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Plan and elevation of English bond wall

Short answer

In a one-and-a-half brick thick English bond wall, odd courses show outer stretchers and inner headers with a queen closer at the quoin; even courses reverse this arrangement. Perpendicular walls interlock by alternating which wall runs through so no continuous vertical joint forms.

Draw the plan (showing two perpendicular walls) of odd-even courses and the elevation of a one and half brick thick wall made with English bond.

Data: brick 230 × 110 × 55 mm (typical Nepali brick) with 10 mm joints; a one-and-a-half brick wall is 345 mm thick. In English bond the courses alternate. In a 1½ brick wall, each course has headers on one face and stretchers on the other, reversed in the next course, so each face shows alternate stretcher and header courses. A queen closer is placed next to the quoin header. S = stretcher, H = header, Q = queen closer.

Plan of odd and even courses (two perpendicular walls)

Wall A runs to the right and wall B runs downwards from the outer corner (outer faces are at the top and on the left). One unit is about half a brick (115 mm), so a stretcher is 2 units long and the wall is 3 units (345 mm) thick. The walls continue beyond the sketch.

 Odd course: wall A runs through the corner, wall B butts against it
 +-----------+-----------+-----------+
 |           |           |           |
 |     S     |     S     |     S     |
 |           |           |           |
 +-----+--+--+--+-----+--+--+-----+--+
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 |  H  |Q |  H  |  H  |  H  |  H  |Q |
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 |     |  |     |     |     |     |  |
 +-----+--+-----+--+--+-----+-----+--+
 |     |     Q     |
 |     +-----------+
 |     |           |
 |  S  |     H     |
 |     |           |
 |     +-----------+
 |     |           |
 +-----+     H     |
 |     |           |
 |     +-----------+
 |     |           |
 |  S  |     H     |
 |     |           |
 |     +-----------+
 |     |     Q     |
 +-----+-----------+

 Even course: wall B runs through the corner, wall A butts against it
 +-----------+-----+--+-----+-----+-----+
 |           |     |  |     |     |     |
 |     H     |     |  |     |     |     |
 |           |     |  |     |     |     |
 +-----------+  S  |Q |  H  |  H  |  H  |
 |     Q     |     |  |     |     |     |
 +-----------+     |  |     |     |     |
 |           |     |  |     |     |     |
 |     H     +-----+--+-----+--+--+-----+--+
 |           |     |           |           |
 +-----------+     |     S     |     S     |
 |           |     |           |           |
 |     H     |  S  +-----------+-----------+
 |           |     |
 +-----------+     |
 |           |     |
 |     H     +-----+
 |           |     |
 +-----------+     |
 |           |     |
 |     H     |  S  |
 |           |     |
 +-----------+     |
 |           |     |
 |     H     +-----+
 |           |     |
 +-----------+  S  |
 |     Q     |     |
 +-----------+-----+

Odd course: wall A runs through the corner. Its outer row is stretchers and its inner row (two units wide) is headers, starting with the quoin header at the corner, followed by a queen closer. Wall B butts against A, with stretchers on its outer face and headers on the inner side, starting with a queen closer.

Even course: the arrangement is reversed. Wall B runs through the corner, with headers on its outer face (the quoin header first, then a queen closer) and stretchers on the inner side. Wall A butts against B, with headers on its outer face and stretchers on the inner side.

So the outer faces of both walls show stretchers in the odd course and headers in the even course. The through wall changes in alternate courses, so the corner is interlocked and there is no continuous vertical joint.

Elevation (face of the wall)

The face looks the same for a 1 brick and a 1½ brick wall: stretcher and header courses alternate.

 Elevation (English bond)
 +-------+-------+-------+-------+
 |   S   |   S   |   S   |   S   |   stretcher course
 +---+-+-+-+---+-+-+---+-+-+-+---+
 | H |Q| H | H | H | H | H |Q| H |   header course
 +---+-+-+-+---+-+-+---+-+-+-+---+
 |   S   |   S   |   S   |   S   |   stretcher course
 +-------+-------+-------+-------+
 S = stretcher, H = header, Q = queen closer

In the face elevation, the stretcher courses and header courses alternate. A queen closer is next to the quoin header, every perpend of the header course lies a quarter brick from those of the stretcher courses, and the back face repeats the same pattern with the courses reversed.

✓ Answer checked by Claude Sonnet 5.5

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