Mirror came loose from bathroom wall

[DesignGuy]

Well, Christmas day wasn't bad until....

Returned home from in-laws house to find the approx 5 ft by 3.5 ft bathroom mirror had come loose from the wall and smashed to pieces on the floor. It had been held in place by eight dark patches of a (now hardened) adhesive tar-like substance. Held it for 11 years, but I would think this would never happen unless it wasn't affixed to the wall properly. There was no residue that I could find on the mirror from the adhesive, so it looks like the mirror broke away from the adhesive (versus the adhesive shearing or pulling away from the drywall).

I'm going to call a glass man out to replace... but is there a better way to anchor the mirror to prevent it from happening again? And is there a way to check to see if other mirrors are about to fall also?

[cm]

Most of the mirrors I remove and re-install use the black mirror mastic with the plastic mirror clips for back-up.

Craig

[buffalobill]

is the link to mirror adhesive by liquid nails

[Chris Lewis]

According to DesignGuy :

I've never been fond of using adhesives to hold up mirrors. Not the least of it being ripping off the coating if you ever have to move/remove the mirror.

We always use mirror clips. The plastic kind for smaller mirrors, metal ones for larger.

[mm]

A mirror came with my bedroom set, the one I got when I was 6, but it wasn't childish.. When my mother moved she hired a mirror company to hang the mirror and she gave them the hooks and the bottom brackets that she'd taken off the wall at the previous house. They used the hooks but not the brackets. When she reminded them about the brackets they said, "It doesn't need that". It fell off the wall less than a day after they left.

The glass broke and the frame separated. They supposedly fixed it, but the corners of the frame don't meet anymore. They're 3/16" from each other at one corner, and I'm afraid to try to fix it because the mirror is in the way.

It matches the rest of the furniture, so I can't replace it.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[George E. Cawthon]

Yeah. Not to be too flippant but they are called screws or molly bolts. With a non-framed mirror, you can use the plastic clips (screw and clip are exposed) or you can use the type that have just just a small metal clip exposed. With a 5 x3.5 foot mirror I would use the metal type (the part screwed into the wall is behind the mirror) and I would use at least 3 clips on the bottom and 3 on the top. I would never trust sticky stuff to hold a mirror. I think you are lucky that it held it as long as it did.

With a framed mirror you just put screws through the frame or use clips that are hidden or mostly hidden under part of the wood frame.