"Ron Bean" wrote in message
...

Ba r r y writes:

Steel studs are common in commercial construction. I haven't seen a
wood stud in a phone building for at least 15-20 years, regardless if
the wall carries a load. Lots of these walls have counters, cabinets,
etc... mounted to them. A lot of this stuff is installed as an
afterthought, so the wall was not specially designed to carry the
load.

I did some web searching on this a while back, and found a number
of people who claimed to be hanging cabinets from steelstuds with
no problems (I don't know what guage of steel they were using).

I assume the success rate would vary with the amount of weight
and the number of screws (and whether you're using screws
designed for steel studs). It seems to me there should be some
kind of rule of thumb for weight-per-screw. The screws seem to
grip pretty well.

Another possible strategy is to arrange things so that something
else takes the weight, and the studs just hold it upright.

The OP said his walls weren't up yet, so I'd certainly add wood
blocking wherever it might come in handy. For an RV, you also
have to consider dynamic loads. I like the idea of a french
cleat, with a peg that has to be removed before you can lift the
cabinet off the cleat.

2x blocking is installed between the studs at the proper heights to act as
*nailers* for the wall cabinets to be screwed to.
Believe it or not the drywall adds a lot to the stability of the steel stud
wall. Without the drywall you can grab ahold of the studs and twist them
every which way, but once the drywall has been screwed on it acts like a
drum head, tightens right up. My next house will be built with steel studs
because I like the consistency of the sizing and continuity of the quality.
Those two things are not possible with wood studs.