Looks like the pegs fell out of the hole. It is painted wood, not drywall. Perhaps some grommets put into the hole, then you put the pegs into the grommets. The grommets should be hammered in and be tight, there are different sizes, if you have drill bits then try using those to measure the size of the holes you are dealing with. You could also add a third hole on each side for extra strength.

http://www.widgetco.com/shelf-pins-1-4-nickel-grommets-sleeves

http://www.widgetco.com/shelf-pins-5mm-nickel

614, please forgive the misleading advice I gave you. Along with decades of experience come's decades of eyesight deteriation and cognitive impairment. The holes in wall looked ( still do ) like drywall. Appearantly Vith has seen your home and/or has firsthand knowledge of the shelves. Best of luck, I'll take my meds and try behaving myself now.

Thank you both for your input. Klem, I take no offense - if anything, your comments do give me more food for thought for other matters. Vith, thanks for your advice and the links - I like the idea of using grommets. Thanks again!

Klem dont beat yourself up, I dont know everything. You can see the wood on the second picture where the paint is scraped off. I like these forums because I learn new ideas everyday, I didnt know those grommets existed till I did some research.

" You can see the wood on the second picture where the paint is scraped off."

Yea,I was convinced that was wallpaper with wood print until you pointed out different. Regarding your statment about learning somthing new everyday, What species of wood is it?. The clue might be inside the hole,not on the surface covered in paint. Is that a "hanging chad" at 1 o-clock in hole? What about 7 o-clock,is that a "missing chad"? Anyone care to look closly at inside and around hole then give us a third opinion? Better still,you should clear this up 614. Surely you know,otherwise you might be in over your head even by newbee standards.

If that is wood, it looks to be rather thin. I think the problem may be that there is too little bearing surface for the shelf pins, and that weight on the shelves forces the exposed part of the shelf pin down and deforms the hole, causing the pins to slip out and down. This is a problem I have run into before, particularly if there is any gap on the sides between the walls and the sides of the shelves. If I was trying to fix this problem, I'd buy metal shelf standards, and screw them to the sides of the niches with the bottom edges of the standards resting on the bottoms of the niche spaces.

No idea on the type of wood. What I've noticed based on how far the previous holes have been drilled is that it goes in about 1 to 1.2 inches deep. The back of the shelf seems to be a flimsy board, like a cheap bookshelf backing.

Kudzu - your impression about the shelf pin deforming the hole is probably what happened when the shelves fell. I saw one or two shelves where the brackets/pins were angled down but had not fallen off. That was part of the reason why I initially liked the idea of using a shelf pin sleeve around the hole but the more I think of it, I think that won't be enough over time. The weight of the shelves might simply lead the pin and the sleeve to pop out over time and deform the hole again. I can tell that the previous owner(s) had similar issues since I noticed that underneath one of the current holes, there's a set of holes drilled underneath that was simply covered and painted over.

Not sure how it might look aesthetically, but using shelf standards to the sides as you suggest does seem to be the sturdier of options. I'll continue to give this thought. Thanks for all you input everyone!

rjp614-

It's possible that the thickness of the sidewalls is what you think it is, but it might not be all wood. Part of the thickness could be thin plywood over a layer of sheetrock, and that would also allow the deformation I suggested, although a contributing factor is the fact that it seems like the shelves are cut too narrowly to extend to the walls, and this puts tremendous force on the holes when the shelves are loaded. I know shelf standards are not as clean a look as you would like, but, one option is to install them and then cut strips of wood that are the depth of the brackets and affix them to the sides to fill the spaces so that the brackets are flush with the new sides. Alternatively, you could route vertical slots in the sidewalls to recess them, but I am dubious about that approach since I am not sure that you have decent wood to the depth necessary to allow that to be done.

Lastly, you could consider fixed shelves where you determine the spacing for the shelves, and then cut full depth boards to support each shelf. For example, if you wanted 12" spacing between shelves, you would cut two pieces of wood (maybe 3/4" plywood) that were 12" high and the depth of the niche and attach those to the sides. Then you would place the first shelf on top of those two pieces, cut two more 12" pieces and attach them, and put in the second shelf, etc. To make it look nice, you could add thin, 3/4" trim all around the perimeter when you were done.

614,you have to help us if you want us to help you. This has gone on for 3 days and people are STILL GUESSING at what material you have. We are dealing with shelves (that's what things sit on) and walls,two sidewalls and one backwall in each unit. You said " The back of the shelf seems to be a flimsy board, like a cheap bookshelf backing." Are you talking about a shelf or a wall? If you are talking about a shelf,what is the front made of if only the back is flimsy? Building material stores don't sell anything called "cheap bookshelf backing",what are you talking about? If you are talking about a wall just call it a wall,everyone knows what a wall is. Useing an ice pick,screwdriver,knife,large nail,fingernail file or other metal object,poke and scratch around inside holes in walls. Does that remove a CHALK LIKE substance? Are you unable to scratch white powder material from inside holes? Insert old brackets ( more properly known as shelf supports) in all 4 holes and sit shelf on them. Push shelf right or left snog against one wall. How much gap is between oppisite wall and shelf? Is gap uniform from back to front along edge of shelf? Place a shelf on floor and support each end 3 to 6 inches above floor. If you weigh more than 150 pounds,get a helper that weighs between 100 and 150 pounds to step up on shelf. Did shelf break? Did shelf sag in the middle? If yes to either you will need to cut new shelves ( we will tell you what materials are suitable). If no,the shelves are plenty strong. Help us out with this and let's move foward in curing your problem.

Kudzu9 - I hear what you're saying about the thickness of the sidewalls perhaps not being all wood. As I was posting my previous comment, I was finding it a bit difficult to imagine the entire inch+ being wood. So once I got back home tonight, I took another careful look and the best estimate I have is that this is plywood that is about 3/4" thick and then there's drywall (same for both left and right sides). I don't see any signs of plywood that's thinner than that.

And you're quite spot on with the shelves not extending to the walls. That was part of my thinking when I initially commented on getting lighter shelf boards - cut them so that there won't be as much space and between the shelf and the walls. There are limitations to that and the nice thing with the current shelves are that they are sturdy, so I'm more inclined to go with the shelf standards - I like the idea of concealing them though I may not go that far. The fixed shelf is another good idea - I don't mind the shelf size being set to a particular size. The thing that might make me more hesitant is that I'm not sure I can get this done cleanly so I'm inclined to go with your shelf standard suggestion.

Thank you very much Kudzu9!


klem1 - I appreciate your attempts to help, at the same time, I take exception with how you are doing so. Yes, this has gone on for 3 days and I haven't been responding quickly and have not been good at using precise words and descriptions. I have other obligations to address in my life and some of them, like family matters, take precedent. I'm here to learn and perhaps down the road, contribute and help others, and that will take some time for me to get the language down. I came to this forum because there seemed to be knowledgeable, respectful, and friendly people I can get assistance from and learn. If you have issues with the pace at which I am going about things or anything else, then please do so as a PM if you aren't able to say things in a respectful manner. There's no further need for me to comment on this matter.

rjp614-

Good luck with your project. Choose the option that best matches your skill set and tools, and feel free to ask more questions if you get stuck.

http://www.rockler.com/search/go?w=shelf%20pins

Drill some new holes to accept these shelf pin sleeves and epoxy them in place.

Shelf pin sleeves that are epoxied in place may help if the material they are epoxied to has adequate structural integrity, but there is still the problem of shelves that aren't as wide as they should be...

The op stated the material was plywood and judging from the pics they are not very wide.

I don't undertstand the comment on"shelves that are not as wide as they should be" unless you are referring to the bearing of the shelves on the pins?

Precision Carpentry- Yes, that is what I meant. As you probably know, when the shelves are less wide than the opening they fit in to, the weight bears on the outer ends of the pins, which puts tremendous leveraging force on the pins and can cause hole deformation, and over time the pins can be forced out of the deformed holes. The OP indicated that was one of the conditions being dealt with. While I thought your suggestion about epoxying in shelf pin sleeves was a good one, there still seems to be some question about the integrity of the material the sleeves would be epoxied in to.

Looked like thicker plywood to me, if it is the 3/4 plywood that should be fine. If it is a thin plywood over drywall that is a different story. If pins wont work maybe try anchors and corner braces.

Thank you all for your continued input. Admittedly, this is more challenging than what I initially expected. To add a new twist, we found out a few new things today. When stacking all the shelves from both the left and right sides of the fireplace (note that there is a shelving unit on each side of the fireplace), we found out that shelves installed to the left of the fireplace were .5" shorter (18.25") than the ones installed on the right (18.75"). We then measured the width of the shelving units and the one to the left of the fireplace is 18.75" wide and the right shelving unit is 19" wide.

The shelves that fell were on the left side of the fireplace and the shelves on the right side were sagging but had not fallen when we removed everything (items on the shelf, the shelf boards themselves) - part of the reason the shelves on the right didn't fall was because the shelves were a tighter fit and not putting as much weight on the shelf supports.

The other thing we found was that within the shelving unit on the right side of the fireplace, someone had installed shoe molding along the inside (top, left, and bottom; no shoe moldings on the left shelving unit) - they're hidden from view so we didn't notice until now. When we tried putting the shelves back in again, the shoe molding appeared to help make it a tighter fit and perhaps there to make it less likely for the shelves to fall. We then realized that shelf standards will not work unless the the shelves are cut shorter, which we don't want to do unless it's a last resort and know for sure it will work.
So this complicates the picture a bit more. Part of me still wants to try something on my own, at the same time, it looks like previous owners had tried to troubleshoot and the problem still exists. Perhaps it might be time to have a professional take a look and fix it.

rjp614-

Here is the way I size it up: You have a non-ideal situation, but there are actually several fairly easy solutions if you have the skills and the tools. Installing standards may be the easiest thing. You install the standards, carefully measure the distance, and cut the shelves precisely to fit. However, for this you need a decent saw, preferably a table saw, a radial arm saw, or a sliding chop saw, which would allow you to cut all the shelves to length in a couple of minutes. If you don't want to trim the shelves, then you need to install more wood at the sides to have fixed shelves. Neither of these is a difficult thing to do, but I'm starting to sense that you don't have the right tools to do either approach. Is that correct?

Make your own circular saw guide (track saw) to cut the shelves. All you need is a circular saw, some scrap wood, two saw horses, and some clamps. I usually use 4 clamps, two to hold the piece of wood to the sawhorses, two to hold the guide to the piece of wood.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIeIZdrbz-Y

For the supports you can get more molding and install on each side, if you want to install on the back side you need a miter saw to cut the angles but you dont really need to do the back.

Clear construction adhesive and finish nail the molding.

Kudzu9 and Vith, Thanks once again for your input. Kudzu, you are correct that I do not have the necessary tools to address what you mention. This home is a townhouse style condo and while I would like to get more tools, space among other factors prevent me from owning them at this point in time. I see that Home Depot has tool rentals, at the same time, with things like sawing, I'm inclined to observe/shadow others and then try. I greatly appreciate you both for the friendly advice - I'll give this more thought and maybe I can try to find someone who can cut the shelves for the shelf standards and then I can do the rest.

I think we can go ahead and close this thread out. I have a much better idea now and if anything, want to make sure that too much time isn't spent on my one topic! Much thanks everyone! I'm sure I'll pop in some other threads to ask questions so I can learn more.

rjp614-

Good luck. If you have a friend with tools and skills this would be a pretty quick job, but I understand how it would be a challenge for you in your present situation (I've been there years ago!). At least you understand the options if you get someone to do it for you.