Has anyone ever hung any interior doors?

[dennis thompson]

I guess this is a form of woodworking. My wife would like to change four of our interior doors from bi-fold doors to solid doors. I have never done this so I got an estimate from a local carpenter for the 4 doors plus installation, it came to $1290 for the labor & materials. I'm thinking of trying it myself. I can buy a cheap door & the hardware at Home Depot for about $60, so even if I experiment & see I can't do it I'll only have risked a small amount (& then I'll hire the carpenter). Has anyone ever hung interior doors? Is it very difficult? Any hints on how to do it?
Thanks
Dennis

[Jerome Stanek]

I have hung hundreds of them what do you need to know.

[Dave Zellers]

I have hung hundreds of them what do you need to know.

Same here. Jerome and I and others will talk you through it.

Hey Jerome- I grew up in Akron!

Dennis- you'll need shims, 16d finish nails, and a good 78" level.

[Todd Burch]

I bought one of those $60 cheap doors @ HD a month or so ago. I installed it during a mission project our church was doing. REALLY cheap. I'll never buy another. Low density MDF for the guts of the door (aka - where the screws go that hold on the hinges).

[ray hampton]

Dennis,the first tool that I would consider is something to hold your door upright while you attach the hinges

[Peter Quinn]

I've made a lot of them, I've pre hung hundreds in a shop environment, I've fit a few I've made to some pretty old openings, I've hung a few factory made units. How to proceed depends on the field conditions and your tool set. It's not out of reach for a person with basic carpentry and wood working skills and the tools to do it, so you might take a shot at it, at the least you will learn something about hanging doors. You may even enjoy it!

If you can pull the trim, a pre hung is almost always easier to install than fitting a slabs to an existing opening. If you can't pull the trim as may be the case in many circumstances, this group can certainly walk you through a basic install procedure. in fact you are sure to get several methods for each step. Additionally google Gary Katz hanging doors, he used to have an excellent tutorial on his site and links to some of his older FHB articles which are a great visual reference to handle any situation. I use a few of his tricks for templating very out of square old openings and they are spot on..

[Myk Rian]

I changed out every door and bi-fold in the house last year, and consider myself a pro now.
As David said, 16D finish nails.
I used a 48" and 24" level.
Depending on the width of the bi-folds you remove, and the door you install, framing may need to be done. Build that 1/2" to 3/4" larger than the width of the door jambs.

[Craig McCormick]

Todd,

Are you finding better hollow doors elsewhere?

azcraig

I bought one of those $60 cheap doors @ HD a month or so ago. I installed it during a mission project our church was doing. REALLY cheap. I'll never buy another. Low density MDF for the guts of the door (aka - where the screws go that hold on the hinges).

[Paul Wunder]

Dennis,

Lowes and the Home Depot carry basic carpentry skills books covering everything from doors to windows to trim. Black and Decker and Fine Homebuilding are two publishers. If you scan these books and review the detailed steps you can decide whether you want to tackle it yourself. It is not a high skill task and if you have patience, some good pictures and instructions it can be done. You will save at least half of what the carpenter wanted, build a skill, and convince the Significant Other that you earned the new tool the you were lusting over.

[Larry Edgerton]

I never use nails on doors. I pull the stop on the hinge side at least and use screws. I get the door set close with GRK reverse thread 3 1/8" finish screws. You can quickly adjust the jamb in and out with this type of screw. I then shim behind each hinge and use a GRK #10 full head screw. Then set the other two sides to the door. Replace stop.

If not on carpet you may have to trim the bottom of one jamb to get the head level.

Ifyou are hinging in place make up a router jig to route the hinge mortices on both the jamb and door. Easy to make and for one job that all doors are the same height making one is cheaper. Don't forget to drop the jamb hinges a heavy 1/16 from the door so you have room at the top.

You can do it, whichever you are doing, prehung or morticing in hinges. Read up a bit and if you have any specific questions just ask.

Larry

[Myk Rian]

We bought our doors at Menards. 3 hinges. They were able to match the styles between the doors and bi-folds.

Start with the hinge side of the jamb. Get it plumb and straight. Then the top, and finally the latch side. I did the hinge and top parts without the doors in.
Hung the doors to do the latch side so I could get even spacing with the door. Worked great.
I only have 1 door that gave me trouble due to the wall being out of plumb. It's the door to my util room/man-cave. As much as 1/2" out of plumb. Still haven't trimmed the inside of it. A real PITA that one is.

[Mike Henderson]

Even I've hung doors, both pre-hung and where I built the jamb and head. And if I can do it, anybody can do it - I don't at all consider myself a finish carpenter. It's easiest to do with painted jamb because paintable, sandable calk hides a lot of sins.

One issue with pre-hung doors is that the jamb may not be the exact width of your wall - in my situation, it was too narrow. I glued a strip on one side of the jamb to bring it to full width.

When aligning the jamb, make sure it's plumb in two directions - inside the door and against the wall. If you don't make it plumb against the wall, when you attach the door, it will tend to swing to the low spot instead of being stable where ever you put it. Or, when you close the door, one part of the door will hit the stop and another part will be some distance from the stop. Your goal is to have the jambs perfectly upright, and when you close the door, the door hits the stop all along the length of the stop.

Also, your other goal should be to get the reveal even and equal all around the door - and not too big.

It's really not difficult if you take your time. I used screws to hold the jamb because I could back them out when I made mistakes. And you need shims to put between the jamb and the the frame to plumb the jamb. The frame is never straight.

Mike

[John Lifer]

One thing to think about before you purchase the doors is which hand you want to make them and for that matter you can change sides the door opens into (as long as not a closet). You can do it!

[Larry Edgerton]

Mike, I think you are confusing casing and jamb. Casing is the trim, Jamb is what the hinges are morticed in to.

Larry

[Jason Roehl]

Even I've hung doors, both pre-hung and where I built the casing. And if I can do it, anybody can do it - I don't at all consider myself a finish carpenter. It's easiest to do with painted casing because paintable, sandable calk hides a lot of sins.

One issue with pre-hung doors is that the casing may not be the exact width of your wall - in my situation, it was too narrow. I glued a strip on one side of the casing to bring it to full width.

When aligning the casing, make sure it's plumb in two directions - inside the door and against the wall. If you don't make it plumb against the wall, when you attach the door, it will tend to swing to the low spot instead of being stable where ever you put it. Or, when you close the door, one part of the door will hit the jamb and another part will be some distance from the jamb. Your goal is to have the jambs perfectly upright, and when you close the door, the door hits the jamb all along the length of the jamb.

Also, your other goal should be to get the reveal even and equal all around the door - and not too big.

It's really not difficult if you take your time. I used screws to hold the casing because I could back them out when I made mistakes. And you need shims to put between the casing the the frame plumb the casing. The frame is never straight.

Mike

Mike, I think you have some terms confused. What you're calling the "casing" is the jamb, which is made of 3 parts: the hinge side, the head jamb and the strike side. "Casing" is the trim that is applied to cover the gap between the jamb and the wall. What you call the "jamb" is the "stop" or "stop molding". If the jamb is not the same width as the thickness of the wall (a typical 2x4 wall with 1/2" drywall on each side will get a 4 9/16" jamb), the strip added to the edge of the jamb is known as an extension jamb.

A properly hung door should stay wherever you put it--it should not swing open or closed on its own. I like to shim in at least 3 places on the hinge side (just below each hinge, and I'll put a nail underneath each of those sets of shims--this allows adjustments to the shims later if needed, and by not putting them behind the hinge, the door can be adjusted years later with a long (3") screw in place of a hinge screw (typically the center screw of a hinge because it's closest to the center of the jamb). Then I'll also shim in at least 3 places on the strike side, keeping the gap between the door and the jamb consistent all the way around. In recent years, I've found that the head jamb is often not long enough on pre-hung doors, so I'll separate the joint between the head jamb and strike jamb slightly (~1/8"). Another option is to plane the strike edge of the door, but that's a messy endeavor, especially on a finished door.