-
Finding joist in ceiling–help, please!
I just got permission from my landlady to put up a pole in my apartment. As a grad student in Chicago, I have no time to commute to classes, so this is excellent for me. However, when I used my newly-acquired stud finder (Zircon StudSensor e50) on the ceiling, I couldn’t get an accurate reading. I’d go over one spot, and it would seem to work. I’d go at it from the other side, and it wouldn’t read anything. I tried both the stud scan mode and the deepscan mode, and neither gave me a solid reading.
I know that my apartment is pretty old, and rather than scraping the paint away from the walls and ceiling during touch-ups, everything is just painted over, so there are many, many layers of paint in the way, too. I’m at a loss as to how to find the joists, so if anyone has any suggestions, I would greatly appreciate them.
-
3 Replies
-
For some of the places I’ve lived in, simply taking out the nearest lighting fixture and sticking your head in there is enough- they’re often about 16 inches apart, and all run in the same direction. If you can see one, it’s enough.
However, I’ve had some places that have joists in WEIRD patterns, funny spacing apart, and such. We just kind of had to guess and hope- you can often tell, if you’re putting a screw in, by the feel of the drill. It’ll give constant tension if there’s something constant you’re going into. If not, then you haven’t found one.
Another place I lived in was VERY old, and in fact had real wood for the ceiling. I got an extra-long screw for that place, because the wood was thick and I wasn’t sure if I would actually reach the joist with the normal one. That kind of ceiling, though, was incredibly sturdy. Best pole anchor I’ve had in a long time.
Best case, though, is stick your head in an already-made hole, like where the lights come out of. 🙂 -
Thank you very much! My landlady’s husband is stopping by tomorrow to see if he can help, so I’ll mention the idea about taking down the overhead light to see if we can see anything. I’ll be getting an X-Pert pole, so no screws needed there, which makes the search for the joists a little trickier, as I’m trying not to create any new holes in the ceiling.
-
I used the look up in the ceiling light and measure from there technique since I couldn’t get a good reading with the stud finder either. When you think you’ve got it you can double check by tapping in a skinny nail (won’t make much of a hole) to be sure it’s there.
Log in to reply.