door hanging / costs

[Pete]

Evening folks,

I've been doing some decorating and well thats going well, but the doors on the frame are those 1970's brown 'orrible jobbies and its time to reknew them or something. I have never hung a door in my life and wondering if its a difficult task for a intermidiate diy'er ?

I have also contemplated, painting them white ..? to keep costs down.

Although I see doors are about £22 for those 4 panel white grained ones that seem the standard in homes now.

I contacted some people who do this and its £65 to supply, fit the doors including the door handle does that sound fair or too much ?

The problem is I have 5 doors needing doing so its going to amount up to £325 so hence why I'm contemplating doing it myself surely it will be cheaper if I don;t mess it up lol

So it looks like a case of buying the right width and adjusting the height of it to match the cutouts on the door frame hinges, which could be tricky as I guess I'll need a circular saw :-s .. and then gawd knows how to attach the handle ...

advice welcomed :)

[Ericp]

Sounds a very fair deal.

Fitting a door of this sort is very easy if you have a decent set of chisels and can control them. There are basic traditional rules about hinge position and stuff like that but if you copy like for like you should be ok.

But for £65 all-in, I would make cups of tea and admire the workers hard at it.

[Tabby]

Its not hard really, the main thing is just take care over marking and cutting the door, if you need to cut them. Yes, buy the right width, and if necessary you can trim the height a little with a circular saw, and plane a little to ensure the edges are clean.

The basic idea is to sit the door in the frame, in closed position, sitting it on bits of scrap packing to get it a bit off the floor. Then you can mark the hinge positions. There's a wiki article here:

are a lot easier if you use surface mount mechanisms rather than ones that you bury in deep cutouts in the door. For surface ones, you only need one hole where the handles go on, half an inch or so wide.

I far prefer wood panelled to flat featureless doors. If you wanted to take it a step further, check out the art nouveau doors linked on here:

[The Medway Handyman]

They are probably better quality than new cheap doors.

You can pick them up in Wickes for £15.99 each - but they are s**te.

Sounds bloody cheap to me. I would just about hang a customers door for that price, not supply it as well.

You may need to trim the height and the width, which can be a problem with cheap doors. Look at the label/instructions before you buy - some doors you can only trim by 4mm a side because they are a frame covered in MDF with polystyrene inside.

You can get by with a cheap circular saw & change the blade to something like a 40 tooth. Google for 'sawboard' and make one up - it will give you spot on precision cuts.

Best way is to use the hinge cut outs in the frame. Trim to fit first, place in 'ole', put a spacer on top & use a lever to lift the door - them mark hinge rebates on door.

Handle & latch are mainly a matter of drilling holes in the right place.

Personally I'd tear the arm off the bloke offering to supply & fit for £65....

[Luke]

Well. A couple of weeks ago I had never hung a door before. I bought 2 cheap panel doors. I had a set of chisels and I borrowed an electric plane from my dad, and a circular saw from a bloke at work.

I cut the first door to size. Went at it with the circular saw first, easy I thought. (involved taking 5-10mm off sides and bottom). Took too much off, and was not happy with the overall fit, so wasted a door.

Second time I used the planer. Made a lot of mess, but much easier to control, and quite easy to get a good close accurate fit - basically by levelling up the bottom and then repeatedly offering up the door to the frame and shaving off wherever the surplus was the greatest, until it fitted. Cutting out the hinges was not hard at all but I was very slow. No doubt an expert would be a lot quicker.

Hanging is not that easy without a helper. I used magazines to prop the door up on and a somewhat reluctant wife as assistance.

As for the handle etc this is much the same as the hinges except you have the big rebate for the mechanism. Not too bad with a spade bit and some rough chisel work. Only thing I would say is to score carefully before cutting to avoid splitting the grain and just go at it carefully.

OK I wasted =A325 and spent a whole day hanging two doors but they look good!

My sister had her whole house done, can't remember exactly how much she paid but it was of the order of =A365 a door. Although the doors fit well it is obviously a rush job as the delicate work (hinges, mechanism etc) is not that precise. If you get those little touches flat and accurately cut it makes all the difference IMO.

Luke

[Roger Mills]

Since you're replacing one door with another, you can use the existing door as a pattern. [I'll talk about one door, but do the same with the others]

Before removing the door, make a careful note of how well it fits - noting any gaps or tight spots. Then remove the door and lay it on top of the new door, and mark the new door for trimming. Make slight adjustments depending on the gaps/tight spots noted. Then trim the new door to the marks using a hand or electric plane on the sides and a circular saw on the bottom. Make sure it fits the hole!

Then fit the hinges, again using the old door as a pattern for hinge positions. Then hang the door in the frame, initially using one screw per hinge until you're sure it's right. To support the door while hanging it, sit it on a large screwdriver lying on the floor at right angles under the middle of the door.

Finally, when the door is fully hung, and opens and closes nicely, fit the latch and handles. The latch obviously has to be at the right height for the striker plate on the frame. You'll need to drill a (22mm I think) hole in the edge of the door to take the latch.[1] Push the latch into the hole and mark the faceplate rectangle, which you'll need to remove with a chisel. Measure how far into the door the bar joining the handles needs to be, and drill a hole from either side at the same height as the latch hole (with the latch removed, of course). Then fit the screws to hold the latch in, and push the bar through. Then fit the two handles onto the bar, and screw them to the door. Job done!

[I reckon it's taken me nearly as long to type this as it would have done to do the job!] [1] The hole needs to be exactly horizontal, and parallel with the faces of the door. It helps to keep the door still by clamping the edge in a Workmate. If possible, use a drill with a built-in spirit level, and clamp a batten to the face of the door and keep the drill bit parallel with that.

[John Rumm]

You can get creative and paint panels on them - using difference shades to get the 3D effect - can look ok, but probably needs as much artistic skill as carpentry skills to hang a new one!

Sounds very cheep. Prolly only a £15 door, and 4 quids worth of hardware

- but still cheap.

Do one, and see how you do. If its a mess, pay the people, and you have only lost £20.

Details here:

the bit about preparing the lining. However you may want to take the stops off and refit them once the door is hung.

[chris French]

Yeah, we fitted that sort of thing (from one of the sheds that were doing some deal) it was about 7 years ago in the old house. Doors were pretty crap really (though, were flat, and stayed that way and were easy enough to install - they don't weigh much)

but we knew we'd be selling the house in a couple of years time, and they did make the downstairs look much better than the awful glazed doors that we had in there. If I was goign to be living with them for longer I'd want something nicer.

And what is it with the 'woodgrained' texture thing, it looks awful, and a proper wooden door wouldn't be liek that?

[MuddyMike]

I stuck a bit of moulding on some plain interior doors in our annex to simulate panels and remain very pleased with the result as in.

[stuart noble]

Unless you regard it as a challenge, leave it to the pros. These guys do nothing else all day long and are very good at it

[chris French]

Err, yeah, but the same could be said of lots of jobs you might DIY

[A.Lee]

I used to charge that. That is until I did 5 doors that took 2 days to fit. Every edge had to be cut, 1 door had to have its framing removed and re-stuck to make it smaller.

My pricing was: door - £20, hinges/mortice/handles - £15, - £30 labour. I always check alignment and sizing before giving a price now. 5 doors a day is easily possible on good frames.

If the frames are in good condition, and need little/no adjustment to the door sides, then it is pretty easy to fit one in a hour,but add in diamond shaped or very undersized frames, and they take a lot longer On building sites you can only get £20-25 to fit a std. cheap door.

£65 is pretty good, so long as they are done properly.

Alan.

[stuart noble]

Most jobs contain a large element of preparation and donkey work that you don't need to pay a tradesman to do. I put door hanging in the same category as carpet fitting. While there are blokes out there willing to do it better than me at a reasonable rate, I'm happy to leave them to it.

[chris French]

Oh sure.

But also people DIY for different reasons, sometimes I'd rather pay someone to do some boring donkey work, so that I can spend my time doing more interesting bits