not confident my wall will hold up shelves, help?!

[goxinyellowsox]

I bought 3 of these shelves to sit above each other on the same wall. They feel heavy before I have put anything in it so I'm now worried about putting the 3 on the same wall (only place they would fit and meant to organise that space)

Can you make your wall fall down if it is too heavy? It's the wall which is a back of a cupboard the other side so an internal wall iyswim

Also it looks like it goes up with just 2 wall plugs and screws in that gap... Will that really hold it?

[FelicityR313]

DH said that if it's an internal wall in a house, it has to be plaster-board and skimmed and as long as you use the rawl plugs it will be grand.
He said to get back to us if the wall falls down

Me, sticking my physics head on would not put them directly one above each other, but staggered laterally as then you're distibuting the weight across the wall.

[lalalonglegs]

No, the wall won't fall down but the shelves might and, if they do, they can damage the wall by making a mess of the plaster finish in the process. Does the wall sound hollow if you knock against it? If so, it is a stud wall and will be a basic wooden framework probably covered in plasterboard with a skim finish. You can hang shelves on these walls if you can work out where the timber supports are (the wood used for the framework) and drill into those - you can buy stud detectors from diy shops which beep when you run them along a wall and they sense one of the timber uprights or horizontals. The timber may not be in the right position for you, however, and in this case you can use plasterboard rawl plugs but they will not support a great deal of weight so I'd proceed with caution.

Ideally the wall will be solid - if you're not sure if it is or isn't, the easiest way to find out is to make a few discreet drill holes keeping well away from sockets and light switches in an area that can easily be filled and painted over afterwards.

[lalalonglegs]

No, the wall won't fall down but the shelves might and, if they do, they can damage the wall by making a mess of the plaster finish in the process. Does the wall sound hollow if you knock against it? If so, it is a stud wall and will be a basic wooden framework probably covered in plasterboard with a skim finish. You can hang shelves on these walls if you can work out where the timber supports are (the wood used for the framework) and drill into those - you can buy stud detectors from diy shops which beep when you run them along a wall and they sense one of the timber uprights or horizontals. The timber may not be in the right position for you, however, and in this case you can use plasterboard rawl plugs but they will not support a great deal of weight so I'd proceed with caution.

Ideally the wall will be solid - if you're not sure if it is or isn't, the easiest way to find out is to make a few discreet drill holes keeping well away from sockets and light switches in an area that can easily be filled and painted over afterwards.

[BombadierFritz]

There are special plasterboard screws that might be better, plus if you tap on the walls you can try and locate the wooden frame and screw at least one into that

[FelicityR313]

Is there any instructions about the type of wall that the units are suitable for or the amount of total weight the units will sustain with the provided screws?

[goxinyellowsox]

No literally no info other than picture diagrams and even the dimensions on the website were wrong and they're double the depth I thought they would be

How does hollow sound? Sorry being dim. It's not a very thick wall. The other side of it is a walk in cupboard that holds my gas meter and I can see from old holes drilled there that it looks like probably concrete or maybe plaster ? Grey with maybe wood frame behind that

The bit of wall is the same width as the shelf (it's a sticky out alcove) where the cupboard the other side sits into the room

[BombadierFritz]

Try drilling a hole and see what the wall is like?

[nancy75]

Knock on a wall that leads outside then knock on the wall you want to put the shelves on. If it's a stud wall it will sound hollow compared to the outside wall ( I can't explain the sound but you will hear it is quite different)

[Liara]

If the bit of wall is the same width as the shelf there should be some handy support woods in just the right place for the shelves.

Take the place where you would want one of the shelves to be, mark where the shelf will hide the wall. Then in this hidden space drill regular holes in the wall until you find the woods.

You may need to adjust where the shelf supports go on the shelves (i.e. drill another of those slits in the back of the shelves in the right place for the woods).

[FelicityR313]

If you knock on a concrete wall, you will have sore knuckles. If you knock on a stud wall, you'll hear a sort of echo and no sore knuckles.

Stud wall - hollow sound.
Brick wall - high pitched sound and sore knuckles.

[goxinyellowsox]

I think I'm going to have to hire someone I'm not confident in my ability not to pull the wall plaster down attaching this shelf.

And now a bit worried I could end up drilling through the gas pipes on the other side. There's no electric socket so I assumed no wires - but gas meter and pipes are in the cupboard, or would they not be in the wall anyway?

I'm not allowed to upload any more photos today but will try to post in the morning to explain myself better

[FelicityR313]

If you think there's gas pipes, you need a builder to check where the gas pipes are (they apparently have equipment to check for pipes). If you have a friend who's a builder, they would probably oblige. DH says it will be cheaper in the long run. If you drill through pipes, you're screwed.
Any maintenance/labourer with the correct tools should be able to do all this for you.