My roller blind has come down off the wall, what went wrong?

Cause one: the fixings pulled out of plasterboard

This is the most common by a wide margin. A bracket screwed straight into plasterboard with no plug, or with a plug that was too small, holds fine for a while and then lets go as the daily pull of the chain works it loose. You will see a torn hole rather than a clean one, sometimes with plaster dust down the wall.

The fix is not a longer screw into the same hole. It is either finding the timber behind the board, or using a proper hollow wall fixing rated for the load. If the bracket was in the ceiling above a recess, timber is usually easier to find than you would expect.

• Torn, crumbling hole: plasterboard failure, needs a proper hollow wall fixing.
• Clean hole with the screw still in the wall: the bracket itself has broken.
• Blind fell from one end only: one bracket failed and the other took the whole load.

Cause two: a cracked or sprung bracket

Roller brackets are usually plastic or thin pressed steel, and both age. Plastic goes brittle in direct sunlight, then splits at the clip where the tube sits. Pressed steel brackets can spring open slightly if the blind has been pulled forward repeatedly, for example by a child or a curtain being drawn past it.

Brackets are replaceable, but they must match the tube diameter and the clutch type. This is where taking the old bracket with you, or photographing it beside a tape measure, saves a wasted trip.

Cause three: the blind was too wide for the way it was fitted

A wide roller carries real weight, and a face fixed bracket on plasterboard is being asked to hold that weight at the end of a lever. Ready made blinds trimmed to fit are especially prone, because trimming does not reduce the tube weight much but often leaves the brackets closer to the ends than intended.

If your blind is wide and has now fallen twice, the fixing method is the problem, not your luck. Top fixing into the recess soffit, or a proper timber batten, changes the load path entirely.

Refitting it without a repeat

If the brackets are sound and only the fixings failed, refitting is within reach for most people: reposition the brackets slightly to one side of the damaged holes so the new fixings bite into fresh material, use fixings rated for the wall type, and check the tube clips fully home at both ends before letting go.

Two things are worth taking seriously. Never refit into a hole that has already blown out, and always check what is behind the wall before drilling near a window head, where cabling to a light or an alarm sensor is not unusual.

• Move the bracket enough that new screws land in undamaged material.
• Match the fixing to the wall: plug and screw in masonry, a rated anchor in plasterboard.
• Test that both ends of the tube are fully clipped before releasing the blind.

When a fall is really a sizing message

We are often called to a blind that has fallen twice in a year, and in most of those cases the blind was never the right specification for the opening. A trimmed ready made roller on a wide window puts its weight in the wrong places, and no fixing will make that go away permanently.

That is worth knowing before you buy the same thing again. A made to measure roller on that opening puts the brackets where the load actually is, and can be top fixed into the recess so the wall is not carrying the weight at all.

If you would rather it was done properly

We fit blinds across East Kent and can refit a sound blind into correct fixings, or measure the opening and quote for a made to measure roller if the existing one was always the wrong size for the recess. The visit, the measuring and the written quote cost nothing.

Our Hythe High Street showroom is also a good place to bring a broken bracket. Matching it in person is faster than describing it, and we have been fitting these systems since 2006.