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I live in a 110 year old house, I know how satisfying that click is when it latches. Bravo
My garage was built in the 50s on a really bad foundation. The door latches perfectly in the winter. It doesn't latch at all in the summer.
You should check the hinges and the hinge plates to the door. Are any of the screw loose and if they are tighten them. And if you can't tighten them because there's no thread in the wood any more, throw in some toothpicks with glue, let it set and reinsert the screws. Check all the screws for the door. Then check to see if the door is lining up.
9/10 when a door misaligns, it's just the hinges and hinge screws becoming loose or failing.
That toothpick trick is genius. Does it hold?
100% you can also use a golf tee or drill the hole bigger and glue in a dowel. Just trim it flush and drill a pilot hole.
Amazing, thanks!
That toothpick trick is genius. Does it hold?
It does hold. I didn't believe it, but had one that was so bad I had no other option to repair it. Now it's like new.
In my previous house, I installed an electronic lock on an external door. The door, however, sometimes wouldn't close all the way, but my fellow occupants would just press the lock button and walk away. As a result, the bolt would press against the frame, twisting the mechanism and wearing at the wood. Eventually, it got bad enough that the hardware was freely wiggling in the door.
At the advice of a more competent co-worker, I tried this trick. It took three or four goes (I guess to fill in the cavity), but it worked.
My bathroom door won't latch all the way so it won't lock. I'm not particularly handy so I don't really know why it's like that. I also live alone so no one is going to barge into the bathroom anyway unless they are here to murder me.
Check to see that the door isn't sagging on the hinges and getting the latch and striker misaligned. You may also notice that the door is hard to fully shut if it's really off kilter.
If it is sagging, tighten the hinge screws, especially the ones going into the door frame. If those screws refuse to tighten, it means they have pulled the "threads" out of the wood. Fix this by removing one screw at a time, jamming some pieces of broken off toothpick into the hole, and then replacing the screw. The toothpick will make for new material for the screw to bite into.
Thanks! I will have to check this at some point!
If necessary (probably only if the door frame is old and damaged), you can also shim up the hinges with pieces of cardboard, cereal box, wood veneer. Whatever you need to do to get the door aligned in the door frame. The entire world is wedged together with shims.
There might be some adjustment on the striker plate in the door frame, too. That might require nudging, tightening, shimming, just like the door might.
Almost every door in my house has its own unique quirk. I've fixed a few of them, but I'm not a good handyman. (These are mostly internal doors - I've made sure most of the external ones are good as they seem more important.)
One door has a gap large enough to see through on the side. I don't think rehanging this would help - I think the door is improperly sized - but I haven't really investigated.
One door has a weak latching mechanism, so it very frequently simply fails to spring back and latch. My cats aren't allowed in this room and my 5 year old isn't diligent about checking that it latched, so we have to be careful with it.
One door has a really strong latching mechanism, so you have to pull it really hard (or twist the latch while closing it) to get it to latch.
One door has no latch or doorknob at all. Not even the hole for one. However, it does have the opening on the doorframe/wall. I bought a latch and latch installing kit, but I've been afraid to use them in case I don't manage to line up the latch with the existing opening.
One door is hard to open because the doorknob doesn't quite turn enough to pull the ... Piece out of the ... Wall hole. (I said I'm not a good handyman.)
One door is hard to open because, I think, it sometimes swells in the frame. I often have to use my body weight on this one to get it open after turning the latch.
One door opens and closes fine, but you have to slightly reopen it to use the deadbolt since it doesn't line up with the wall hole when fully closed.
One door has a problem not with the door itself, but the flooring in the room behind it. The tile was laid unevenly (a common problem in this house), so the door frequently gets stuck on it and has to be forced past.
Those are all the quirks I can recall offhand. I think the previous owner of the house did some very minor work but either tried to DIY with knowledge interior to even my own; or went with the absolute cheapest contractors. I still quite like my house, though.
When I went to do the final test I was a little worried it the handle might not work correctly so I made sure I had my phone, my leatherman, and a bottle of water “just in case”.
Lol. I'm glad I'm not the only one who has had to bring a Leatherman into the bathroom, just in case. Pretty much the exact same situation - I had repaired the door latch recently, and I didn't trust it yet.
How long until you started to trust it?…
…if ever?
Lol. I felt confident about it within a day or two.
The best part is every time you hear that latch you can think, "I did that"