Bathroom wall stability

[grubbyjeans]

Only one item has been a frustration for me with our 2720SL. That is the loose setup of the shower wall. It has never been stable enough when using the bathroom or showering. Any slight bump to the wall and the latch would allow the wall to separate at both the top and bottom latches and almost collapse. I finally found a way to fix it.

I put a pin (removable) in the bottom wall that helps hold the walls in alignment during use.

If you look at the latches (tool chest latches) there is a tip that should be located in the bottom part of the latch which would keep the two parts of the latch bound together. What I saw on mine was that the tip had been bent into the cavity and could not mate into the other part of the latch.

There are three of these latches and all of them had been deformed the same way. I'm sure the shower side latch had been modified to prevent damaging the bedside shower wall in transit, but I could find no reason for the other two latches to be modified, so I straightened them out.

I made a drill guide that would center the drill for placement of the pin in the lower shower wall and drilled a 1/4" hole in the top of the wall aligned at the center of the lower latch (7" from the corner of the wall). I then drilled a hole in the bottom of the top section of the wall.

Edit: I used a short section of 2X4 and marked 3 lines, 1" apart and drilled a 1/4" hole in the center on my drill press to keep the angle at 90. Put a small finish nail in each of the end lines. Set the drill guide over the location on the bottom section and turn until both the nails are against the wall and the drill location is centered. Do the same on the other section of the wall. This prevents drilling the two sections at different angles which would make the pin difficult to insert into both sections and would damage the drilled hole.

I marked the drill bit with tape so I wouldn't drill deeper than 3/4". That prevents the pin from dropping into the lower wall during use.

Now, when I setup, I just drop a 1 1/2" x 1/4"dia. pin into the hole and align the top wall over the pin and latch them together. That prevents the two sections of the wall from sliding when bumped and makes the wall much sturdier.

At take-down I pull the pin out and drop it into the drawer of the cabinet so it doesn't get lost.

After straightening the top and middle latches of they are much sturdier.