Crumbly walls

[Fizz]

Advice needed
The walls in my new home appear to be particularly crumbly and I am having difficulty fixing onto them. I thought it a little strange when I tried to put a few pictures up and small chunks were falling off underneath as I gently tapped the picture nails in!
Last week the curtain pole, with brackets, screws and raw plugs, fell off the wall in my sitting room. They had been attached onto wooden circular blocks which also came off the wall. Having had a look I can see that the previous owners had, had problems getting a deep enough fixing due to twisted steel rods above the windows. The wall mixture is a very light colour and also appears incredibly crumbly, therefore the raw plugs seem to be digging their way back out! I can actually dig the wall with my nail and reckon I could get through to the other side in less than an hour!
Any idea what is going on, how I can overcome this problem and whether I need to use particular fixings for this type of surface?
All advice gratefully accepted

 

[nstreet]

The wall mixture is a very light colour and also appears incredibly crumbly

May sound silly but are you drilling deep enough to fix into the block work or are you fixing into the render, which wont really support anything. Try longer fixings or glue-in fixings. You may have soft blocks in which case you will need some fixings for this.

http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/cat.jsp?cId=101293&ts=12741
http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp?ts=12821&id=77888

 

[Fizz]

Thanks Nstreet,
Dont think they did drill in far enough as all windows in house seem difficult and full of steel rods. Gave up on my kitchen blinds as bought hammer drill and couldnt do it, holes just got bigger and bigger, then employed someone who said he couldn't either so he just drilled into my UPVC window frames.
I can see that the previous owners had had trouble and a couple of the holes had been filled with what looked like 'Hard as Nails' but that came out as well when it all fell off the walls! Now I realise why they had curtain poles but not a single curtain on them when I viewed the house!
Thanks for your suggestions, will order them and see how it goes. Other than that, Anyone want to buy a house???

 

[nstreet]

The standard hammer drills (percusion) aren't much good at drilling into hard concrete, may be worth hiring an sds rotary hammer from you local hire outlet.

 

[Nige F]

Try a resin anchor system from a Builder`s Merchant. Build Center do small tubes (for a std. mastic gun) Is the house brick outside...or a concrete wall factory-built type...I`m intrigued
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[leadbeaterian]

hi how old is the house if its victorian then the render can be over 3cms thick then you are into old crumbling brick work so you will need a 6 cm screw just to hold a picture up

 

[Fizz]

Just to update you, it turns out my house is built, all three floors out of aerated concrete blocks/ Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (AAC) which is why it is so friable and crumbly. Unfortunately living only two houses away from a railway line means that the trembling of the house when the freight trains go by, literally just shakes the fixings out of the wall!
Think the answer to my problems will be to use a resin anchor system as you suggested Nige F. Oh and by the way, the house has bricks to the first floor and is then tiled for the other two floors.
I will be selling it soon, as think it has beaten me! Give me a traditionally built house anyday!!!
Thanks

 

[Steve]

Those resin anchors really do set like a rock, i have used a couple in our house, fixing radiators to walls that are 2 inch thick aerated (whatever they used in the 50's). Forget how we used them now, i think we actually just set the screw into the resin! Also useful for bay window ceilings where you put the curtain tracks up and the plasterboard just crumbles away otherwise.

 

[petewood]

look for aerated block fixings in screwfix. We have aerated block walls where I work and I have mounted some extremely heavy stuff on the walls using what are in effect overgrown rawlplugs, and the plus side is that you don't need a hammer drill to make the hole.

 

[Steve]

i bought some really good anchors from b&q, they came with screws. Massive chunky rawlplugs, need 10mm² hole 10cm deep i bought them for mounting the air con unit inside the conservatory, on the original outside wall of the house . . i wanted to make sure it was mounted properly on the dot n dab plasterwork . . . overkill i suppose. My fave type of fixing is the one i used on the outside wall for the outside unit, the metal expanding bolts, they are amazing. lol. Not advisable on aerated concrete though . . .