Grab Bars in a Shower Stall

[Tekkie®]

Arnie Goetchius posted for all of us...

These are the ones I have seen before but couldn't remember.

I recommend them.

[Tekkie®]

DerbyDad03 posted for all of us...

YES I was not convinced of the suction cups then.

+50 When one is of advanced age there is a different perspective of falling; they can be fatal.

I would suggest that to get the experience of advanced age that a victim has rigid splints applied to their arms and legs. Then attempt to shower. Have spotters. Same as coating eyeglasses with Vaseline to simulate older eyes.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Most of us stand or sit in the shower so minimal weight is on a grab bar. If you prefer to hang on the wall, that is fine too.

If you can, yes, but not everyone can do so.

[DerbyDad03]

One of the advantages of using a wire is the length.

I don't know how long a 1/32" wire could be, but a "bit" made from a wire hanger will drill a nice neat hole though a cinder block wall or through a rim joist plus cedar shake plus insulation board plus vinyl siding.

A wire is a great way to locate a hole on the other side of a thick wall. It won't blow out the block either. If you don't like where the hole is, it's small enough to easily seal up.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

When I bought this house, there were 3 grab bars in the bathroom. All were mounted vertically, so there was no problem getting both screws in the stud. I gave them to a relative who needed them. They were mounted vertically again.

[snip]

[Paintedcow]

An Xray machine would do the job with NO damage to the wall whatsoever.

[knuckle-dragger]

Or even if not fatal, they can be very painful and costly.

[Old people tend to ramble so here goes...]

I too have a 60" shower stall with faucets on one end wall, solid glass and aluminum doors on the open side, a blank tiled wall on the closed side and a kitchen fan (very powerful) on the other end near the ceiling. On the fan wall I do have a 12" grab bar installed horizontally about 18" from the floor but it's not for grabbing; it's to rest your feet on (one at a time) while washing them.

The faucet end has three outlets: a hand held shower, an ambient shower head, and a three valve set with a bath filling outlet like you might have if you were installing in a bath. All can be run simultaneously but usually the bath filler is used for filling buckets or the hot valve side is used to gauge the temperature of the water at the outlet. The actual showers are pressure balanced.

So, on 9/11 (2016 but it's easy to remember) I was up on a ladder cleaning the kitchen fan and replacing the grille. To do so I had to stand on the very top of the ladder... not a step but the part they say "Don't stand here". They were correct. The ladder and myself toppled over backwards and I fell against the faucet wall. Fortunately no head involvement but my back took the brunt. I broke two faucets on the way down as well as the handles of the bath filler one of which ended up embedded in my back puncturing a lung. Something, perhaps just the impact broke two (or three according to one MD) ribs and of course bruising and blood all over.

I could still walk and with some first aid from my wife was driven to the emergency room by my son. Why not an ambulance? Because the assholes charge $1400 for an ambulance ride which might be necessary sometimes but I was able to walk, breathe etc and the blood loss wasn't so much as to cause death. Further, ambulances in my area drive so slowly that you could die en route; if you're driving an ambulance and have to put on the siren, you should be emulating a NASCAR driver.

Anyway after the Russian, Black, Indian, and other assorted MD's took a look they decided the most serious was the punctured lung (duh!) for which the standard treatment is to drain the pleural cavity via a surgically implanted tube. Four days in the hospital. I took one look at the proposed surgeon and decided, oops, no thanks. Time to get my Syrian refugee PCP involved and I must say he did what he's paid for. He organized a high quality thoracic surgeon and we all met in the hospital the next day. After several new X-rays and an overnight stay, the surgeon decided that I didn't need a drain after all and that the wound was closing on its own. Later one of the nurses made some remarks about the quality of the emergency room doctors leading me to believe that maybe there was no lung puncture at all.

There was major pain however which now has all but disappeared. I did have the opportunity of trying the top level opoid (Diludid, IIRC), intravenous of course. And getting a sponge bath from a very cute Russian girl. The pain reduced the erotic factor unfortunately.

As the thoracic surgeon said, "After 70, only fools climb ladders."

[Ed Pawlowski]

Smart doctor. How high are your ceilings?

[HerHusband]

That was my thought as well. A person falling is probably not dropping from the ceiling. The majority of their weight is already on the floor, the bar only needs to resist the side and downward movement of the person falling from a vertical position.

Also, I believe the anchor ratings are for a single anchor, so the load would be divided by two anchors (both ends of the grab bar).

I don't know the exact calculations involved, but I doubt a grab bar would ever need to support the full weight of a 262 pound man.

Anthony Watson

[knuckle-dragger]

In this bathroom about 10 feet.

[Tekkie®]

DerbyDad03 posted for all of us...

No, they usually have a rating for shelves and the like; not life safety.

[Arnie Goetchius]

I just installed a suction cup grab bar in the shower to help with some balance issues. The bar appears to be quit sturdy and there is no way I could pull the bar off of the wall. The bar is described here:

They do say on their website and in the instructions included with the bar:

"This product is to be used as a balance assist only. Do not use it to support your full body weight. Do not lift yourself up with or hang from this product. This product is intended for temporary attachment and should be periodically reapplied as instructed."

[Stormin' Norman]

That is the big problem with suction cups, environmental changes combined with cleanliness and chemistry cause the cups to lose vacuum at unpredictable times.

If you reapply them before using them each day, you will "probably" be safe.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Mine stayed in place about a year at a time. Have you ever used one? If so, tell me about your experience, if not you should learn more about them.

[Stormin' Norman]

I have used suction cup devices in the shower and my experience is as I cautioned above. I have also used powerful suction cup devices for pulling very large, glued on mirrors off several walls and they are ridiculously powerful. However, I did notice the vacuum can bleed off if left in place for several days.

That is another consideration, the vacuum cup grab bars could easily provide enough leverage to dislodge older or poorly set tiles.

Going through the tiles into studs eliminates all such considerations.

[clare]

And the earlier remark that someone could connect one end to a stud but the other end didn't match to another stud means someone was using the wrong grab bars.

16 and 32 inch bars mount horizontal. 24 inch bars mount on an angle, and bars shorter than 16 inches mount vertically. There is no such thing as "won't reach a second stud" if you use the right stuff.

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Arnie Goetchius:

That's today.

[Arnie Goetchius]

Agree. The instructions say "This product is intended for temporary attachment and should be periodically reapplied as instructed". It will be interesting to see how many days it takes before it falls off the wall.

[clare]

It's a real bugger when one of the "good" ones pulls the tile off the wall. I wouldn't trust anything short of stud mounted.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Of course they are not as good as a properly mounted bar. They serve a purpose and fill a need. Not everyone can mount of have a proper bar mounted.

What is important to prevent most falls is being able to hold something, anything, to steady yourself. They can do that well. They can prevent serious injury.

Depending on the surface, they can stay in place for weeks or more.