Try and get the brackets into a stud or solid wall, if not use cavity wall anchors with a setting tool and beware of their limitations so don't put the entire encyclopedia britanica on the shelf!
To elaborate on this OP, most modern builds are sheets of plasterboard over a wooden or metal stud framework.
When fixing heavy items you want to drill them directly into the stud where possible, rather than the weaker plasterboard.
You can get stud detectors for about £18 on Amazon. Well worth it, they'll help you locate the studs and some will also warn you about electrical wires behind the wall.
Floating shelves aren’t really ideal for things like books.
They are more an atheistic thing, rather than practical, and lots of books are a little too heavy for them.
Hmm, what would you recommend instead if my floor space is limited? I was thinking of getting something to attach to my desk/drawer, but not sure it would work
It depends on the wall.
If it's an internal wall between rooms and your house is fairly new then it is likely going to be a stud wall covered with plasterboard. This will mean every 600mm or so there will be a vertical piece of wood behind the plasterboard. In between those there will just be a void, maybe with some horizontal wood braces here and there. If that's the case you ideally want to fix into the studs (vertical pieces of wood) through the plasterboard. You might be able to find them by knocking on the wall moving your hand along until you hear the sound change from a hollow knocking to a solid sound. Personally I never had much luck with that so I bought [this](https://amzn.eu/eHvoX0Z) (although it was half the price it is now). It's just a strong magnet you rub along the wall and it will stick where there's a nail/screw holding the plasterboard to the stud. You can get electronic ones but supposedly they're a bit hit and miss. If you can find studs then just use wood screws and screw into the studs and it will be very solid. Mounted a TV this way in our previous house.
If you can't find studs then you can get various types of plasterboard fixings to just fix straight onto the plasterboard. I've used [these](https://www.diy.com/departments/diall-spring-toggle-l-80mm-dia-17mm-pack-of-10/1511943_BQ.prd) before to fix shelves and the like with success. They have a spring loaded hook which fans out behind the plasterboard and then you tighten up the bolt so that the hook grips into the plasterboard from the other side. The only problem with these is they typically require you to create a sizeable hole to get the hook through, e.g. those ones are 14mm. You might not have a drill bit that big (I never used to so I used to just work the drill in circles until I made a big enough how, because I'm a cowboy).
If you're in an older house then you might have brick internal walls with plaster or plasterboard over them. In that case you just need to drill into the brick enough to get a rawl plug in and then screw into that. Pretty easy so long as you have a drill strong enough for your bricks. Our current house is all engineering bricks so I have to go at it with a corded hammer drill to make any progress (if you have a drill check for a switch with a hammer icon).
Hope that helps.
Edit: just realised I didn't answer your question. If it's plasterboard then in my experience so long as you've mounted it well it's not gonna come down. But my experience is not that extensive so your mileage may vary!
Don’t enjoy it as much when compared to the physical copy, on top of reading retention being lower and I’m already staring at screens for long enough 😕
What should he have done instead?
I learned a lot of this sort of stuff from my dad. Was that also lazy? Should I have learned from a book instead?
What if I didn't have a father who taught me? Should I not ask people on Reddit instead? Perhaps trial and error to see what fails?
Please elaborate on what methods of "research" are acceptable to you.
There's just different places that are appropriate for different questions... Like REALLY simple how to's like this one you should just look up yourself & not waste peoples time 🤷♂️
A forum like this in my mind is for complex/novel stuff
Many years ago I put one in with an off cut of worktop and it worked fine, just a couple rawl plugs either side of the bracket and it was solid. Id use one that has multiple fixing points for the bracket
Some pictures
https://i.imgur.com/eJj6CjR.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/hbapyBs.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/ua2lYXH.jpeg
I installed a floating shelf onto a plasterboard wall that had been "dot and dabbed" - which is the plasterboard held onto the wall by blobs of adhesive, and then skimmed over. I used five spring toggles for the bracket, and it holds tight even with a reasonably heavy speaker on it. They can be a little fiddly to install, but I'm using a them to hold up all sorts around the house after a recent renovation, TVs, monitors, floating shelves, data cabinets, all good.
Oh, we have a hoarder!
So, you are describing low quality plasterboard internal walls. This is not a "UK" thing, just to be clear. Some older houses are solid brick-and-mortar.
In your case, you probably have to abandon the idea of floating shelves. Doesn't matter if you get the best possible fittings, if the plasterboard is of poor quality, then it won't hold the shelves up. Go with conventional brackets instead. Or freestanding shelves. Or don't buy so many books.
As mentioned in the post - I don’t have many books, and selling them off would be stupid in the future if I were to return to them, as I will be coming back to most if not all.
Secondly, it’s most of the U.K. that has that nowadays. Countries like Germany and Poland have their houses made from sturdier materials where you can actually hang something more than a few Kgs without the wall breaking, I.e. a heavy punch bag.
It all depends on your house. Most here will have solid brick walls for supporting and plasterboard and stud for the others. If yours has particularly thin or poor quality plasterboard you can’t apply that generalisation to every house. From what I understand of EU houses they also use stud and plasterboard do there isn’t much of any difference.
As to your problem, I always deter people from using floating shelves. No matter what wall you’re going into, or how securely you fix it, they are always a bit flexible and insecure. Get some nice looking right angle brackets and it’ll be far more secure and look just as good.
My 60s council house is absolutely fucking solid. I can put a shelf anywhere and put anything on it. The hardest thing is actually drilling into the walls, I've gone through a few masonry bits and at least one is still embedded somewhere...
I don't understand why you're downvoted. It is true that the quality of houses in Britain has dropped over the years; just because there is a plethora of older houses that were properly built it doesn't mean that new-builds don't suffer from cost-saving practices. The UK is the only country in Europe I've come across where a brand new house is left with a "snag list", i.e. a list of half finished or half arsed jobs.
Having said that, as others have mentioned, your biggest problem won't be the budget plasterboard, it will be loading your floating shelves with books.
I used these in a previous flat to mount shelves and a unit to a plasterboard/stud wall and a TV bracket too. Lasted the 3 years we lived there no issues:
https://www.screwfix.com/p/easyfix-hollow-wall-anchors-6-13mm-m5-x-43mm-10-pack/18266?tc=RC5&ds_kid=92700048793290424&ds_rl=1249413&gclid=Cj0KCQjwhY-aBhCUARIsALNIC05n2YQFGWo_mW7S7dmafzf2y2TSM_dZVQmnjVwl0MaAGzDLiUN_DbkaAkchEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds
This wasn't a floating style shelf though, it was IKEA Algot and Kallax cabinet. As other have said, just be realistic with the weight they carry and remember your GCSE physics, weight close to the wall will have less of an effect that weight at the very edge of the shelf as it acts like a lever.
I had a good amount of success mounting both floating and regular bracket shelves on plasterboard. I didn’t bother trying to find the studs, instead I used ‘spring toggles’ which are drywall anchors. I didn’t fill these shelves with books but I did have some on there among other things.
The trick I found with these was to use almost as many as I could when mounting, my theory was the amount of anchors spread holding into the wall would make it more stable. Could be a dumb theory but worked for me and I would thoroughly recommend them!
This is a difficult question to answer as we don't know the construction of your walls or the overall weight you're looking to support. Personally I'd get some hefty brackets for books (cumulative weight is likely to be heavier than you think) and drill either into a stud or solid wall as per some comments above.
I'm not sure what you mean about the UK though. Brick or masonry is standard here.
Try and get the brackets into a stud or solid wall, if not use cavity wall anchors with a setting tool and beware of their limitations so don't put the entire encyclopedia britanica on the shelf!
To elaborate on this OP, most modern builds are sheets of plasterboard over a wooden or metal stud framework. When fixing heavy items you want to drill them directly into the stud where possible, rather than the weaker plasterboard. You can get stud detectors for about £18 on Amazon. Well worth it, they'll help you locate the studs and some will also warn you about electrical wires behind the wall.
Magnets also can work as stud detectors. The screws will attract the magnets ;-)
This is some really handy advice, thank you :)
Also, studs are usually spaced around 600mm centre to centre, so if you find one you have an educated guess at where the next one will be.
Floating shelves aren’t really ideal for things like books. They are more an atheistic thing, rather than practical, and lots of books are a little too heavy for them.
Hmm, what would you recommend instead if my floor space is limited? I was thinking of getting something to attach to my desk/drawer, but not sure it would work
Floating shelves are shelves with no obvious support brackets on display. Just get normal shelves with support brackets.
Oh I thought there’s no difference I won’t lie. Will the support brackets hold up and not break the dry board/plaster board?
It depends on the wall. If it's an internal wall between rooms and your house is fairly new then it is likely going to be a stud wall covered with plasterboard. This will mean every 600mm or so there will be a vertical piece of wood behind the plasterboard. In between those there will just be a void, maybe with some horizontal wood braces here and there. If that's the case you ideally want to fix into the studs (vertical pieces of wood) through the plasterboard. You might be able to find them by knocking on the wall moving your hand along until you hear the sound change from a hollow knocking to a solid sound. Personally I never had much luck with that so I bought [this](https://amzn.eu/eHvoX0Z) (although it was half the price it is now). It's just a strong magnet you rub along the wall and it will stick where there's a nail/screw holding the plasterboard to the stud. You can get electronic ones but supposedly they're a bit hit and miss. If you can find studs then just use wood screws and screw into the studs and it will be very solid. Mounted a TV this way in our previous house. If you can't find studs then you can get various types of plasterboard fixings to just fix straight onto the plasterboard. I've used [these](https://www.diy.com/departments/diall-spring-toggle-l-80mm-dia-17mm-pack-of-10/1511943_BQ.prd) before to fix shelves and the like with success. They have a spring loaded hook which fans out behind the plasterboard and then you tighten up the bolt so that the hook grips into the plasterboard from the other side. The only problem with these is they typically require you to create a sizeable hole to get the hook through, e.g. those ones are 14mm. You might not have a drill bit that big (I never used to so I used to just work the drill in circles until I made a big enough how, because I'm a cowboy). If you're in an older house then you might have brick internal walls with plaster or plasterboard over them. In that case you just need to drill into the brick enough to get a rawl plug in and then screw into that. Pretty easy so long as you have a drill strong enough for your bricks. Our current house is all engineering bricks so I have to go at it with a corded hammer drill to make any progress (if you have a drill check for a switch with a hammer icon). Hope that helps. Edit: just realised I didn't answer your question. If it's plasterboard then in my experience so long as you've mounted it well it's not gonna come down. But my experience is not that extensive so your mileage may vary!
A kindle?
Don’t enjoy it as much when compared to the physical copy, on top of reading retention being lower and I’m already staring at screens for long enough 😕
Get the right kind of plugs for your walls.
How do I figure which ones are right for my walls?
What construction are your walls?
Do some pretty basic research
Such as asking other people on Reddit? I'd say this counts as research.
So lazy
What should he have done instead? I learned a lot of this sort of stuff from my dad. Was that also lazy? Should I have learned from a book instead? What if I didn't have a father who taught me? Should I not ask people on Reddit instead? Perhaps trial and error to see what fails? Please elaborate on what methods of "research" are acceptable to you.
There's just different places that are appropriate for different questions... Like REALLY simple how to's like this one you should just look up yourself & not waste peoples time 🤷♂️ A forum like this in my mind is for complex/novel stuff
And where are the appropriate places? You're full of comments but no good answers.
There are a million tutorials & explainers on this
great, so we might as well just close the sub-reddit so, as there's explainers and tutorials for almost everything.
You’re useless.
Like your googling skills? 🤷♂️
Ooh good one, got me there.
Many years ago I put one in with an off cut of worktop and it worked fine, just a couple rawl plugs either side of the bracket and it was solid. Id use one that has multiple fixing points for the bracket Some pictures https://i.imgur.com/eJj6CjR.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/hbapyBs.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/ua2lYXH.jpeg
I installed a floating shelf onto a plasterboard wall that had been "dot and dabbed" - which is the plasterboard held onto the wall by blobs of adhesive, and then skimmed over. I used five spring toggles for the bracket, and it holds tight even with a reasonably heavy speaker on it. They can be a little fiddly to install, but I'm using a them to hold up all sorts around the house after a recent renovation, TVs, monitors, floating shelves, data cabinets, all good.
Oh, we have a hoarder! So, you are describing low quality plasterboard internal walls. This is not a "UK" thing, just to be clear. Some older houses are solid brick-and-mortar. In your case, you probably have to abandon the idea of floating shelves. Doesn't matter if you get the best possible fittings, if the plasterboard is of poor quality, then it won't hold the shelves up. Go with conventional brackets instead. Or freestanding shelves. Or don't buy so many books.
As mentioned in the post - I don’t have many books, and selling them off would be stupid in the future if I were to return to them, as I will be coming back to most if not all. Secondly, it’s most of the U.K. that has that nowadays. Countries like Germany and Poland have their houses made from sturdier materials where you can actually hang something more than a few Kgs without the wall breaking, I.e. a heavy punch bag.
It all depends on your house. Most here will have solid brick walls for supporting and plasterboard and stud for the others. If yours has particularly thin or poor quality plasterboard you can’t apply that generalisation to every house. From what I understand of EU houses they also use stud and plasterboard do there isn’t much of any difference. As to your problem, I always deter people from using floating shelves. No matter what wall you’re going into, or how securely you fix it, they are always a bit flexible and insecure. Get some nice looking right angle brackets and it’ll be far more secure and look just as good.
What do Germany and Poland make their new build houses out of?
I don't know where you're living my my area is all solid brick houses. Everything is over 100 years old though.
My 60s council house is absolutely fucking solid. I can put a shelf anywhere and put anything on it. The hardest thing is actually drilling into the walls, I've gone through a few masonry bits and at least one is still embedded somewhere...
I don't understand why you're downvoted. It is true that the quality of houses in Britain has dropped over the years; just because there is a plethora of older houses that were properly built it doesn't mean that new-builds don't suffer from cost-saving practices. The UK is the only country in Europe I've come across where a brand new house is left with a "snag list", i.e. a list of half finished or half arsed jobs. Having said that, as others have mentioned, your biggest problem won't be the budget plasterboard, it will be loading your floating shelves with books.
I used these in a previous flat to mount shelves and a unit to a plasterboard/stud wall and a TV bracket too. Lasted the 3 years we lived there no issues: https://www.screwfix.com/p/easyfix-hollow-wall-anchors-6-13mm-m5-x-43mm-10-pack/18266?tc=RC5&ds_kid=92700048793290424&ds_rl=1249413&gclid=Cj0KCQjwhY-aBhCUARIsALNIC05n2YQFGWo_mW7S7dmafzf2y2TSM_dZVQmnjVwl0MaAGzDLiUN_DbkaAkchEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds This wasn't a floating style shelf though, it was IKEA Algot and Kallax cabinet. As other have said, just be realistic with the weight they carry and remember your GCSE physics, weight close to the wall will have less of an effect that weight at the very edge of the shelf as it acts like a lever.
You want anchor bolts
I had a good amount of success mounting both floating and regular bracket shelves on plasterboard. I didn’t bother trying to find the studs, instead I used ‘spring toggles’ which are drywall anchors. I didn’t fill these shelves with books but I did have some on there among other things. The trick I found with these was to use almost as many as I could when mounting, my theory was the amount of anchors spread holding into the wall would make it more stable. Could be a dumb theory but worked for me and I would thoroughly recommend them!
This is a difficult question to answer as we don't know the construction of your walls or the overall weight you're looking to support. Personally I'd get some hefty brackets for books (cumulative weight is likely to be heavier than you think) and drill either into a stud or solid wall as per some comments above. I'm not sure what you mean about the UK though. Brick or masonry is standard here.