recently put up a shelf supposedly on wall studs, but a question

[J-J]

I recently put up shelving using wall studs as support. I used an electronic stud finder, then of course made sure the screws went into the stud and not the wall. However, I just found out about the magnet test and it indeed is helping me find an additional stud a lot easier than the stud finder did. However...

For the 12 x 36" shelf I already installed, the magnet test is not finding a stud where I had installed one of the shelving brackets, but about 3-4" to the right of the bracket, yet I know both screws for that bracket went into a stud. There are no wires or outlets near this section of the wall. Can studs sometimes be only 3-4" apart for some reason with one stud having no nails driven into it for the drywall installation? How can I tell for sure? Could it be anything else holding that shelf bracket?

Thanks!

[hubops]

plumbing, plumbing vent, central vac, HVAC, etc etc .. an extra stud put in by the carpenters because the first stud was compromised by plumber, electrician, HVAC, etc etc Structure on the other side of the mystery stud that needed it ? Drywallers would just use the normal stud location. John T.

[J-J]

Interesting. Well, I can rule out plumbing as this is a room far away from the plumbing in the house and the house has nothing but window AC's, so must be some other reason. No electrical boxes anywhere near it either or outlets or switches. I suppose I could just install an extra bracket at the location where it normally would be just as a preventative measure. I sure don't want this glassware tumbling down unexpectedly someday.

[Anonymous]

Is it possible that on the other side of the wall with the shelf, in the next room, there is a wall that extends out.

Like this ( if my ASCII art works). There would be studs that form the corners of that wall that are in the middle of the normal 16" spacing of the shelf wall.

_

_ = wall on other side

_ | | | | | | | =shelf wall

[Ralph Mowery]

Sometimes hard to say why the extra studs ar for.

I bought a house and hada the bathroom remodeled . Found out it was studded in for another door that was not installed. One door would go to the bathroom and the other to a hall way. It only had the hallway door. Plan was to close that off and put in a sink on that wall and have the door moved to the bedroom wall. After the door was moved and some other work done, come to find out I could not move a partition wall without great difficulty as the plumbing for the upstairs bathroom was in that short partition wall. Had I known that, I would have put in two doors.