4.5mm screws for plasterboard plugs?

[opps]

I recently purchased some Plasplug plasterboard plugs for a small job at a customer's home. He only mentioned the task on the penultimate day of the job- I have been there for months.

Plasplugs

Wall Clocks Lamps Shelving Units Wall Cabinets Bathroom Cabinets

www.plasplugs.co.uk

I then discovered that you have to use 4.5mm screws. A diameter not sold in the store that sells the plugs.

5mm is too big. I had some 3.5mm screws with me but they don't grab the toggle element sufficiently. The plugs are static and as you drive a screw in, it pulls the black plastic toggle up to the reverse side of the plasterboard.

Over the years, the screws that I am most likely to purchase are 3.0mm, 3.5, 4.0, 5.0 and 6.0 (and 4.2 plasterboard screws). I have never purchased a 4.5mm screw in my life.

Ok, Toolstation sell 4.5mm screws, but the longer lengths don't have threads that run all the way up to the screw head (which is kinda required in this case). Screwfix do have ones that are fully threaded but my question is "WTF would a large organisation sell a fitting that requires an esoteric screw diameter?

If the customer doesn't want to keep the remaining plugs, they will end up in the bin.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

4.5mm screws aren't that common, granted, but "esoteric"? I'll have to look that one up when I get home!

 

[blup]

Esoteric is an esoteric word. Spax do a range of 4.5mm wood screws in various lengths, but plugs usually specifiy a range so you should be OK with 4mm.

Blup

 

[Deleted member 174758]

I was only joking... With items like shelf brackets you often want the biggest screw head you can get. We've recently been seeing 4 x 70mm screws with heads nearer to the diameter of a 3.5mm screw. Horrible things

 

[opps]

Esoteric is an esoteric word. Spax do a range of 4.5mm wood screws in various lengths, but plugs usually specifiy a range so you should be OK with 4mm.

Blup

I get what you are saying, but nah, they specify 4.5mm. Not 4mm to 5mm, but 4.5mm

I did happen to have some stainless 4mm screws, they were too short. In the end I used 5 by 70mm screws in the top holes. The screws cut in to the opening hole and may, or may not have sufficiently grabbed the black plastic toggle part. I screwed then in by hand and stopped as soon as the screw driver showed resistance.

I was tasked with putting up 3 crash helmets on a plasterboard wall (on the penultimate day of a 3 month job). I made up some timber braces with 12mm wooden doweling projecting at 45 degrees. It worked. Fortunately, the shear load is very low. They aren't going to fall down unless someone hangs from them.

I will never purchase those plugs again though.