Specs For Building Shelf Bracket

[Stuart]

In order to give me more floor space in a spare room I am building some shelves out of 2" x2" with boards across the top . What i am proposing is to screw a piece in to the brick vertically with another length on top (outwards ) with a third piece at an angle from under the top piece to in front of the vertical piece to form a triangular bracket .What i wondered was if there is any particular formula for the sizes of each piece .I'll be making the top to suit the board .They are 5.25" so i'll be using two of them to make a 10.5" shelf. tia Stuart .

[John Rumm]

That should work - a sort of "gallows bracket".

Much depends on how much weight you will be putting on the shelf. For ligherter stuff then just a small triangular section would be fine. For something heavey like a TV then I would be tempted to bring the "brace" out to two thirds of the depth of the shelf from the wall.

The length of the upright will govern the amount of "pull" the shelf can have on the fixings. The longer it is the stronger it will be.

(ASCII art alert - use a fixed width font)

So ordinary shelf:

===================== ################# # # # # ## # #

Extra strong self:

# # # # #===================== ################# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #

[Set Square]

Sounds to me like a case of re-inventing the wheel. Why not just get some of these -

- 12 quid for 20? Screw the 300 bit to the wall, and the 250 bit will nicely support the shelf. Depending on the length and loading of the shelves, use 2, 3 or 4 brackets per shelf - as appropriate.

[Stuart]

I had thought of those but I also intended to use the inner part of the made up brackets to store some lengths of mouldings etc . I might still use both tho' Stuart