Hercules, the senior German Shepherd went walk-about this morning. It was an hour before he decided to amble on home.
He knew he was in the wrong. He slunk up the driveway like a hen-pecked husband sporting fresh lipstick on his collar and the odor of way too many gin-and-tonics. Belladonna gave him a very stern talking-to.
Examining the site of the jail-break revealed that sub-optimal door hanging caught up with us.
You can see from the drag marks on the strike plate that the bolt is hitting low and just barely hits the opening.
This is what it looked like before I removed the strike plate. Easily a half-inch gap between the door face and the strike plate. The sleeve that carries the bolt wobbled its way out. The bolt engaging the hole in the strike plate by the a fingernail, and only because it wobbled upward.
The original installation was 2002. Tightening the screws on the door hinge raised the bolt every-so-slightly but not enough to address the issue.
It was clearly a poorly installed door from Day One.
Looking at two other doors from that vintage of installation also revealed issues that need to be dealt with.
"For want of a nail..." and all that.
One of my sister's dogs learned to pull down and out on the door lever and open the door without human help.
ReplyDeleteChanging the lever to a knob fixed the problem.
You may be able to shim the appropriate hinge to move the door into better alignment with the striker plate as a stop gap measure.
Shim the bottom hinge of the door with a bit of paper or cardboard to raise the other side of the door.
ReplyDeleteEasy, cheap fix that doesn't require the door to be removed, only the screws on the bottom hinge. It takes suprisingly litle to make a big change at the latch.
Right. I have found that paper match covers work great for that.---ken
ReplyDeleteSure, blame the DOG for being a DOG. Tell me you would have done different if the situation was reversed. Go on.
ReplyDeleteSir! (Drawing myself up with great dignity) If I had staged a jail-break I would have taken Mrs ERJ with me, and she very rarely wears lipstick.
DeleteLOL, I would say good doggie, but apparently I'm in the minority! :-)
ReplyDeleteIn situations like this, the die-grinder is your friend and labor-saving device. If the door is OK as hung in the frame, just carve a little out of the striker plate so the latch can pass and locate properly. Less than a minute.
ReplyDelete