself is built identical to the standard block type wall and can accept a veneer of any type such as stone, brick or any other that would be chosen. You can go to www.Proto2.com and see what this engineered wall is all about! Below we will explain why you can save money and how it is built!

First, the footings required to build the PROTO II Wall System are half the size needed when building a block wall the conventional way. With the PROTO II Wall System there is less rebar needed. Less digging, less rebar and less concrete means you are saving MONEY! The image to the right is a footing that was dug for the PROTO II Wall being built. It's dimensions are 8" wide and 8" deep with one rebar laid horizontally in place. When building the same wall in the conventional manner the footing would be 12" deep and 24" wide and two rebars laid in place. In this image and below to the left, you can see the tension rods that replace the rebar and concrete in the footing that is used when building a wall in the conventional manner.

It is these tension rods that make everything work in the PROTO II Wall System! This simple idea has been around for years. The rods hook the rebar that is placed in the footing before you pour the concrete. After the wall is built, these rods hold everything together with 6000lbs of pressure. Anyways.... we'll talk about that later.

As you can see in the image to the right, the wall is built exactly like the conventional wall is. In this image the wall will be plastered so the standard grey block is being used. The PROTO II Wall can be built using any of the many block choices available by retailer and like stated before, can accept any type of veneer.

While building the wall you install laddur steel in the mortar joints. This replaces the horizontal rebar that that would be used in the conventional block wall. The cost of the laddur steel is about 50% less than the other. Once again, less money spent on material is a lower cost for you, the customer!

Here is where the tension rods come into play! Near the top of the wall there is a plate and nut that are attached to the end of the tension rod. By using a torque wrench and tightening the nut to 55lbs of torque, there is 6000lbs of pressure distributed through out the wall. Since there is no grout or concrete in the wall, the wall can "move" when there are earthquakes. A wall that has been built the conventional way will have grout or concrete in it making it ridged and possibly crack or even worse. Be sure to go to www.Proto2.com to check out more on this type of wall.

In this case, our client wanted a color coat finish to the PROTO II Wall we built to match their home. Any type of block can be used to build a post tension masonry wall. Like we said before, any type of veneer you might want can be applied to the PROTO II Wall System. The Proto II Wall System is sold exclusively through ANGELUS BLOCK and to see the different choices of block sold at ANGELUS BLOCK, you can go to their website www.angelusblock.com or go to our links page for their link.

THE PICTURE LINK AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE WILL TAKE YOU TO THE PROTO II WEBSITE