(Un)hinged
I happen to have attended two jobs in a row where poor quality hinges have been the culprits. If you are having a new door or work done on your door, as well as asking about the quality of the locks being fitted, be a nuisance about the hinges.
A heavy door needs three good quality hinges. Two flimsy, pressed pieces of nonsense fabricated with zero quality control in China are going to give you problems down the line (and the line could be as little as a few weeks long).
The first door today had been set up for hinges of 2.5 mm thick steel. Someone had replaced them with 1.5 mm brass hinges. Firstly they weren’t strong enough, there already being signs of bending; and secondly, the door couldn’t actually close! The hinge-side of the door met the frame while the door was still ten degrees open. The poor hydraulic door closer I’d been brought along to adjust, was being asked to close a door that Hercules would have struggled with.
The second door had a kind of latch that we don’t see very often — one with “chain” built in. When you shut the door, a four-inch bar automatically grabs a little projection such that when you next open the door, it’s limited to opening just enough to see your visitor/assailant. Unless, that is, someone replaces the hinges with ones half as thick, the door ends up 2 mm further from the frame than it used to be, and the bar can no longer grab the projection.
