# Attaching a Mantle to Soft Brick...



## Miss Brown (Mar 30, 2011)

The brick is old, soft, crumbly, made of riversand I think. I can scatch it with a nail no trouble. I need to re-affix a mantle to it, but hitting self-anchoring masonry screws in it seems like a bad idea. 

Fireplace is bricked in, the mantle doesn't need to hold weight, it's just bad form if someone can pull it out of the wall. 

Plastic drywall-type anchors?
Epoxy? Construction adhesive...no.
I want to stay away from anything I can't hide,easily, the wood is staying unpainted.

Thank you kindly for help.


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## dom-mas (Nov 26, 2011)

No chance of a wood surround with a mantle supported by the surround? That was typical and classic.


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## greg24k (May 19, 2007)

No matter what you use it will come right off or it will pull the brick right off the wall.

You should pre-drill the brick and fasten your mantle support directly to the studs, instead of the brick and hang your mantle on it, then put a sign on it... *do not touch *:thumbsup:


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## Miss Brown (Mar 30, 2011)

I wish I was technologically advanced and had a picture...No surround, no wall behind brick. It's an actual brick fireplace, 100 odd years old. I just mangled it, (repointed. Ok, it looks great...for uh, having never repointed brick...) 

Hey now, one can hang heavy objects in plain ol' drywall...there has to be something...I like the sign idea.


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## stonecutter (May 13, 2010)

Maybe use toggle bolts?


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## Calidecks (Nov 19, 2011)

Miss Brown said:


> I wish I was technologically advanced and had a picture...No surround, no wall behind brick. It's an actual brick fireplace, 100 odd years old. I just mangled it, (repointed. Ok, it looks great...for uh, having never repointed brick...)
> 
> Hey now, one can hang heavy objects in plain ol' drywall...there has to be something...I like the sign idea.


Can you get anything behind it and back it out. It's like trying to pick a turd up by the clean end.


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## dom-mas (Nov 26, 2011)

I'm suggesting you install a surround. That was very typical pre-1920's, no one wanted to look at plain old brick. You can buy mantles with surrounds at architectural salvage places for very decent prices. But I guess if the customer wants just a mantle, then toggles sound like the best idea. 

I don't like the picking up the turd idea. That one sounds bad


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## ohiohomedoctor (Dec 26, 2010)

greg24k said:


> No matter what you use it will come right off or it will pull the brick right off the wall.
> 
> You should pre-drill the brick and fasten your mantle support directly to the studs, instead of the brick and hang your mantle on it, then put a sign on it... do not touch :thumbsup:


Greg is right. Once you get to the stud you can use lag bolts and then cut the heads off so you can insert the posts into corresponding wholes on the mantle. I use liquid nails to fill the holes before inserting the bolt shafts..


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## dom-mas (Nov 26, 2011)

THERE ARE NO STUDS. This a a real fireplace, made of non-flammable stuff called masonry. 

Sorry for being an ass, but she already stated that and when someones talking about a fireplace made of old soft brick....99.9% of the time when a fireplace is made of old soft brick it's actually made of old soft brick.


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## raskolnikov (Mar 10, 2008)

d-m,
You the man! I was reading this and was scratching my head 'cause it was soft brick over and over and ...:blink:

D.


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## JBM (Mar 31, 2011)

What is behind the face brick? 2 rows, block or a hollow space?


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## ohiohomedoctor (Dec 26, 2010)

dom-mas said:


> Sorry for being an dom ass, .


I fixed it for you..


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## ohiohomedoctor (Dec 26, 2010)

In this case the answer isthe expanding epoxy screen anchors.


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## Miss Brown (Mar 30, 2011)

> Sorry for being an ass, but she already stated that and when someones talking about a fireplace made of old soft brick....99.9% of the time when a fireplace is made of old soft brick it's actually made of old soft brick.


:laughing: Yeah, man. It's totally brick, it's a tower. Of brick. It's at least 150 years old. And my dumb ass just blew out one of the bricks by trying to set the damn thing up temporarily with tapcon screws, silly goat. I knew that wouldn't be a good idea.  And no, I can't build in anything to hold it...Picture uploading is like pulling teeth for me...But I'll try. 

Stone cutter, toggle bolts sound intriguing. Trouble is I can't have a bolt head sticking out. I really need something like, a cypress dowel that I can slam into the brick that will expand, but not too much, that I can flush cut the end of....this is already sounding like a bad idea....:sad:


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## ohiohomedoctor (Dec 26, 2010)

Miss Brown said:


> :laughing: Yeah, man. It's totally brick, it's a tower. Of brick. It's at least 150 years old. And my dumb ass just blew out one of the bricks by trying to set the damn thing up temporarily with tapcon screws, silly goat. I knew that wouldn't be a good idea.  And no, I can't build in anything to hold it...Picture uploading is like pulling teeth for me...But I'll try.
> 
> Stone cutter, toggle bolts sound intriguing. Trouble is I can't have a bolt head sticking out. I really need something like, a cypress dowel that I can slam into the brick that will expand, but not too much, that I can flush cut the end of....this is already sounding like a bad idea....:sad:


Your best shot is getting the epoxy to expand enough to distribute the potential load over the largest amount of rear surface area as possible.


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## Miss Brown (Mar 30, 2011)

Expanding epoxy screen anchors sounds promising...


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## ohiohomedoctor (Dec 26, 2010)

Miss Brown said:


> Expanding epoxy screen anchors sounds promising...


 http://www.fastenal.com/web/products/detail.ex?sku=51921

We used these to attach a ledger board to a 80 year old block building with much success. The next day just give the bolts a quarter tighten and its amazing how well they grab.


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## dakzaag (Jan 6, 2009)

If the wall was sound enough to repoint, it should be sound enough to drill and epoxy some bolts to it. A bolt glued into a brick should require the whole brick to be busted out as these are most likely solid brick. They may be soft, but that doesn't mean they have no strength, if you are not sure, just try taking one out and you will soon decide that "it ain't going nowhere..."

I spent the whole day today removing 100 year old brick and I can say for certain you could hang an anchor off these brick and they were not going anywhere.

As far as what is behind it, really hard to tell without a pic, but I would expect masonry behind most of it. Maybe away from the throat area it might be hollow, or backed up by a stud type wall, but the area above the fire box will be masonry corbelling back to start forming the chimney.


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## Miss Brown (Mar 30, 2011)

This may work...


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## stonecutter (May 13, 2010)

I have used toggle bolts that have segments that you snap to flush them out. Or you can check into using Molly bolts too. I've never used them but I think they might work. The few times I have had to anchor into antique brick I only used mechanical hardware never epoxy.


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