Affixing Heavy Equipment to Solid Limestone Walls with Buffer

Hi there /r/DIY! I'm installing a home gym in the coming weeks and have a question regarding affixing a squat rack and weight storage to the wall. So the walls are solid limestone, as is common in my country, and the local standard for heavy installations would be rawl bolts (anchor bolts, sleeve anchors or whatever your local nomenclature is). I've done many heavy installations using these fasteners already. I'm planning on also affixing 12mm thick OSB boards to the wall first, both to protect the stone from bumps and scrapes from weights but also for aesthetics. I plan on installing the boards first, using less heavy-duty anchors. Then using boring bits to create the space in the boards to drill for my rawl bolt installations. My question comes in as to the space between my fixture and the sleeve of the rawl bolt, assuming the brackets for the rack are 5mm thick plus the 12mm for the OSB, that would leave a significant gap between the bracket and the sleeve itself. Is there any issue with switching out the provided bolts to suitably-sized longer ones to compensate? Is filling this negative space with washers the way to go, or are there metal sleeves built for the purpose? I'm assuming I won't have a problem with the shear strength of the bolts. Is this total madness? Would I be better off cutting out space for the brackets in the OSB (like I will need to for lightswitches and sockets anyway) and mounting the racks flush to the wall? Is the whole thing total madness? Any and all insights are appreciated - thank you so much. submitted by /u/UnfortunateGenius [link] [comments]

May 31, 2025 - 11:52

Hi there /r/DIY!

I'm installing a home gym in the coming weeks and have a question regarding affixing a squat rack and weight storage to the wall.

So the walls are solid limestone, as is common in my country, and the local standard for heavy installations would be rawl bolts (anchor bolts, sleeve anchors or whatever your local nomenclature is). I've done many heavy installations using these fasteners already.

I'm planning on also affixing 12mm thick OSB boards to the wall first, both to protect the stone from bumps and scrapes from weights but also for aesthetics. I plan on installing the boards first, using less heavy-duty anchors. Then using boring bits to create the space in the boards to drill for my rawl bolt installations.

My question comes in as to the space between my fixture and the sleeve of the rawl bolt, assuming the brackets for the rack are 5mm thick plus the 12mm for the OSB, that would leave a significant gap between the bracket and the sleeve itself. Is there any issue with switching out the provided bolts to suitably-sized longer ones to compensate? Is filling this negative space with washers the way to go, or are there metal sleeves built for the purpose? I'm assuming I won't have a problem with the shear strength of the bolts. Is this total madness? Would I be better off cutting out space for the brackets in the OSB (like I will need to for lightswitches and sockets anyway) and mounting the racks flush to the wall? Is the whole thing total madness?

Any and all insights are appreciated - thank you so much.

submitted by /u/UnfortunateGenius
[link] [comments]