Stair gates and plaster

[lnr]

Deliberately bought a stair gate for upstairs which the manufacturer claims can be used by just attaching the wall cups to the wall with the supplied stickers, rather than having to drill and use screws. Went up ok last weekend, though the wall cups on the bannister side seemed to slip a few mm as I tightened the pressure fittings. Trouble is over the rest of the week they slipped more and more and last night one of them slipped off entirely!

Took the gate down this morning, but when I turned my attention to the wall cups on the other side it seems they were rather better stuck to the stickers, and the stickers were well suck to the wall. However it seems the plaster was rather less well stuck! This is the result:

I'd been meaning to get round to doing something about that crack!

Amusingly as the other gate at the bottom of the stairs had to be fitted on the second step up Matthew has now managed to fall off the second step a few times, making it feel slightly less safe than when the gate wasn't there :)

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

We have a rather lovely pine gate that is screwed in across the kitchen door to keep both children and the dog out. It has been up for 8 years and I have no intention of taking it down its fab. Sue

[lnr]

The really irritating thing about having resorted to screws with the first gate is that if I'd known I was going to be screwing things to the walls anyway I'd have bought a different sort of gate entirely!

[lizardc.livejournal.com]

Oooops! :) we have what look like the exact same gates. The stickers aren't great and do slip a fair bit, but so long as we wiggle it back into position every now and again and re-tighten them up, they seem to do the job...

[lnr]

Will have to see if I can refit it - have ordered more stickers and wall cups anyway - only £4 inc postage :)

[hsenag.livejournal.com]

The two steps will be great for him to practice on though.

[lnr]

They do indeed seem to be!

[htfb.livejournal.com]

Oh dear.

After reading the first paragraph, and without knowing anything about stair gates specifically, I was going to warn you that stickers can over a few months become more stuck than the plaster is to the wall, however easily removed they might appear at first.

[giving unwanted advice over the internet since 1993]

[lnr]

Heh, months would have been nice, less than a week was quite impressive :) We've poked at the crack a bit more, and removed some more big bits of plaster from both near the existing missing bit and from another bit of the crack. Now we just need to decide if we get it looked at by someone who understands cracks or just replaster (and indeed whether to attempt plastering ourselves or get someone in).

[htfb.livejournal.com]

We have one neighbour who has successfully replastered a wall, so it can be done, though he's a sufficiently good handyman to have considered giving up his day job to specialise in maintaining buildings of similar vintage to this one. But better DIYers than I have told me that their rule for plastering is "don't".