Screw hole too big now in stud for hanging cabinets up. What can I do?

Question

My holes are now too big in the stud I was going to use to hang up my ikea cabinet. What options do I have to still try to use that location? I needed to have it I installed there because my other cabinet is right next to it.

I was thinking of using wooden dowel/toothpicks to plug the hole but I don’t think it would be strong enough to hold my cabinet.

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Update: this is a BROR cabinet so it’s a steel material. Here’s a photo of the back. I was going to use the bottom set of holes to attach to the wall. Is it ok to do that? I only plan on keeping lighter weight stuff in it (paper towels, etc) so additional 15-20 lbs at most.

Secondary question: What happened originally was my screw broke when I was screwing it in. I tried to remove it and it made a bigger hole. I was going to go buy a bigger screw but impatient and I tried to use a toggle bolt that I had around. But the depth of the stud was beyond 4” so I couldn’t use that. Is it normal for a stud to be that deep?

Answer 1

I would be considering two options:

1. using larger screws into the stud.

2. gluing a dowel into the hole in the stud, even drilling out the hole to 6mm or 8mm and then, once the glue is dried drilling a pilot hole for the new screws.

For me Option 2 is my preferred choice.

Answer 2

Continuing from Solar Mike's excellent answer:

3. Use a longer screw. However, one must be sure that there is no electrical or plumbing behind that point that could be penetrated by the longer screw.

4. Put the screw somewhere else vertically. It may mean drilling a hole in the back of the cabinet to run the screw through instead of using the predefined hole. However, this shouldn't be a concern, as the cabinets I installed didn't have any holes in them at all and I had to make my own screw holes in them. Of course, if this is a cardboard-backed cabinet, that won't work, but there is no indication of whether this is the case or not.

Based on the second image posted and the updated description:

I would not rely on just the bottom hole on one side of the cabinet. The cabinet acts as a lever trying to pull the screw out of the wall. The lower the screw is, the longer the lever pulling against it. At the top, you've got a very short lever arm and not as much force, lower down, you've got a longer arm and thus more force. I'd suggest using both top & bottom holes.

Since the back of the cabinet is steel you can easily drill a new hole through it near the existing hole, then drive your screw through the new hole and directly into the stud. I would move the mounting bracket down to meet the new hole. Since the bracket is also designed to screw into the side rail of the cabinet, I would use the holes in the bracket as a template to drill new holes into the side rail of the cabinet and screw it in its new, lower position.

Since your screw snapped, you'll need to get new screws. I suggest that you get "cabinet" screws. They are designed for holding well in wood and have a built-in washer to help spread the load across the back of the cabinet wall instead of just the small point of a "regular" screw head.

Also, you mention "only" storing a few light items up to 10KG in this cabinet. That's all well and good until you forget and start loading it up with dishes, or run out of space and need to put some liquids up there, or you move out and the next person doesn't know you've done a rubbish job of installing the cabinet. If you're going to do this, DO IT RIGHT!

Answer 3

There's a further option not mentioned above, and one that may suit someone less handy:

5. Use a solid wall anchor or threaded insert. Using an anchor or insert would allow you to continue to use the existing hole in the cabinet. There's plenty of variations of wood anchors but options include Screw-it-Again and EZ Lok threaded inserts. The Screw-it-Again anchors can hold 135lb so that should be sufficient for your cabinet, and I haven't seen load capacity for threaded inserts but I assume it is significantly higher. If choosing threaded inserts make sure they are flush and are self-tapping.

Answer 4

Assuming that to the right in the photo is “the other cabinet” you mentioned, you probably don’t want this approach and should use one of the other answers, since you’d probably have to redo that. But this will definitely work, and if I assume incorrectly and you haven’t put up the other cabinet yet (or for other readers in a similar situation but who haven’t put up any cabinets yet), it might be the best answer.

IKEA sells a rail for wall mounting, the Sektion. It comes at a fixed length and you’ll have to cut it down to size, but you can put several cabinets on one rail. Then the cabinets can be affixed to the rail—it’s far easier to level the rail than it is a cabinet, and the rail ensures that all of the cabinets are even. And in this case, you would also gain a lot of back-up support for the one weaker point. Probably still worth taking notes from other answers to improve what you have there, but it would add a lot of additional strength to this situation.

Answer 5

"Update: this is a BROR cabinet so it’s a steel material. [...] I was going to use the bottom set of holes to attach to the wall. Is it ok to do that? I only plan on keeping lighter weight stuff in it (paper towels, etc) so additional 15-20 lbs at most."

To add to other answers, another reason why it is absolutely wrong to only use the bottom holes is that you are effectively creating a trap. This is a steel cabinet that looks like a strong heavy cabinet that can take books or bottles or other reasonably weighty materials.

By only weakly attaching it to the wall, you are creating a dangerously disguised time bomb that will fall down on anybody who puts anything heavier than paper towels in it. It could be you in a moment of forgetfulness, or later when you've returned from a trip away, it could be your partner or visiting family or friends or children. How are they supposed to know that a steel cabinet attached to the wall is only strong enough for paper towels?

Anything attached to the wall must be capable of taking the weight that it looks capable of taking. Honesty in appearances is an important part of safety. Things should not look safer than they actually are.

Answer 6

If you use the middle set of holes instead of the top one, traction load on the screw (red) will be about double with the same weight in the cupboard( blue). That's due to leverage.

How about just driving the screw into the stud at an angle to dodge the damage done by the previous accident?

Answer 7

Why would you have to use the same fixing place? Follow the stud, and screw in at least 2" away from that hole!