Installing a Pre-hung Interior door

Installing an interior Pre-Hung Door

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Someone said they needed help installing a door.Hope this helps.Installing a door is childs play for a carpenter. The devils in the details. Picking the right door for the project. The variable can come back to bite you. What are some of the things to consider. Lets start with the size of the door. The depth of the door jamb. The swing of the door. A pre-hung ? Hollow core or solid ? Is the slab flat or is it going to be a raised panel?

Will the door be post formed or will the carpenter make a custom door ? Particle board or real wood ? Is the door pre finished, raw or primed?

Lets make some assumptions. The door has been choosen and all things considered. We are replacing an old door with a hollow core door and the jamb size is accounted for. The wall is wood framed with 3/4 " drywall both sides.You have purchased a door with a left hand swing. The opening is fairly squared, with a just the right width and the floors are level.

You have enough shims and all the right size finishing nails for the door and the standard size casing. Because the floor is level and the open squared all you have to do is pre measure the opening to check for the best placement inside the opening. Envision the door set in place and having to put the casing on. The casing in trim arounf the door. You want it to have a nice reveal even on three sides and you want to be sure that when the door is set that the casing will work for you and not be too narrow. This will be determined by the size of the opening.

Some carpenters will center the door in the opening and shim the two side and header. I prefer to favor the hinge side keeping as tight to the frame work as possible. Because we are dealing with a hollow core door it is okay to center the door in the opening. If it were a solid core door it would be to heavy. If it were a little over sized like an 8 or 9 ft. door and solid I would definitely favor the hinge side and I would purchase longer screw in what ever finish matched the finish of the screws on the door. I would replace at least two of the short screws per hinge with the longer screws, making sure that it was long enough to go through the door jamb and into the wood framing around the rough opening.

For the purpose of this example we are dealing with a hollow core door that is not heavy or over sized. You made sure that you had enough space between the header above the door jamb and the jamb itself. You want adequate space along the bottom to help with air exchange and you have considered the finish of the floor and future remodeling or replacement of the floor. Raise the door now so that you don't have to under cut the door later.

Centering the door give us about 3/4" space around the opening and that works. Our casing is a standard size 2 3/8" wide. I like spacing my shims behind the hinges for a minimum three sets of shims. I do that so that the jamb is secured in place. I start withe the hinge side first and tac that in place while keeping an eye on plumbing the door and keep my jamb square.Rember we checked for problems and determined everything was good to go.

Next I tac the oposite side top and bottom again making sure to keep the door frame or jamb squared. I let the door close and check for a perfect reveal around the three side of the door and jamb. We want just the right amount of even space around the door. Be sure not to make it to tight. Opening the door a few times and checking for the reveal we want and the plumb of the door. we also want the header to be level. We make all the adjustments and firm up the fastening of the shims and finally set the last of the shims behind the jamb where the hardware is going to go. That area where the striker plate is going to be. It lends security to the door.

With that done you are ready to install the casing. Most doors come with the trim pre mitered. Just check it so that the space is even all the way around and the mitered cuts are right. Tac it to the jamb and later to the wall remember to marked where the 2x4's were in the rough opening and nail into that area.

Once you have done both sides go back and set you nails deeper than the surface of the trim and fill it with wood filler. Let dry sand the wipe it down and caulk around the door trim, door stops there you have it. Piece of cake. Call your husband and tell him it's his job to install the hardware.If you have a question call me but I suspect you'll be fine. I have been in construction in one way or another for over twenty years. I am no longer in construction because of my health speaking of which i need to plug my website I built after I had three stints placed in my main artery. I keep asking myself daily Why Plavix ? Eat right and please stay healthy.

Thank you and God Bless

Joe Garcia

aka joeygee007