Installing Grab Bars

It's relatively easy to install a grab bar in a tub-shower area or a shower stall. Just position the grab bar and drive the screws provided into the wall.

Alas, it is not that easy, particularly on a tiled wall.

First you have to locate the studs inside the wall so you can drive the screws into solid wood. Screws driven in a tile and plasterboard wall will not hold well.

Then you have to position the bar so that each end, where it is attached to the wall, will cover a stud. Sometimes you can slope the grab bar so that each end covers a stud. Or you can put the bar in vertically, attaching both ends to the same stud, although a vertical bar is not as reliable in helping a falling person.

But sometimes it is impossible to find a stud, or the studs simply are not in the right place for mounting the grab bar properly.

For those instances, you need a bar assembly that contains plastic sleeves to be inserted into the wall. Screws driven into these sleeves hold very well.

Joe Horner of Belmont told us about the grab bar called Safety First that is sold in some Home Depot and some True Value stores.

Horner is a retired physicist at Hanscom Field, and volunteers as Mr. Fix-It for the Belmont Council on Aging. He says he has installed 100 to 150 of the grab bars over the past 10 years.

Here's how to do it, according to Horner and the handyman: