Tip Risk: IKEA chests and dressers (anchor kit offered)

[bibliothecary]

boston.cbslocal.com/2015/07/22/ikea-offers-free-repair-kit-for-chests-dressers-following-2-child-deaths/


IKEA has issued a safety alert for millions of chests and dressers that can tip over and fall on children if they’re not properly secured to a wall.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission announced Wednesday that roughly 7 million MALM chests and 20 million other IKEA chests and dressers are included in a nationwide repair program.

[econmarie]

They are all sold with the anchor kits. Many people (like me) do not install them. We are working to anchor all of our furniture. We keep the extra parts, so we have some of the kits. Ikea is being very generous by offering to mail additional kits...I've requested 4.

[those3words]

Jul 22, 2015 14:24:00 GMT -5 @aditi said:

Jul 22, 2015 14:19:36 GMT -5 econmarie said:

They are all sold with the anchor kits. Many people (like me) do not install them. We are working to anchor all of our furniture. We keep the extra parts, so we have some of the kits. Ikea is being very generous by offering to mail additional kits...I've requested 4.

No offense but why wouldn't you install them? It takes no extra time or effort, really.

For example if you purchased the furniture long, long before kids were ever a thought and you don't live in an earthquake prone area. When I got some of my IKEA furniture (over a decade ago) the anchors were a suggestion if you lived in an area where earthquakes were common.

ETA - also, we have a lot of brick walls in our old house (or thin wood paneling on top of brick)- so I'm not really sure how to drill into brick. I think we'll just think about getting rid of some of the pieces.

[econmarie]

Jul 22, 2015 14:24:00 GMT -5 @aditi said:

Jul 22, 2015 14:19:36 GMT -5 econmarie said:

They are all sold with the anchor kits. Many people (like me) do not install them. We are working to anchor all of our furniture. We keep the extra parts, so we have some of the kits. Ikea is being very generous by offering to mail additional kits...I've requested 4.

No offense but why wouldn't you install them? It takes no extra time or effort, really.

We lived in an apartment and didn't have kids. I felt like the risk was low and didn't want to deal with patching walls. Now we own our home and have kids, so we are working on anchoring furniture. We strapped the TVs first and are working on the dressers next.

[rztrumpet]

Just putting it out there, that while this is tragic, it is a good reminder to anchor ALL your furniture around small children! Things have been known to happen, not just with IKEA furniture!

[canadiansciencegeek]

If you live near an IKEA, they have the anchors for free, usually by the returns area.

[2chatter]

12 years ago overseas IKEA did not offer the kits and our change table/dresser was handed down from each of our kids. We bought an anchor kit at Home Depot. We also bought a secondhand IKEA dresser, so I ordered a kit for that one because we just got it.

[seadragon2013]

Years ago, our six pound cat tipped over a four drawer MALM by jumping into the top drawer - it takes very little force. Luckily, no one was injured and ALL of our furniture is now anchored. If you don't want to wait for the IKEA kit, you can get mounting anchors at Home Depot.

[anakah]

We used the anchors that came with our malm chests but we bought heavy duty wall anchors to sink into our walls. Dh grumbled about the extra effort but I insisted. I have since caught the kids climbing and hanging on the drawers like a jungle gym. DH doesn't think I'm paranoid anymore.

[danabsd]

I agree with rztrumpet, the risk is not only with Ikea furniture, all dressers especially should be anchored. We have these, they work great and were easy enough for my not so handy husband to install.
www.amazon.com/KidCo-S142-Anti-Tip-Furniture-Straps/dp/B0009ET8CS

[danabsd]

I don't think not anchoring furniture when you don't have children is something to get your paints in a bunch about. I certinaly did not, I mean I used to drink a lot butI rarely tried climbing the dresser.

[sarasansh]

If anchoring your furniture can be a pain because you often need to move it to retrieve lost items or you need to access an outlet that sits behind furniture (like me) then you can also find anchors that work with zip ties. That's what we use--that way I can detach and get behind the furniture and then reattach it.

We have these ones.

[harlowjune1984]

I have never had an issue with a IKEA anchor not working, but that is because I am attaching them to studs and not just drilling them willy-nilly into the drywall. Hopefully people start anchoring their stuff!

[seamonster]

I know our dresser didn't come with one, but hopefully we can pick one up on our next Ikea run.