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My roomates and I got a large whiteboard for studying. It measures 1800 x 900 mm and has a stainless steel border and backing. At a guess, it's easily 20 kg, and we've currently got a rather ad-hoc and precarious setup, as you can see.

whiteboard

We'd really appreciate any ideas on how to hang or support it at eye level.

Edit: I should’ve clarified, because this is a rental property, we can't drill into the walls!

Double Edit: We’ll have to check with our landlord before drilling, but drilling and then puttying might be an option.

Cheers!

bubbleking
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Adrian Hindes
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  • What's that wall made of? Gypsum, concrete, etc? – haimg Apr 19 '17 at 13:12
  • Concrete, but since it's a rental property we can't nail anything in. We've hung a framed poster in the room using Command strips, but I doubt any number of those could hold up the whiteboard. – Adrian Hindes Apr 19 '17 at 13:15
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    What country? In the US at least, rental does not mean you can't nail anything in; hanging pictures is considered normal wear-and-tear. – mmathis Apr 19 '17 at 13:31
  • A better option may be to build a free-standing frame – mmathis Apr 19 '17 at 13:31
  • Talk to your landlord before drilling, but I would guess he'll be OK with it. If that was my wall, I'd be more worried about damage to the paint from the gaffer's tape that you seem to have on there. If making holes is acceptable, come back here and we can talk about what kind of fasteners to use. – Mike Baranczak Apr 19 '17 at 15:02
  • @mmathis rental might mean he can't nail anything in the walls. His rental agreement will state what he can and can not do - even online rental agreements include provisions for damaged walls etc.. i.e. nailing, hanging etc... And also who is responsible for repairing if it is allowed by the landlord. – Ken Apr 19 '17 at 19:15
  • @Ken at some point it doesn't matter what's in the rental agreement, the law takes precedence. The law is a bit vague in some cases regarding normal wear-and-tear, but it's generally accepted that some nail or screw holes from hanging things on the wall is normal wear-and-tear, as they are part of the intended use of the rental. See e.g., https://www.landlordology.com/normal-wear-and-tear/. Again, this is all for the US; other countries may be different. – mmathis Apr 19 '17 at 19:32
  • @mmathis - my agreement for my tenant states who is responsible for fixing those holes in the wall, most landlords allow this in order to rent the unit- in his case a concrete wall might be specified differently. When I rented an apartment the agreement also had such a clarification. Clarification in contracts prevents ambiguity of the "Normal Wear and tear, for example a carpet that has been clawed by a pet is not normal wear and tear. Without clarifications; the norms and such as HUD would be applied. Yes clarifications can be overruled or not by a court. – Ken Apr 19 '17 at 19:52
  • I'm in Australia, not sure what the rental agreement laws are. @mmathis – Adrian Hindes Apr 20 '17 at 07:58

6 Answers6

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As an active landlord myself, simply ask them for permission to drill the necessary mounting holes and then hang it appropriately for the weight and materials as several others have mentioned above. Most landlords don’t mind holes in the walls of it A) makes the tenant stay longer which equals more rent stability and B) the tenants correctly patch the holes after vacating the property. I’ve had tenants who have hung similar products on the walls that they’ve left with my permission. I got a free property upgrade as well as if they hung it correctly to start I don’t have to worry about shoddy wall patching later. Just ask your landlord and talk through what you want to do now and what you would do with it upon vacating when that time comes.

NRd
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Buy a small buffet or sofa table cheap - Buy two metal flat rods or even a 6 feet length of 1 x wood -

mount the flat rod or 1x to the sofa table as mounting rods for your whiteboard. place the white board on top of the sofa table up against the mounting 1 x's mount the white board to the 1x's you are done. place it against the wall and study till you drop... or until you have had enough caffeine to keep you going another week.. :-)

enter image description here

Ken
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  • I like this idea but I'm not sure if I can find a table thin enough so it's not awkward to lean over and write. – Adrian Hindes Apr 20 '17 at 07:59
  • @Excalibur42 - check Craigslist., or Yard sales. They make them thin enough. and if you need to you can weight the back side to keep it more stable if you need to.24 inch wide or less should do the trick. Not sure where you are but here's an example https://columbus.craigslist.org/fuo/6097836576.html – Ken Apr 21 '17 at 17:54
  • What is "1 x wood?" – bubbleking Dec 29 '20 at 23:13
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Shop or search for "tension pole" or "spring pole". These can be had with holes for mounting coat hooks, shelves, etc. Two of these can be pressed into service to hold the whiteboard, and you can even add a marker tray.

A. I. Breveleri
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Edit: I posted my answer before the clarification that the walls are concrete. When screwing into concrete, you'll need to add an appropriate anchor first. You could probably fill the holes with epoxy when moving out.

There are a couple options, both of which will be very strong since the whiteboard is so big.

Hang the whiteboard like a standard picture

Drill a screw into at least 3 studs (leaving the heads about 1/8" from the wall), and hang the whiteboard from those. There are various ways to hang the whiteboard:

  1. You can attach regular picture wire to the back and rest that on the screwheads. This will put a lot of stress on the sides of the frame, so if you go this route make sure the frame is sturdy.
  2. You can get some alternative picture hangers (the triangular shaped hooks below the spool of picture wire, or the semi-circular hooks below those, or the long bar with the saw-tooth sides towards the upper leftof the image below) and hang those from the screwheads. This will put stress on the top of the frame

picture hangers

Attach the whiteboard directly to the wall

You could drill through the metal frame of the whiteboard (or build a wooden frame) and screw it directly to the studs. Attach both the top and bottom of the frame, in at least 3 locations along the length of the whiteboard.

A hybrid approach

Attach some J-hook type brackets (shown to the right of the brass-colored hooks in the image above) to the wall and rest the bottom of the whiteboard on those, and then secure the top to the wall using S-clips (shown on the bottom row in the image above). Alternatives could be mirror clips, screws through the frame, picture hanging hooks, etc.



In all of the cases, you're attaching to multiple studs which provides a lot of stability.

When you move out, just remove the screws and fill the holes with some spackle. This is considered normal wear-and-tear on a rental in most states in the US, not sure about other countries though.

Image taken from Home Depot as an example, not an endorsement.

mmathis
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I think the simplest way to address this, would be:

  1. Buy two dimensional lumber boards at a home improvement centre (90x45mm or similar)
  2. Notch these boards as needed (if you have baseboards on your wall), so the boards can be placed vertically, flush with the wall.
  3. Attach them as two "legs" to the board (so all the weight is transferred to the floor, not to the wall).
  4. Attach the legs to the wall with heavy-duty double-sided tape. This tape only prevents the board from tipping over, since the majority of the load is on the legs.
haimg
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Just get a whiteboard adhesive roll. It's really inexpensive and reusable. I've reused mine in three different houses.

whiteboard adhesive roll

enter image description here

Amazon

Joe Fala
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