D Vautier
5/22
One of the greatest things in the world is the molly-bolt, an ingenious way to fasten stuff securely to walls, but very hard to remove without damage to the wall. Naturally things change and walls change and there's nothing uglier than than painted over remains of a dead molly-bolt.
A molly-bolt can be installed on standard half inch sheetrock (which is in just about all residential walls) by drilling a 5/16 hole. A one-forth inch hole is probably too snug and damages the sheetrock so use a 5/16th.
When the screw gets tight the four prongs fix it securely
to the interior of the wall. When it has to be removed that’s a different
and difficult story.
Can I share an easy way to remove molly-bolts without
damaging the hole too much.
Back off the big long screw almost to the end. Hammer the head of the screw
a bit. This releases the four
prongs.
So
here we have the four prongs after a little hammering.
Now you are able to pull out the bolt about a quarter of an inch
exposing the top flange.
This
allows plenty of room to roll off the
top flange either with needle nose pliers or diagonal pliers.
The rest of the bolt can just be pushed in and the hole
sealed with patching plaster. Easy job.