Replies

1. 
   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 05:58am | #1

   *
   Trick number one would be looking for a quality unit. Sounds flippant, but the idea of a prehung is ease of installation-- instead you are at the mercy of the low pay guys assembling them at the plant. Cheap butts, mortises are too deep or too shallow, the bevel is bad, the jambs are trash. I've hung hundreds of doors and those cheap prehungs from HD can be the worst. A good one almost hangs itself.

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 07:00am | #2

   *Are we talking interior pre-hungs, or exterior pre-hung doors?There is a difference in technique.James DuHamel

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 07:01am | #3

   *Brent:Lone cat is right about the quality of the per-hung door. I never thought that I would be giving door hanging advise over the internet. In person it is easy to say " see, like this". Any way, the first "trick" that comes to mind has to do with using pnumatic finish nailers. Position the unit in the opening and start by "floating" the unit on a few nails. With a nail gun you can hold the jamb away from the framing and shoot a few nails high and low on each side and the unit floats on the nails with out touching the rough frame.This makes it very easy adjust. If you eye ball it close enough, the door may actually open and shut. I then start to add shims, bottom hinge first and gradually add more shims and nails as I check all aspects. I always tell people, don't nail too much too soon. Meaning that with just a few nails the door is still adjustable. If you concentrate on plumb first then go to your margins don't for get to cycle back and check plumb again. Chances are you knocked the door out of plumb when you adjusted somthing else. Do you see where I am going with this? One thing often affects another. I try to have the head and upper part of the jambs flush with the drywall and take up any "sissor" at the bottom. That way the caseing mitres will be nicer and any out-of-plumb problem shows at the bottom where you can roll the caseing easier.If you want to show up on the job tomorrow I can show you lots of framing problems and lots of tricks. Speed comes with practice and experimentation. Maybe if I sleep on this I can come up with some more advise tomorrow. I hope some of this made sense.

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 08:08am | #4

   *Ross, do you really float the frame on nails first? My experience or common sense tells me that if the frame needs to go closer to the trimmer, the nail heads usually cause wood to uplift because of the reluctance of the gun nails to move again once they are shot in. I always gun nail to a well placed shim and attempt to place the top hinge 1/16 out of plumb(to account for hinge wear) I would much rather pry the frame away from the trimmer if need be. I set the rest of the door frame to the door once the door is back on its hinges. I guess I should have said I take the door out of the frame prior to hanging the frame. I also take the stop off if it is removable because the door shops seem to always install it against the door on the hinge side causing a bind when the door is closed. The stop needs to be set away from the door on the hinge side about 1/16. I guess this really doesn't fall in the category of "tricks" it's just procedure. Something that might be considered a trick is bending the hinge with a cresecnt wrench to account for leaves that are set too deep.

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 09:47am | #5

   *Hi guys,R Hayes, I'll bet you could work alot faster if you tried Ross's method. Can't believe that too many of us here remove the door from the frame to hang the frame.My Tricks: I usually do my own rough and finish. Frame jack stud on rough frame perfectly plumb with straight stud. Make opening about 3/8" bigger than door frame with even the latch side pretty plumb. Now take prehung door and blast the jamb right on to jack stud (its plumb remember). Blast remaining jamb on to latch side jack. Pry frame from jack to perfect reveal. Add shims as required and finish nailing. Interior prehung following my own framing should not take even 1/2 hour. Realistically following others shouldn't take much longer either. That may be slow by others standards but I'm not a production carpenter.The pitfall: if floor is unlevel and you nail hinge jamb lower than latch jamb can go, you must cut jamb or remove and reinstall higher. Solution to pitfall: set jambs above rough floor or scribe to finish floor.joe d

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 03:29pm | #6

   *Hey Lonecat, Couldn't agree with you more. Out here most builders get there doors from a door shop that assembles all their own jambs and I would have to say by paying the extra cost over HD or Lowes you would expect better quality. Unfortunately, you don't get it. Warped and twisted jambs, and improperly cut mortises are common. I once recieved an exterior unit that was supposed to be a RH unit and found that the bevel on the latch side was backward. Oh well, it does make the job a challenge. MDM.

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   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 04:19pm | #7

   *Joe , I've hung doors by just about every method possible. If I was hanging a door for you or Ross I would spend about 10 minutes per opening and in your words "blast" it in the opening.Something else that you would probably consider slow is putting on a pair of clean cloth gloves before handeling any doors or frames.

4. 
   Guest_ | Mar 08, 2000 11:49pm | #8

   *After I check the hinge side trimmer for plumb, I hang them by reveals and how they hit the latch side stop. Another thing, I don't nail through the shims. I keep my nails just below my shims so I can ultra fine tune them after evrything is all nailed off. A well hung door is not hingebound, has even reveals on both sides and top, and stikes the latch side stop along its entire length.

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   Guest_ | Mar 09, 2000 02:10am | #9

   *Brent,

   The problem with given someone "tips" on hanging doors is that there are different tips for different situations. To give you a tip would most likely be useless unless they match your conditions.

   The best tip I could give you would be to hang a couple hundred doors and you can develop your own.

   That notwithstanding I would give you some suggestions on how to proceed.

   These simple steps will tell you whether your door will fit into the R.O. correctly. Make sure that you have a rough opening that is at least an 1-1/2" larger than the width measured from the outside of one jamb to the outside of the other across the head jamb. In some cases the jacks on either side of the door frame can be very badly out of plumb, making even this space not large enough to hang the door. A simple way to check this with a plumb bob. Drop it down form each corner of the door header, if either of the bottoms of the jacks touch or pass your plumb mark, you're going to have a problem. It would save you more time to do this than to put the door up and start to hang in and than find out its not right. Check to make sure that you have at least 1" more than the length of the door in the R.O. Give a quick check of the floor to see if its level or not. If it not level against you the 1" in height difference in the R.O. may not be enough.

   These steps will tell you how your door will hang in the opening.Check how plumb the wall is on both sides of the R.O. This will let you know how badly if at all your jamb will pass on one side and be in on the other. I mean this through the door and not across the door. Take a six foot straight edge and lay it across the R.O. You do this by first holding the full six section on one wall and than slide it across the other side. 0 to 3/16" difference I have found to be workable. If it should be more it will only add to the condition I stated above.Once you know this, that's where the tips would come in handyGood luck.

   View Image © 1999-2000"The first step towards vice is to shroud innocent actions in mystery, and whoever likes to conceal something sooner or later has reason to conceal it." Aristotle

6. 
   Guest_ | Mar 09, 2000 06:04am | #10

   *Brent:There is some good advise out there. Crazy Legs' comments are very concise. I guess its like thinking of the goal and finding the most direct route there.The stop should be spaced away from the door at the hinge side. R. Hayes found that this is not always the case. As Lone Cat said not all pre-hung doors are created equal. Good doors from a good door shop do make a lot of differance. Yes I do float the jamb on nails to start and it is very easily adjusted with a non- maring dead blow rubber mallet or the heal of a running shoe....some tines with a light push of the hand. Crazy's comment about nailing near but not through the shim to start is good advise. Well Brent, practice is a good teacher. I hope all the information so far has helped.

7. 
   Guest_ | Mar 09, 2000 10:39pm | #11

   *Brent,

   Somehow when I first wrote it I thought I had said it this way but after rereading I didn't. The statement should have read "move in 3/4" from each corner of the door header and drop your plumb line". . . Well at least no one caught me on it. ;-}

   View Image © 1999-2000"Whenever, therefore, people are deceived and form opinions wide of the truth, it is clear that the error has slid into their minds through the medium of certain resemblance's to that truth." Socrates

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   Guest_ | Mar 10, 2000 12:22am | #12

   *Geez Joe, and I just returned all my doors for smaller ones cause I thought they wouldnt fit ;-)

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   Guest_ | Mar 10, 2000 01:11am | #13

   *Jim,

   ooooops ;-}.

   View Image © 1999-2000

10. 
    Guest_ | Mar 27, 2000 06:06am | #14

    *i dont know if this is a canadian thing....but aroung here we hang our doors with zero head screws...they are not as messy as casing nails and in the event of a mistake in the reveal you can back the screw out easily...another tip that i find helpful when hanging pre hung doors is to check the reveal on the door after it is delivered..if it is good make a small pencil mark on the door and on the jam and then when the marks are alighned again you know your reveal is good!

11. 
    Guest_ | Mar 28, 2000 04:22am | #15

    *I'm with the other guys who start with plumb hinge side, nail that sucker down, use planed down 1x3's as solid spacers if the opening's too big. Good to have a bunch of different thicknesses. I use long screws in a brass color on brass hinges to run through both studs. I try to get a long screw on the latch side through the strikeplate as well, seems to keep it more solid and stands up to some abuse.

12. 
    Guest_ | Mar 30, 2000 11:54pm | #17

    *Brent,I've never seen two carpenters hang any door exactly the same way. Each man has his own methods. You'll find yours.Ed. Williams

2. 
   brent_collins | Mar 30, 2000 11:54pm | #16

   *
   Any tricks on setting prehung doors? It seems to take me forever to get it right. Any tricks would be greatly appreciated. Thanks