Banister Attachment

[bobnew...]

I recently moved into a house where one of the banisters has pulled away from the wall on the stairs. A quick scan with a stud finder shows that the attachment is several inches away from the closest stud. My inclination is to move the round wood banister support all the way to the end of the banister at the edge of the wall where it can be anchored into wood but my wife objects to the appearance of having it at the end and also 16” to the right of the end. Here are two pictures showing the banister and the large screw that attaches it to the wall (next to an AAA battery for scale). If you look closely, you can see the hole in the drywall where the screw pulled out from the wall.

Can a banister be securely mounted into drywall using some kind of anchor rather than into a stud?

[Dean Hoffman]

There are drywall anchors made for heavy stuff. Could you fasten some sort of decorative board to the studs? The board would be parallel to the existing banister. Fasten the banister to the board.

[hubops]

It looks like those supports have only 1 screw ? If so - that is a poor thing to try to anchor in drywall. The supports for my second floor bannister have 3 screws each ; for my basement banister - 3 screws each into an oak backer. If you can devise a decorative backer that your wife can live with - and use ~ 3 drywall anchors for each ; then firmly attach the supports to the backer .. Or new supports with 3 screws.

John T.

[Scott Lurndal]

Use a toggle bolt.

[micky]

Is the other support mounted to a stud? If it's not either, all the more reason to take off the bannister and mount a 2" or so wide board behind it, ends cut vertical, maybe stained the same color as the bannister, or if you can't, a contrasting color

[bobnew...]

Yes. And I checked the other banisters and this issue is not unique to the one that I'm currently working on. Makes me wonder what other poor decisions were made when the house was built.

This morning, I went to HD and spoke to a guy at the Pro Desk. Like Scott (two messages above), he recommended a 3/16 strap toggle. It's supposed to hold up to 238 pounds so I think that should be enough, especially since the other support is anchored into a stud with a big screw.

[hubops]

Thanks for the heads-up - I'd never seen the snap-toggle type before - just the old style toggle. John T.

[Thomas]

It's not the screw weight bearing, can the drywall keep up with the toggle?

[micky]

There appears to be snap toggles and strap toggles. I looked at one and didn't understand it. The metal part was in silver and the rest that is not included was in dim grey to indicate it's not included. I was going to look some more but I'm posting now.

[hubops]

Cobra brand calls them flip toggles < Lowes > :

Paulin brand calls them snap toggles < Home Depot > :

Hillman brand calls them strap toggles < Amazon > :

John T.

[retired1]

Watch the video at the Lowes link. Show perfectly how it works. Nice that if you need to remove the screw later, you don't lose the toggle.

[micky]

Thanks. This one has a video that explains it. They're just regular toggles with a couple extra parts so they don't fall in the wall when you take out the screw. That's a good feature.

Three different names for the same thing! Outrageious. There should be federal legislation to stop that.

[hubops]

Yep. And the toggles can be easily oriented vertical for some better strength - or off-vertical as required for space limitations. The old style would be more of a guess. John T.

[bobnew...]

Why would you get greater strength if the toggle is oriented vertically as opposed to horizontally? It seems to me that either way the same area of the toggle will be against the sheetrock (inside the wall) opposing the tension from the tightened screw.

[Thomas]

Would you trust these toggles to hold the weight of your clothes washing machine? If you have a slip and your full weight is on that bannister, my bet is it is going to follow you down the stairs.

[bobnew...]

Here's some information that relates to this situation: The load supported by the banister is shared by the two attachment points. The 3/16" strap toggle I purchased is rated to hold up 238 pounds in 1/2" drywall. (That's the tension load before the drywall rips out; shear load on the bolt is 247 lbs.) The other banister support is anchored securely into a stud. The back of the strap toggle package states that 1/2" drywall anchored in a stud will support a tension load of 412 lbs. For reference, a 5.5' person with a BMI of 40 (class III obesity, formerly known as morbidly obese) weighs 247 pounds.

[Thomas]

I looked at the pics. I did not until now. I was picturing a full length bannister for an entire run.