Long closet pole

[Actor123]

Hi all:

I am doing a remodel that will result in a rather large walk-in closet. Along one of the longer walls I would like to have a long closet pole for hanging clothes. The thing is, I would prefer not to have any braces or brackets during the run of the pole, just at the ends. This is because I prefer to be able to slide all the clothes around a lot, as it makes organization much easier.

I realize most closet poles are not strong enough to support that kind of weight without brackets to the wall every few feet. I am looking for approximately a 10' span with no brackets in the middle.

Has anyone encountered this situation and been able to come up with a solution. I was thinking of a steel pole of some sort, which I imagine I could find strong enough to support the weight. The other issue would be the brackets on both ends, which would obviously be supporting quite a lot of weight as well, so I was thinking not just bracing the ends to the wall but to the floow as well.

Any suggestions?

[roger61611]

I think you're out of luck. You can't hang 300 pounds of clothes on a

10' pole and not have it sag

[RicodJour]

10' of clothes would probably weigh a lot more than 300 pounds.

As far as having a 10' pole with no intermediate supports - nope, no way and it's not even close.

R

[RicodJour]

You find a need to slide clothes more than a few inches or a foot? Why?

I don't see how a single support in the middle would cause a major problem. Aren't you going to have shelving above the closet rod? What supports the shelving?

R

[nicksanspam]

I built an 8' tall x 6' wide clothes rack with 2 rods with some of my

6-ton $500 collection of P5500 Unistrut from a dismantled warehouse. It's a large erector set, mostly in 18' 45-pound lengths of 12 ga steel in 2x3 U-shapes with one narrow open side and internal flanges to hold special Unistrut nuts against the inside of the flanges with 1/2" bolts and connectors outside. B-Line also makes Unistrut-standard stuff.

The clothes rods have the open side of the U facing up, and hangers sit and slide nicely in the slots. The ends of the rods are attached to the 8' columns (with the webs facing out) with 1/2" Unistrut nuts and bolts and 90 degree Unistrut fittings. Each column is bolted to a 6' floor rod parallel to the clothes rods and a 2' floor rod perpendicular to the 6' rod (with all the floor rods open side up) with a straight shelf connector that I bent to 90 degrees with an oxy-acetylene torch and 3 1/2" Unistrut nuts and bolts. Tightened up with a long-handled 1/2" socket wrench, the nuts and bolts are as strong as welds. The beam loading table in the 2002 Unistrut General Engineering Catalog (No. 14, North American Edition) says the rods can hold up to 1090 pounds each, with a max deflection of 0.34 inches... 10' rods could hold 660 pounds with a 0.96 inch deflection.

If that's too much, you might enjoy the P5001 shape (like 2 2x4s stacked on edge), with a 2260 pound load and 0.31 inch deflection for a 10' span. Its columns could each support 6950 pounds, on a strong floor.

Nick

[dadiOH]

You don't need a pole, you need a track...something that can be securely mounted to the ceiling structure and which has a slot or "J" for carriers.

If you really want to organize, split up the long wall into 3-4 sections. No problem with poles that way and you can get much more hanging space because a section can have two poles - one high, one low - for things that are short like suits/shirts.

-- dadiOH ____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06... ...a help file of info about MP3s, recording from LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that. Get it at

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Take the spar from the wing of an airplane.

Any pipe able to take the weight with no say is probably to thick to accept a hanger and anything wood will sag. It may be possible to fabricate a vertical structure that can take the weight, but it will have to be so high that a hanger will not lay properly. I'd guess that a 6" section of 1" plywood would work.

Personally, I'd plan on at least a center support.

[Phisherman]

There are closet poles that are supported at the bottom to allow hangers to be slide over the supports. It is not practical to have a

10-foot pole that is not supported >Hi all:

[John Grabowski]

Closetmaid has brackets for their poles that are designed to let clothes hangers pass over them smoothly. It is sort of a "J" shaped bracket and supports the pole from underneath. I think that it will only work with the Closetmaid shelves. You can buy Closetmaid at Home Depot and Lowes.

[Cliff Hartle]

closet maid has a line called superslide that can create an unlimited length of rod

[Anonymous]

Use a 10' length of 3/4 " galvenized ( or black ) iron pipe.

[RicodJour]

Typical closet rod is at least 1" thick going up to 1 1/2" which is about the maximum interior diameter of your average hanger. The thinner the rod, the less stiff it will be. 3/4" daimeter anything, even solid rod, would bend a lot if it was 10' long and fully loaded (what closet isn't?).

R

[Pat]

Most households don't need more than 4 feet of rod mounted 5.5 feet from the floor. Many times I install only 2 feet. Mostly for dresses, rain coats, robes and coveralls. Most items (shirts, skirts, pants) can hang in 40 inches of space. Which means that you can mount a rod near the ceiling and another half way to the floor. So I install 4 feet or less of rod 5.5 feet from the floor and the rest near the ceiling and in the middle. I use cupboards to break up a long wall into sections. Cupboard space is just as important in a closet as hanging space. To divide your 10 foot wall into two sections install a 1 foot wide cupboard on the floor in the center. Put a shelf every foot. Great for shoes. hats, folded clothes. Make it extra nice by adding a face frame and cupboard doors. Divide your wall into three sections by using two cupboards. I like to use 1 1/4" electrical conduit for rod. Super strong. I drive 1 1/4 pipe floor flanges on the ends and screw them to the wall. 6 feet is the longest I would make them. I have never felt a need to slide hangers on a long rod. Using this system future adjustments are easy. You can always remove a rod or shift them to a new height. If I build the house I put blocking behind the sheetrock for support. Otherwise I mount a piece if 3/4 inch plywood on the face of the sheetrock.

[SQLit]

Schedule 80 or better steel pipe or better a solid 1.5 inch bar. The schedule 80 pipe will be about 100 pounds and the bar over 200 lbs.

Then comes the problem of attachment to the walls for the bar/pipe. You definately would need backing attached to the structure to support such a span.

Look at some floor joists span details. 10' clear with no other support at least a 2x10.

[nicksanspam]

A 20' P5501 rod could hold 330 pounds with a 3.82" deflection.

And a 20' P5001 rod could hold 1130 pounds with a 1.24" deflection.

Nick

[Jeff]

Doesn't seem possible unless you use a piece of steel tubing. Note the deflection of a beam supported on both ends is proportional to the cube of its length.

[The Real Bev]

Are you sure about that?

[Gary Heston]

Must be British pounds. 1130 pound notes might do it.

Gary

[Jay Pique]

If you believe what you read...

We're all just one big Usenet family, huh?!

JP

*********************************** I'm not Jeff Davis.

[RicodJour]

What does it matter what it could hold? A hanger wouldn't fit on it. You might as well suggest using a I-joist for closet rod.

R