We have a fairly old wooden front door which rarely gets used, and just recently the mortice lock inside the door has seized up and cannot be opened with the key. The door has been kept locked for quite sometime now, and we only found out the lock had siezed just by accident.
Is there anyway it can be freed, preferrably without taking the door off??
Thanks
aerosol oil? WD40?
ROn Fri, 29 Feb 2008 10:08:34 +0000 someone who may be Bob H wrote this:-
That is what penetrating oil is for. It penetrates mechanisms and (hopefully) frees them. The most well known is WD40.
First time I've heard a silicone water displacer called 'penetrating oil'.
First time I've heard that WD40 contains a silicone. Not mentioned here anyway
Anyway, to me, penetrating oil is very light machine oil containing graphite.
WD40 does not contain silicones.
Which was my real point.
On Fri, 29 Feb 2008 12:09:06 -0000, "LSR" had this to say:
Plus Gas is probably the best known penetrating oil. WD40 is useless for the purpose.
Could be that the door has swollen or distorted so that the lock bolt is binding in the door frame. Try pushing/pulling or lifting the door as you turn the key.
Yes that was my thought when I read the OP. Not an uncommon situation particularly considering how wet it has been recently.
Well, the manufacturer seems to think it both penetrates & lubricates. Or are they wrong too?
Urban myth. WD40 contains mineral oil. But you are right that "real" penetrating oil contains anti-rust additives.
Plus Gas is very good, but WD 40 may work on a lock.
Well, I learned something. But I knew it wasn't 'penetrating oil' even if they market it as such. I'd use Plusgas or even a petrol/oil mixture.
On 29 Feb 2008 20:32:29 GMT, "Bob Eager" had this to say:
Somebody on Another Group once recommended the following as an ersatz perpetrating oil:-
80 parts paraffin oil 10 parts machine oil 5 parts diseasel, and 5 parts petrol.
Their use of the letters WD should be enough to tell you it is a Water Dispersing fluid, just like LY is used to denote a Lithium product (usually a grease.) O is used to denote an Oil and G is used denote a more normal Grease (this is at the highly technical end though). As I don't have my lubricants book any more, I can't go into this any further. Shell produce the books for industry.
Dave
ps other manufactures sometimes use different codes, just to confuse things, but generally they stick to the letters.
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