How to Install a Towel Bar in a Bathroom
Wet towels can weigh a lot-so it's important that any towel bar you install is strong enough and attached solidly to the wall-in order to hold that weight. Now, towel bars come in all kinds of designs, styles and colors-but for the most part, they have one common problem-their length doesn't match the distance between wall studs in 99 percent of North American homes. In other words, you can't install them directly into solid wood.
Usually the best you can do is install one end directly into a wall stud, while the other end is supported with a wall anchor (like a molly bolt or toggle bolt). Here's how to go about installing your towel bars so they will be able to hold the weight of those wet towels.
- Difficulty:
- Moderate
Instructions
Things You'll Need
- Towel bar
- Level
- Screw drivers
- Stud finder
- Wall anchors (Molly bolts or toggle bolts)
- Power drill
- Drill bits
- Measuring tape
- Pencil
- Masking tape
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How to Position a Towel Bar
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Start by determining where you want your towel bar to be installed. Towel bars are usually mounted close to a tub or shower so you won't need to stretch, as well to be convenient to the sink. Obviously, you'll need enough wall space to accommodate the length of the bar.
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Try not to put the towel bar behind a door, since a swinging door and a protruding towel bar can do considerable damage to each other.
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Measure up from the floor 48 inches to determine placement of the towel bar. There's no law that says towel bars need to be 48 inches from the floor, but it's standard. However, you can adjust the height up or down to best suit the people using the bar.
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Use the stud finder to find where the underlying wall studs are located along the length of the bar, then mark the locations with a piece of masking tape. Studs are usually spaced 16 inches or 24 inches apart, so once you've found one, others should be easy to find. Refer to my article, "How to Find a Wall Stud" (see Resources below).
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Hold the towel bar up to the wall with one end held over the masking and your level sitting on top of the bar. Once the bar is level, mark the location of the far end (it's probably not going to be over a stud).
How to Install a Towel Bar
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Since towel bars are usually installed onto separate hardware that's mounted on the walls, use the actual hardware as a template to mark exactly where to drill your mounting holes.
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Hold a piece of mounting hardware against the masking tape and use your pencil to mark the actual spots to drill your holes.
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Use different-sized drill bits to drill for the two ends. The Molly bolt or wall anchor will require a much larger diameter hole than the screws going directly into the stud. (The size of the hole required for the wall fastener will be marked on the packaging.) Refer to my article, "How to Hang Things on Your Walls" (see Resources below).
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Install the wall fastener into the wall, then mount the hardware onto the wall and place the ends of the towel bar over the hardware.
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Attach the towel bar to the mounting hardware using the screws included with the towel bar. These are commonly small-slotted screws located on the bottom of the end pieces of the towel bar.
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Tips & Warnings
Most towel bars come with plastic wall anchors to mount them onto a wall. Unfortunately, these anchors aren't very strong and will often pull out over time under normal use.
Molly bolts and toggle bolts are readily available at your home or hardware store.
Towel bars aren't grab bars and they won't stand up to children hanging on them. The bars aren't strong enough to hold a even a little person's weight and they will probably break. Refer to my article, "How to Install Grab Bars in a Bathroom" (see Resources below).
If you're going to be using a toggle bolt, make sure you put the toggle bolt screw through the mounting hardware BEFORE you put the bolt into the wall. Once in the wall, the wings of the toggle expand and you can't remove the screw to install the hardware without the wings falling down inside the wall.
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Comments
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Ken Swanson
Feb 08, 2008
See 'Finding wall studs' for a comment on this article. -
Ken Swanson
Feb 08, 2008
See 'Finding wall studs' for a comment on this article.
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Ursula Anderson
Feb 06, 2008
I've literally been waiting for years for one of the men in the house to replace a towel bar that had been both broken AND torn from the wall. With your instructions, I hope to be able to do it myself and spare everybody the headache. Thank you!
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Ursula Anderson
Feb 06, 2008
I've literally been waiting for years for one of the men in the house to replace a towel bar that had been both broken AND torn from the wall. With your instructions, I hope to be able to do it myself and spare everybody the headache. Thank you!
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Jill M
Feb 06, 2008
Thank you for your article. It was very helpful.
