Preferred interior door brand?

[Mike Cornelsen]

I'm replacing my smooth hollow-core interior doors with solid wood 6-panel doors. I've looked at Masonite, Jeld-Wen, ReliaBilt and am currently leaning towards a Simpson. I only need 5 doors so I'm looking for quality over price. I'm not looking for any fancy wood species as I'll eventually trim out the rest of the rooms to match the doors. While I may paint them, even pine will stain OK with a base coat of shellac (and pine molding is widely available). I was just wondering if anyone has a favorite brand or a don't go there brand. Thanks!

[Neal Clayton]

considered building them yourself?

doors are not terribly complex, assuming you have a decent mortiser in addition to the other basic requirements (jointer/planer/table saw/router table or shaper).

and with 6 panels you won't have a need for wide/expensive panel boards, they'll probably wind up being 8-10 inches or so.

even if you don't have the mortiser you could justify buying one. using lumber that costs 5 dollars a foot, for reference, you'll have ~25 board feet in a typical interior 1 3/8" door. even if you spend 200 dollars for higher end mortise locks/crystal knobs/brass lockplates/etc., you're looking at 300 bucks or so in material cost per door, which is less than half of what you'll pay for pre-finished doors from a manufacturer. 5 doors saves you at least 1500 bucks, which pays for a pretty spiffy mortiser .

[Mike Cornelsen]

With work, travel and the number of projects I've already got on the fire, it's a time issue. But still, building them myself should certainly be a consideration.

[Eiji Fuller]

considered building them yourself?

doors are not terribly complex, assuming you have a decent mortiser in addition to the other basic requirements (jointer/planer/table saw/router table or shaper).

and with 6 panels you won't have a need for wide/expensive panel boards, they'll probably wind up being 8-10 inches or so.

even if you don't have the mortiser you could justify buying one. using lumber that costs 5 dollars a foot, for reference, you'll have ~25 board feet in a typical interior 1 3/8" door. even if you spend 200 dollars for higher end mortise locks/crystal knobs/brass lockplates/etc., you're looking at 300 bucks or so in material cost per door, which is less than half of what you'll pay for pre-finished doors from a manufacturer. 5 doors saves you at least 1500 bucks, which pays for a pretty spiffy mortiser .

Why is it that so often people dont consider time as value????

If you can build, finish, prep all the hardware and pre hang each door for less than $300.00 worth of your time than it is worth it. If you have to by any tooling for it than that will cut in on that $300 of time per door. 300 is less than 6 hrs of time for me. If they are just your standard paint grade door it would be a total waste of my time. A stain grade/ cool designed door would be different.

[Mike Hollingsworth]

Those brands are mostly the same from the big boxes.
They have veneered faces. Check for peeling veneer.
Half show damage/defects.
You can't build these for the <$100 price tag, unless your time is worth nothing.

[Neal Clayton]

Why is it that so often people dont consider time as value????

If you can build, finish, prep all the hardware and pre hang each door for less than $300.00 worth of your time than it is worth it. If you have to by any tooling for it than that will cut in on that $300 of time per door. 300 is less than 6 hrs of time for me. If they are just your standard paint grade door it would be a total waste of my time. A stain grade/ cool designed door would be different.

no one off custom built piece no matter what it is will ever be built in the time that a factory can build lesser pieces with, considering they have automated finishing lines and CNC machines.

i don't see how that conflicts with someone doing such things as a hobby in their spare time.

[Eiji Fuller]

no one off custom built piece no matter what it is will ever be built in the time that a factory can build lesser pieces with, considering they have automated finishing lines and CNC machines.

i don't see how that conflicts with someone doing such things as a hobby in their spare time.

I dont say it conflicts either but youre still saying hoby time is worthless?

[Ben Franz]

I've has pretty good luck with Simpson doors. I used to buy them from a local door shop that pre-hung them in whatever type of jambs I needed. If you want a paint grade door, Tru-Stile makes a (mostly) MDF door with wood strips at the hinge and lock areas. They are heavy, dead flat/straight and paint up great for maybe 70% of the cost of solid wood. One word of caution - buying doors at the Borg is a real c**p shoot. I had such a high rate of problems I refused to buy doors there no matter what my clients wanted. The same products were maybe 15-20% more at door shops but the quality was 100% higher.

[Rick Potter]

I bought MASONITE six panel interior doors that have a kind of lightweight particle board interior. I got them because they were lightweight, but still solid. These were all to be painted. One problem was that EVERY pre-drilled lockset cavity had to be redone, as they didn't fit Schlage locks (I made a jig). Most of them also had pre-routed hinge pads that were routed crooked side to side. Got them at HD.

I don't understand how a major company cannot clamp a jig on correctly.

Rick Potter

[Chris Harry]

I did actually build a few interior doors myself in my house. Bought the 6 panel slab, built the jambs, mortised the hinges, etc. Its a pain. Came out nice, but if you find a decent lumberyard they can get you about anything you want.

I got Masonite branded doors from a local lumberyard. Solid core, pre-primed (I wanted mine painted white). The hinge mortises and door handle openings were perfect. The 5 doors delivered to my house, truck driver even took them out and put them exactly where I wanted. Sure beat building them myself, and the quality and price (they were CHEAPER than getting the same door from HD, Lowes) couldnt be beat.

I sprayed all 5 with my HF HVLP gun and for about 500.00 including doors, paint and the HVLP gun, I had 5 doors done and ready to go in a couple days.

[Paul Ryan]

I recently when through the same thing. But for the cost of 8/4 red oak, my time, wear and tear on my tools, finishing, and so on and so forth, it wasn't worth making my own. I have used menards solid doors before, there are veneer but decent doors. They had a crazy day sale this summer $89 for a pre-hung unfinished solid core 4 panel door. I don't know how they sell them for that price. The bathroom closet door I had to build. it is a 17" door. That would have been a special order door from menards, same manufacturer (mastercraft) same build quality, it would have run me $240. Materials for the closet door still ran me $120. They look really close the profile is a little off but you can only tell if 2 doors are side by side. If you need a different wood other than pin or oak, then it might make sense to build your own. But if not, I would buy them.

[Neal Clayton]

I dont say it conflicts either but youre still saying hoby time is worthless?

anything anyone builds as a hobby is trading time for money, is it not? if they didn't want to trade time for money they would hire someone else to build it.

one would assume that most people on this forum are in the habit of trading time for money, else they wouldn't be here.

[Peter Quinn]

Jeld wen and Simpson are both popular around here. I have looked at the fir slabs at the local Borg and they are falling apart in e store, so beware of those.

As far as making them, it can be a winner or a loser depending on your situation. It takes 40 bf to make an acreage raised panel door, 8 hours for paint grade, maybe 10 -12 hours for stain grade, including sanding but not finishing. And that's if your already well equipped and know what your are doing. You gain a little on setup times with multiples, so figure perhaps a bit less than those time numbers, but not by much. It's easy to see revalue in buying for a basic door. I've made the poplar and mdf doors in my house for $80 materials plus 6 hours per door from rough lumber to ready to hang, and as they are a custom order from most manufacturers it's still a winner for me if you don't figure in the $30k worth of tools in the shop, And the free access to a wide belt sander at work.

For a basic paint grade slab or pre hung I'd probably go with Simpson myself.

[Mike Cornelsen]

Wow. Very interesting discussion. I think I'll buy a manufactured door right now to get my laundry room remodel completed (pocket door). But I'm going to let the idea of making the other doors percolate in my slow-cooker brain.

[Peter Quinn]

Wow. Very interesting discussion. I think I'll buy a manufactured door right now to get my laundry room remodel completed (pocket door). But I'm going to let the idea of making the other doors percolate in my slow-cooker brain.

A lot of guys like to do their own entry ways if tackling a large door project interests you. It lets you focus on one interesting and beautiful door rather than go through the repetition of making multiple basic doors. With a decent hardwood entry way often in excess of $2500, it starts to make sense cost wise too. You can do side lites, a transom, an elliptical head transom with in swing lites...well whatever you feel like tackling! Making a dozen 6 panel doors in paint grade sounds more more like work than fun to me.

I just finished gluing up an entry door for my neighbor this morning, a simple 3 over 1 craftsman type thing with three little lites up high that will get stained glass, and one big lite below from the falling apart door this one is replacing. I can tell you that gluing up a door alone with multiple bars and 6 tenons with a glue that has a 10 minute open time sure gets your heart racing.