Crowdsource your DIY Dilemma

In this day and age, do-it-yourselfers have more information and ideas, literally at their fingertips, than ever before. Many DIY situations you’ll come up against are somewhat unique and the answer may still be outside your experience.

That’s where crowdsourcing comes in.

For example, I ran across a discussion the other day on DIY Chatroom where someone was trying to determine the best and safest way to hang a heavy bathroom mirror that had moulding glued to the glass to make a frame.

There were a couple of good ideas that emerged during the discussion:

• Replacing the frame (which wasn’t doable)
• attaching wall cleats (like this) to the back

But attaching cleats to glass has it’s own problems.

• Attach them with screws – which means drilling though the glass
• Use a construction adhesive – which had potential for failing under the weight

It Never Hurts to Ask Questions

After asking a couple of additional questions, I came up with a suggestion that incorporated some of the ideas that had been floated earlier in the discussion – Why not make a perimeter frame around the existing mirror that the cleats could be attached to?

The DIYer with the mirror thought my idea would work for his situation. That pleases me.

If you run into a situation that you just can’t seem to work out, or readily find an answer to by Googling, then read the forums to see if the answer is already there. If not, then sign up and ask for some help.

There are plenty of Professionals and DIYers  online (like me) that are eager to help pass on what we’ve learned within our own frames of reference. When we all put our heads together, we can usually find an answer – plus we all learn something new.