InstaHang Sucks!

Before we go on with this, allow me to explain three important points:

1.) According to several standardized tests, I am not, technically, an idiot. 

2.) I have nothing against the common tools known as the hammer and the nail. I do not fear them. I even own a few examples of such and have been inclined towards their deployment on occasion. 

3.) I have absolutely no idea what I was thinking when I bought this...

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The above packaging element pretty much spells out what InstaHang (or Insta Hang or Insta-Hang) is out to do. It hangs stuff--pictures, tools, shelving... tapestries. The device has a ten pound pull rating, which would exclude most tapestries (hung woven objects and other rug things) along with the majority of shelving and framed pictures, but that's what the claim is. So it's really for very light objects--and not your ninja sword set or collection of gold records--the type of stuff you normally hang on the wall with tacks. 

Tacks is a good word here, since that's essentially what InstaHang would do if it worked--affix a tack at a 45 degree angle into your wall. You then have the option of placing a cap on the tack--and then further hanging a hook off the cap. That's a lot to find after it falls off the wall, lost with the shattered remains of whatever you attempted to hang. 

InstaHang is a  failure on several levels. As mentioned above, this tool cannot be used on the majority of objects that you might want to hang on your wall.  Beyod this, ths physics behind it are crap; a critical portion of the process is undone by a cheap part; and the machine itself is poorly designed. The idea is stupid to begin with--and it's also poorly executed. 

First, the idea that a tack hammered into the wall at a 45 degree angle holds better than one put in normally is, at best, iffy. Moreover, the cap thing you are to place over this tack is not configured to accommodate the tack's 45 degree angle. So what's the point?

You will note that the television commercial sort of glosses over the how you apply the tack to the wall portion of the demonstration. Do you hit it with your palm? Or do you firmly depress the plunger? The instructions say "Push down forcefully on grey button to dispense peg into wall."

Calling a sliding plunger a "button" and the act of slamming your palm into it "to dispense" are curious word choices. But it doesn't matter. You could yodel at the thing and you will get the same result. 

Which brings us to its critical flaw. The peg is so poorly made that it crumples, no matter how how much force is applied nor how evenly. I tried it on drywall, plaster and wood. I pressed it. I pushed it. I slammed it with an open palm, GI Joe with Kung Fu grip style. At best, the metal portion bent. Mostly, it snaps off. It went through plastic, but not well. The metal in the pins is so poor that it defeats the whole purpose of the system.

As for the rather solid seeming system itself, mine jammed after the tenth application. A peg has lodged somewhere in the dispensing chute and will not come out. If I knew where I bought the stupid InstaHang, I would send it back. By Tuesday it will be landfill. 

Allow Me To Save You $14.95 Plus Shipping 

(Or whatever InstaHang Costs)

 A.) For Those Things InstaHang Should Hang. 
Remember, we have a ten pound weight limit with InstaHang. For our purposes, I am lowering the weight limit to seven pounds for interior drywall. Drywall lining an exterior facing wall (the great outdoors is on the other side of this wall) can handle up to ten,

You will need:

A level. This was probably the only useful part of the InstaHang. Levels are fairly cheap. Higher end tape measures come with them built in. 

A hammer. It doesn't have to be huge, but it does have to be a hammer. Do not use shoes, cuttig boards or other objects. Hammer. Period. 

Tacks and Wire. By tacks, I mean thumb tacks. Not the type that press flat, but rather the kind with a prong. Metal or brass is best. Plastic is fine, if you don't mind breaking a few. If what you are hanging is more than fifteen inches long, you probably are also going to need a span of wire. The wire should be thin enough to cut with scissors (scissors you don't care about). 

The realization that this is a hit or miss operation. 

Procedure:

Look at the back of whatever it is that you are about to hang. If there is a wire already there, you are set. If there are little hoops on the corners, you need to take your span of wire, tie or wrap the wire around one hoop, let out enough length to reach the other hoop and then tie or wrap the other end of your wire around the second hoop.  The span does not have to be all that tight, but the wire shouldn't give more than half an inch. 

What if there's nothing there? Or there is something else there? Ikea shopper, huh? Unless the object of art is covered in glass or certain grades of plastic, consider hanging it by tacking through the object. Yeah, people will see the tacks. Who cares? Do not tape. Do not velcro. Tack it at the corners, make sure it is level and call it a day. 

In either case, we are talking about some fairly flyweight items. 

To get back to the framed object, if it is small, you're fairly much set. Find a place on the wall and hammer the tack in. Then use the level to make it straight. You are now an interior decorator.

A larger framed object is the same as above, but it's a balancing act. You are hanging it on a wire between two tacks. The tacks have to be level with each other, which can be tricky. You put in one tack, then you get the object and see how far away the other tack should be. Then you take the level, placing it on top of the picture, and feel around for how high the second tack needs to be. Eight brocken tacks and some pencil marks later, you are done. 

Note: Drywall hates thumbtacks. But it doesn't hate thumbtacks any more than it hates anything else you want to gouge into it. The above procedure is fine for flyweight objects such as your dream catcher or your framed picture of mom. For anything else, it's kind of dubious. Which brings me to...

B.) For Things You Were Thinking of Hanging When You Bought the InstaHang. 

Obviously, I have no idea how stupid you are. If you were thinking of hanging a tapestry or a painting with a thick wooden frame or a priceless print encased in glass with the InstaHang, you are an official nitwit. You need a stud finder and some actual skills for that. Hopefully you weren't in total Wonderworld when you picked up the phone, touched that tone and ordered yourself an InstaHang. 

I hope you knew that the InstaHang is not for putting up things of value. It is for hangng crap. 

A Few Words About Crap.

Crap is mass produced. And everything that touches or contains crap is also crap. Crap holds collectibles. Crap has sports team logos on it. Anything beer-oriented is crap. Crap does not need to be cared for (that much) and any crap you want to put on your walls is of such a disposable nature of crap that you can easily replace it and should not care what happens to it when it comes off your walls. Crap is your cork board, your white board. Crap is that little shelf for figurines or replica cars. Crap is tin butterflies. 

(I speak to you as a magazine collector--a magazine historian, even. Magazines are largely crap. And any magazine I have on my walls is interesting looking, but basically otherwise crap. That is what one hangs up when one decorates with crap. And if you bought the InstaHang, I am willing to bet one of my personal testicles that you are a crap decorator--like myself. By placing a chunk of crap on your walls, you are expressing your ingrained human desire to share and are making a sacrifice to this desire with the object itself. Embrace this mindset and you will never go wrong.)

I have two suggestions for dealing with the hanging of crap of any weight. 

1.) Nail Crap to the Walls. Nail through the crap. Nail one top corner down. Get your level. Nail the other top corner down. For extra points, nail the bottom corners down.

Wait. I'm not talking about three penny nails here. And don't use a nail gun. I'm talking about thin nails no longer than an inch and three quarters. Tap the stuff in by the corners. You're hanging stuff chest high or above. Nowhere near an outlet. As long as it is level (and clean), you're fine. You have met the artistic standard. 

This is suitable for Frampton Comes Alive posters, autographed Flutie Flakes boxes, banners, coated and framed skyline photos and tin type Esso signs. If you ever checked out a restaurant or bar, that's the way they do it, too. And they invented crap decorating. Now that you know the rules, obey the rules. 

If you are worried about the little holes this might leave behind in your (landlord's) drywall, filling such is what Pepsodent is for. Not that it is any less destructive, but we do have one more method...

2.) Screw and Span Method. You need a screw driver, a hammer and a level for this one. You also have to get to the hardware store. From the hardware store you need to buy an equal number of long, thin screws and matching wall anchors. A wall anchor is a screw condom. They actually look like large plastic screws themselves. 

The wall anchor does what the InstaHang is supposed to--it keeps your drywall from spitting out whatever you pound into it. With a wall anchor you don't need to find the stud. And a box of wall anchors and matcing screws is going to cost you under ten bucks. 

While you are there, tell the hardware store employee what you are out to do. They may have another answer. In general, you use the screw to tap in some guide holes into your walls. Here, you are marking the walls and making sure everything is level before doing anything else. Once you have the guide holes done, you put the screws into the wall anchor. Tap it into the wall just as far as our guide holes went. Then you screw-shove the sheathed screw into the wall. This is suitable for hanging whatever framed thing you want to hang. It does leave a pretty massive hole in the wall, however. 

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I didn't come up with the idea of hanging tapestries with the InstaHang. That was in the advertising copy. 

Speaking of Hardware Stores, my new novella is now available from Amazon by clicking the banner ad.