Is hanging doors like tiling?

[Suz]

We had a go at tiling and found it easy. Is hanging a new door as simple as the instructions make it look, or do you need special skills/ talent for it?

TIA Suzanne

[Grunff]

A lot like tiling, but with less grouting. :-)

Yes, it's not too difficult, just take your time.

[Michael McNeil]

Fitting Doors

Some time back someone asked how much it costs to fit a set of internal doors in a house. I think the bill I suggested was in the region of £200 not counting the cost of materials. I just knew the subject would come up again. So I wrote this and waited. Of course this is a set up for the whole house. I hope it doen't put you off having a go at an odd door or two.

Assuming you have some tools, chisels and drills for example; this is how to do it for about £100 or less:

First you want to make sure the frames are straight, plumb, level and square. This is easy with a good (i.e. expensive) 6 foot level. They cost about £40. You also need a 2 foot level and a good one of them is about £15. You can manage without that though.

In fact you can manage without both. You just offer the door to the frame and either plane it to suit or readjust the frame. The latter method is the correct one as all future doors will be able to be hung with ease. Using the former method requires an electric planer and makes a lot of mess.

The outlay that is definitely required is a good chisel or a set of chisels. These are quite cheap these days, they do require sharpening from the box usually. A stone is required for that.

For 8 or 9 doors all of the same type and for the same type of frame, the use of a router is worthwhile, although an hammer and chisel is just as effective. If you get a router (about £30) get a cutter for hinges and a stop-plate to follow a template.

Make a template for the hinges from a straight piece of timber such as a piece of floor-board the length of your door:

Decide where the hinges are to fit on the doors. Usually they are fitted 6 or 7 inches down from the top and 8 or 9 inches up from the bottom. Toilet, airing cupboard and kitchen doors may require 3 hinges. The third is usually fitted at the middle of the door.

Using a piece of scrap, determine how far from the stop the guide allows the cutter to reach. (Mine requires I make the hinge template

1/4" wider on each edge. For a 3" hinge for example, the template must be 3 1/2" from top to bottom.)

Cut these slots so that the edge of the template sits flush with the door, on the side opposite the side where the hinge butts out. The slot can be worked out mathematically but use trial and error to get it perfect.

Reset the depth of the cutter and try out the first effort on a piece of scrap. When you are happy that you can rout out the hinge housings, mark which faces of the doors and which sides of the faces are to have the hinges. (The top of the door carries a notice which edge the lock is on, the hinges fit on the other edge.)

The template can now be used on the frames. Again, mark out which side the hinges go. The gap between the door and frame is 2 millimetres. To get this, either glue a tupenny piece to the top of the template or fit a screw in position that is 2mm proud.

Fix the template in place tight up to the head of the frame. Rout out the housings on that. (Make sure you have the template fitted the right way around first.) If the template is ¾" thick it should cope with the rebates on the frames. If not you may have to finish them off by hand.

The corners will also require finishing with a chisel because the cutter leaves a radius there.

Fit the hinges. Use a drill to pilot the holes for the screws. Fit the doors.

With another template mark the positions of the catches, handles and locks. Drill and fit. Rub graphite on the bolt and mark where the latch comes to on the frame. Fit the keeper. Adjust to suit. A set of fast bit can be had from a market stall these days for less than the price of a Sandvik one from a builders yard. Check the size you need,drill apiece of scrap and the latch should be a nice fit. A little too large is preferable than a little too small.

Keep the drill level by marking the height of the lock (usually 1 metre above the floor) against your groin and hold the drill handle there. (Or get someone to spot it for you.)

If you find you have fitted the hinges to a door on the wrong side (or to the wrong side of the frame):

Cut a piece of scrap to the length of the hinge or infinitesimally larger. Glue and tap it into the housing and drill and fix it with a screw. Leave overnight and then remove the screw. Plane the scrap to bring it flush with the door or frame.

=================================================================================================

Some problems that you are likely to hit in a modern house or an old one where a deal of subsidence has taken place:

When a frame is placed near a corner, the door needs to be brought away from anything it may catch on opening. This is accomplished with a "nib", usually a piece of 4" x 2" attached to the adjoining wall and to which the frame is fixed. Untrained joiners or those on a price and with no scruples, may neglect to add this.

Consider hanging the door on the other leg.

In most cases the house holder will never realise there is a problem except that the door won't open as far as they might like, or that the door stop is in the wrong place. (Assuming the second fix joiner has forseen the problem or the overseer has asked him to make sure the handles or whatever don't damage the wall or other door or whatever.)

The other major snag is the floor level. The gap under the door is about 3/4" to allow for underlay and carpet. If the door wont open because the floor is uneven it has to be cut to suit. If this leaves a gap under the door that looks too big when the door is closed the carpet needs a packing there.

A perfect job would be a layer of screed made from cement and plasterboard bonding with perhaps a little pva. You can buy proprietary self leveler. Alternatively, use a piece or two of harboard etc. (The bottom piece(s) a little wider than the top. They will need fixing once you have checked they are the right thickness. Use a little mastic glue or a couple of screws and plugs.)

Before jumping to conclusions that the floor is out of level check the frame is not out of plumb. It might be easier to move the frame. This involves taking off at least one architrave and finding the nails or screws that the frame is fixed with. You also run the risk of disturbing the packers that the frame was put in with.

[Chippy]

If the old door is still fitted, the first thing to do is to have a good look at how it fits (in fact, if the old door has been removed, but is still available, it is worth re-hanging it for this).

If the door is a good fit - no uneven or excessive gaps, opens smoothly, catch locks OK - then you effectively have a template for your new door.

Check if the top corners of the old door are square, and carefully measure the width at top and bottom, to see if the old door has required planing.

Then put your two doors together, hinge edge uppermost, and transfer the hinge positions across, using a set-square. While they are together, check the length, to see if anything needs taking off the bottom.

Repeat this process for the latch/lock.

It is then just a matter of chiselling and drilling for hinges and lock.

[Michael McNeil]

A real investment if you have a decent car boot market near-by, is an old wooden Jack Plane. If the bottom is in good condition and the blade has enough steel left once you get the hang of sharpening it and setting it (put it in flush and tap the wedge until the blade comes out about 1/16", then try it from there) you will find that it whips the edge off almost any door nearly as fast as an electric planer. (Just as fast if you consider cleaning up after.)

You might get one for a few pence certainly no more than a couple of quid. Make sure it is good condition though.

[Suz]

Ah takes me back a decade to my Grandad's garage and work bench. He used to let me plane odd bits of wood (2 decades ago). His was ancient and so sharp it was like a knife through butter. Wonder if my uncle still has it, hmm? Have the spirit levels, don't have the chisels. Couple of old crap ones that are more use as a lever than anything else.

The door frames are prob 60 years old and have a billion yrs of cellulite looking paint on them. They would require a good bit of effort to get the paint layers off, and the frames were never anything special, definitely not level, but not too bad. Would I be better tackling them as is, or try and replace with new - running the risk of tearing of more than frame etc etc.?

[Suz]

Thanks for all that Michael. We are prob. distant cousins from Barra :-) Suzanne

[Michael McNeil]

The sweet way they used to run over wood made the iron ones feel like sticky. If someone had bothered to design an adjuster for the blade depth they would never have been replaced. The thing is once you get the hang of adjusting them they are a pice of cake so the thumb controls were never seen as necessary.

You can get very good chisels for a quid or two these days. Car boots again. There are a couple of good market stalls near here that sell those made in China tools for a pound each regardless of size.

If your only problem is paintwork then just scrape and strip it off. Will you be able to find doors of the right size? And if you have to replace the frame will you know how to make the thing fit if it's a little out?

I would leave that alone unless you are feeling brave. How about your Grandad? Is he still around?

[Peter Ashby]

Can you be made somewhere else and still get them?

Peter Commas are a useful aid to sense.

[RichardS]

Aieeee - not a grammar and punctuation thread again.....

food for thought:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer

in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is

taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a

toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we

do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. ceehiro

Certainly explains some of TNP's posts....

cheers

Richard

-- Richard Sampson

email me at richard at olifant d-ot co do-t uk

[Peter Ashby]

No, no, just that the humour in one possible interpretation struck me. The problem is not that sense can be garnered with limited information density, it is that the sentence lacks a comma so one after 'China' gives a different meaning from one after either 'sell' or 'tools'. The lack of a comma means I have to choose the sense that was meant. The idea of a car boot sale that only sold to those made in China suggested itself to me before the more sensible interepretation.

Peter

[Suz]

Archibald McNeill entered this life 12th May 1900 and left it in July 1997. His great-grandaughter was born 9th May 2000, but we didn't call her Archibaldina ;-)

[Suz]

Where exactly would you put the commas in that sentence? Go on, show us.

"There are a couple of good market stalls near here that sell those made in China tools for a pound each regardless of size."

Can't stand dot the i's, cross the t's people. Good communication is what it's all about. Look how much language has changed in a short time, from Chaucer to Shakespeare, to Shelley, to Amis and Murdoch. Language is not a set of rules, but a beautiful, fluid, ever evolving process of communication. It'll turn your hair white, what the next generation are doing to language with "txtng". Vowels are redundant and lots of sentence structure is dropped. Nevertheless, they still communicate. In this Century we have changed and removed a lot of language since Chaucer's time. You gotta roll with it.

[N. Thornton]

Hi Suz.

Its easier than they all suggest :) It really is. Nice tools are nice, but none are essential.

Basically you offer the new door to the frame, and see where it needs trimming down to fit in the frame. You're looking for a gap of 3-6mm all round, sides, top, bottom.

Trim door with saw (any, but circular is easiest) then plane (again, electric is easy and fast)

Now you can chisel little bits out where the hinges go - just look at the old door - or you can just not do this, it isnt necessary. But if you dont, allow for 6-7mm gap.

Lift the door up to where it will end up, using wedges, screwrivers, anything, and mark carefully where the hinges go.

Screw hunges to door Screw hinges to frame

Eureka.

The one ESSENTIAL in this whole process is that you meansure and cut EXACTLY. You dont have 5mm error to spare. So check, be accurate, but other than that its easy nuff.

Tools: a chisel will be needed for fitting the latch, lock etc. Your manky old ones are perfect, just get a round grind stone and put it in the drill, and get the end as straight and clean as poss. Dont throw old chisels away!

Regards, NT

[geoff]

In message , RichardS writes

Hey that's good - I've only seen that about 6 times recently - and double spaced too ...

[RichardS]

Ah, well....

I get most crap thats going round, but this one only once. guess you're just lucky!

I _did_ toy with the idea of shuffling the lines around... leaving the first and last in the correct place of course.

You sure it's double spaced? could be the belgian beer again.. :-)

-- Richard Sampson

email me at richard at olifant d-ot co do-t uk

[geoff]

In message , RichardS writes

Look for yourself - an > in between every line

bloody softies ...

[Peter Ashby]

Oh I agree with that, and the wonderful possibilities for comedy from the ambiguities inherent in the language too. Which is what I was getting at. There are two ways of reading the sentence.

Peter

[Andrew Gabriel]

I could manage without commas, but if the "made in China" had been quoted (or identified as a likely multi-word adjective in some other way before it was scanned), I would only have had to scan the sentence once to comprehend it. My scanning tripped up first time at "... that sell those made in" which caused me to check back that I hadn't read it wrongly. The line break positioning in your quoted text didn't help, which was not a factor in the original, but I didn't read the original until afterwards.

[Michael McNeil]

Why?