brickwalls
I rent a small flat in an old building. Since the walls are pretty brittle. Bricks are far apart, mortar has bigger stones then usual, so drilling can be difficult.
This is why the dowels are not sticking in the wall.
I thought about drilling downwards, to add a downward force to hold the dowel in the wall. Is there a better way?
To tie two rows of bricks together you normally use to use brick (or cavity) ties, so these might be useful to tie the pretty bricks to the inner wall.
To help prevent the whole wall moving you need to basically "nail" the wall to the ground behind. This site has some examples. They don't look terribly pretty (though they are for large expanses), but if you want to stop the wall moving and collapsing it's what you need to use. You might be able to use something like this on the inner wall and then build the outer wall afterwards. At this point I'd probably consult an expert.
you definitely don't want to drill into the brick. Drilling into the mortar isn't too bad though, and easily repairable if ever desired.
I've used Tapcons for anchoring into mortar. They work well:
The box will say what size masonry drill bit you need to pre-drill, then you just screw them in with your driver like any screw. I'd suggest longer is better (though no longer than the width of the brick, as that may be as thick as the brick is.)
Also, make sure this brick you are drilling into isn't a chimney. If it is, make sure it's either not in use, or has a metal flu inside (and don't puncture the flu)
Your idea of installing a wood cross-member into the brick and then hang something from there isn't a bad idea. I'd suggest 3 screws, then perhaps attach peg board to that, hanging the pots from peg board ala Julia Child
Best Answer
Brittle and old walls can be like a chocolate box... Drilling downwards doesn't help very much, in these walls the wall plugs and screws just behave like nails: they resist almost not at all to pulling forces.
Depending on how bad it actually is, you may need to do one or more of the following (maybe even different strategies depending on where in the wall you drill. Ever hanged a kitchen on a wall built out of post-war rubble?):
For big holes/heavy weights there are commercial systems available that will help with glue reinforcement.
Of course you can always do the last resort and do it like people did before they invented the wall plug:
Whatever you do, in these walls you have to massively derate the manufacturers specifications on load bearing abilities of the wall plugs.