Experiment

Many people ask how they can attach things to the walls, so this is my experiment. I took a piece of wall panel, drilled a 1/16" pilot hole and put in a coarse thread drywall screw to find out how many pounds of pull it would it take to pull it out. the scale the pounds just as the screw started to pull out. It took about 37.5 pounds.

Testing this is great and on the right track but a few comments.

In the case of hanging stuff I think you want to do a shear (lateral) load test not an axial load test. Most likely the attachment is stronger that way but it’s thin material so it’s worth testing to see. How far from the wall you apply the load makes a difference because it’s a little lever, so pick something typical for something hanging on a wall, maybe 1/4 or 1/2 inch?

Also since wood is a variable material you typically get a load variation in test results so you need to do multiple tests and look for the average and standard deviation. Generally speaking that is about 5-10 tests. If the variation in the first 5 tests is less than say 10% then thats good enough. Do the test slowly as wood unlike metal can take a lot more load for short periods than long ones.

I can dig out my Wood Products Handbook and see but IIRC for single fasteners a safety factor of about 2 is specified for short duration loads like bump loads in an rpod. Since those loads are about 2g I think an overall 4x safety factor would be safe. That would be around10 lbs per screw for the pullout test but I think it will end up being more than that for a shear load.

Every once in a while I read something here and think "oh, my! 'the guys' are going to have a field day with this." It usually has to do with tow vehicles and weight limits. 

Originally posted by EchoGale Every once in a while I read something here and think "oh, my! 'the guys' are going to have a field day with this." It usually has to do with tow vehicles and weight limits.  I think you're kidding...right?

I'm in for the betting!