Brand new door hard to close......man screams out loud.....news at 11

[Peter Quinn]

I had the great pleasure of installing a prehung steel entry door for my BIL today a part of a kitchen gut they are doing. Couldn't believe the experience. I used to make doors mostly, at my last job, am making a large set of very complicated entries presently at new job. How the heck hard is it to set the door at the right height in the jamb? Its done with a freaking CNC machine at the factory no? I'm an idiot with a plunge router and a $.50 MDF template, mine come out pretty darn good, nearly perfect on the best day. I had to rebuild the rough sill completely, so I took the time to get it level, set the door, carefully plumbed and leveled it, secured hinge side, the lock side, making sure everything was straight as I went, no bows, even gaps.......the threshold weather seal pushes so hard on the adjustable sill you can barely close the door. The sill is adjusted all the way down. They simply set the hinge locations on the door too high, so the door sits too low for tolerances. I had to walk away days end with a barely functional door in place, no time to fix it today. I will fix it, dowel the screw holes, lower the hinges on the door 1/8" (top gap between door and jamb head was nearly 1/4", tells me door sits too low), make it work. But why should I have to? I remember following a thread recently where the OP was describing the same symptoms with a new door he had installed, carpenter told him they all do this? No dice. I'm going to email the company and tell them what I think of their product in some very direct terms. What do you want for $250? I want a door that opens and closes personally. End rant.

[Bill Orbine]

Sigh! And many people don't realize the cost of true craftsmanship thinking what's the matter with a $250 door with all sorts of poor workman/ machine fab issues?

[Tom M King]

Yeah, but it was made fast and cheap, the most important two factors in building anything. Nothing else is as important. I hate prehung doors.

[jack forsberg]

you can buy a exterior door for $250????????????????????

[Bill Orbine]

you can buy a exterior door for $250????????????????????

And less!!!!!!!!!!

[Paul Girouard]

Good luck with that Peter.

When you move the door up you may end up having to adjust the strike side escutcheon as well to get it to latch.
I'd suggest moving the hinges UP on the jamb, you can use long screws on the inner two holes that should catch the trimmer studs. You still will need to bang some dowel or thin rippings into the holes but by using long screws on the inner two holes (assuming the hinges are type with four screws per leaf). If the jamb is paint grade you might get by with putty to fill the gap , or you could use a wood dutchmen in the gap.

Sadly it's pretty common issue in todays building environment, remember the guy hanging doors in most of the door places is maybe making $12.00.

He's more than likely using a "Norfield" door hanging machine that's 30 years old , not a CNC. And any jig , or CNC for that matter, is only as good as the person maintaining and running the machine.

[Todd Burch]

I hear ya.

I can't belief the cr@p they call "new prehung doors" these days. I just installed a house full - both interior and exterior. I was sorely disappointed. Some hinges routed out of line with the others, causing the door to bow. Stops not lined up in the corners. Stops nailed in with the tiniest of brads way too far apart and not vertical. Staples joining the top corners of the jambs sticking out into the inside face of the jamb, out the top and out the sides - just about every place but in the top rail. Nails meant to hold the door closed fully set into the jamb, so they had to be dug out to be removed.

Todd

[Peter Quinn]

you can buy a exterior door for $250????????????????????

Yeah Jack, that was the upgrade with stainless steel threshold. They had cheaper ones. The door is fine for what it is and where it's going, it's the jamb fitment that's lousy. They didn't need to spend more time or money, just set the darn machine up correctly and watch that it stays there.

Paul, I'm thinking of making adjustments on the door for two reasons, the door hinge mortises are square, the jamb is round so harder to fill with dutchmen. And the strike actually hits the latch plate a bit low, so raising the door should correct both problems. I just can't believe they can call it a door if it won't operate correctly when perfectly plumb and level. The glass looks nice! It's a good solution for the average working person of medium income that doesn't have $3500 or more to dump on a custom entry. But in this case it would have been quicker if they sold me a door and jamb set with no mortises than to put them in the wrong place. Did I mention that they also router the jamb mortises way way too deep? That I can fix with a few slips of veneer, but again, you make thousands of units it this stuff....just how hard is it to get it right?

[Jim Andrew]

We used to have a wholesale lumber company in our town, and where they started guys was in the door shop. From there they moved to counter sales. Their doors sucked.

[Mel Fulks]

Jim, I agree, lack of good management is the problem. Even easy jobs will be done sloppily without it.
Sounds like the place you described considered the door units only a sufficiently annoying initiation to earn the real job of
salesman.

[Peter Quinn]

We used to have a wholesale lumber company in our town, and where they started guys was in the door shop. From there they moved to counter sales. Their doors sucked.

Hey...I started in the door shop of a medium sized millwork operation! Maybe they were trying to tell me something? That really is where they started new hires, boss considered it less complicated than cabinetry because it operates largely in two dimensions and one of those is fixed, so the plans are easier to read. I saw it as swinging two bats in baseball during warm up....if you can glue up a complicated entry with 18 lites or a heavy 6 panel door cabinets seem pretty easy after that.

[Phil Thien]

This is the 2nd thread I've seen in as many months about a door that wouldn't work smoothly because of the threshold. And it seems like this isn't discovered until the install is pretty much complete.

When I've installed doors, I tack them in place and then open/close the door a few times to make sure it operates smoothly.

Once I'm sure it works, I proceed to fasten the frame in the rough opening, watching my reveals, and I continue to check the swing of the door.

I think I'd catch a manufacturing defect like this pretty early, and I'd get a replacement.

[Kevin Jenness]

Sounds familiar. Years ago my neighbor bought a "custom" kitchen from a factory. The drawers were made with sliding dovetails, but the fit was so loose that the sides were stapled to the fronts to keep them attached. They probably made hundreds of drawers per day, all of them wrong, with an expensive machine capable of close tolerance work, because the guy setting it up didn't care or didn't know any better and no-one above him was paying attention. Keep in mind that $250 door brought in about half that to the shop making it.

[Tom M King]

This is the 2nd thread I've seen in as many months about a door that wouldn't work smoothly because of the threshold. And it seems like this isn't discovered until the install is pretty much complete.

When I've installed doors, I tack them in place and then open/close the door a few times to make sure it operates smoothly.

Once I'm sure it works, I proceed to fasten the frame in the rough opening, watching my reveals, and I continue to check the swing of the door.

I think I'd catch a manufacturing defect like this pretty early, and I'd get a replacement.

I don't use prehung often, but I do something similar. I set one (can't really say "hung" one) last week as a new entry door into a basement in a flipper house. I use screws through the brick molding, and check the opening. With only a couple of screws on each side, you can check the movement, but still back a couple out and adjust. The one I set ended up needing to have the lock side of the jamb wedged up a 1/4". It opens and shuts fine. We ended up having to pack mortar under the now out of level sill, and the lock side has a quarter more reveal at the top than the hinge side.

[Mark Bolton]

If your on a job installing a pre-hung door there is no sense lamenting over the times youve had the luxury of assembling your own jamb-set and doing your own mortise work. The two worlds are light years apart and your not on the better of the two jobs. There is simply no way you can make/assemble a jamb, mortise three pair of hinges, bore a lockset and latch, and a strike, for what a pre-hung costs. Its simply not possible. Im buying six panel pine interior doors for 180/ea (non-borg) and thats all Im going to get paid to install other than on a primo' or restoration job. Carrying on about the things we've done in the past is fruitless. You have to work with the cards your dealt.

Of course if your hanging your own from scratch because you refuse to work with pre-hungs and eating the loss thats your own business but its not the real world.

To Peters original post,.. my guess as to what would happen on the production job site is that the installer would put a bulldog or other very robust bar under the hinge side of the door in the same way you would a drywall kicker. They would loosen the hinge screws slightly, stomp on the bar, and with all their weight on the bar run the screws back in. They'd likely be 3" everywhere including into the door. The end result would be levering the threshold down slightly (stretching/bending/breaking the staples) and pinching the door as high as they can in hopes to get the heck out of there before the door sags its way down and starts dragging again...

Sad, but true.

I had recent batch of interior doors from a very sound supplier to date that were simply atrocious. Any problem you could imagine including problems with the slabs which couldnt have been avoided if Id eaten a hundred a door and hung them myself. In the end it became clear it was the perfect storm of problems. A bad lot of slabs from south america (all slabs origin), a lack of qualified help at the distributor so newbies galore, and dovetailing in to the lack of qualified help was the fact that the distributor was so overwhelmed they fell behind in keeping their equipment in spec so hinge mortises were bad, lock bores were off and blown out, and so on.

Needless to say there are about 10 or 12 doors in my shop (free) that were just not worth installing. Sadly the ones that went in were acceptable but not great in my opinion. A clear sign that its time to move to a different trade because the uber high end doesnt exist where I am.

[jack forsberg]

if you refuse to do work with garbage you don't do garbage work. I don't care what the been counter says. When they dug up the pyramids they do not display the accounting government records it was the craft that we hold as the highest order.


i say stop buying this junk and all this BS that money is the only single metric to live by.

[Peter Quinn]

This is the 2nd thread I've seen in as many months about a door that wouldn't work smoothly because of the threshold. And it seems like this isn't discovered until the install is pretty much complete.

When I've installed doors, I tack them in place and then open/close the door a few times to make sure it operates smoothly.

Once I'm sure it works, I proceed to fasten the frame in the rough opening, watching my reveals, and I continue to check the swing of the door.

I think I'd catch a manufacturing defect like this pretty early, and I'd get a replacement.


You would think so...but....I live 65 miles from the job site, its pro bono for my SIL, she works for the vendor (not the manufacturer), the old one came out in pieces totally rotten so no backing up, we were doing it on a Sunday after a 65 hour work week, had to completely rebuild a non existent sub sill (really the strangest field condition I've ever seen...the last installer just hacked out the sub floor and the top of the joists/sill plate...and dropped a door into a hole where it sat and rotted), had to rip of that lovely aluminum wrap that comes with even lovelier vinyl siding job, back out the vinyl siding, tear out the casing, rebuild with Azek.....had to make a new construction 4 9/16" jamb fit a 100 year old wall that varies 3/8" from fat to skinny, all of it at least over 5"........started getting dark clouds in the early evening as we hit that "proofing" point. I did tack the thing in with trim heads so I could remove in event of catastrophic failure, which this is not. Add it all up.....If this were for a paying client, they would have a piece of plywood in the opening and an invitation to use the other entrance, and the big box the door came from would have that junk back on their loading dock complete with the garbage poorly mitered FJP brick mold it came with. Hey....if you are going to bother attaching brick mold, how about actually cutting the corners at 45 degrees? I removed it to make casing work with the vinyl siding hacks 25 year old work, didn't give up much of a fight. IN this case, the door had to go in like there was no tomorrow, because there really wasn't. No bringing it back option. Just making it work.

My point is I don't care how much the door costs, it should work as sold. The thing is in level, the gaps are perfect, they set the door too low in the frame....complete incompetence. For the love of god its an adjustable threshold, leave a 1/4" gap and bring the threshold up to meet the door in a nice weather sealing just friction sort of way. Next time I'm going to pick it out my self and set it up IN THE STORE and pile up any that don't work along the back wall after putting my hammer through them. Wild man from borneo making a big old pile of junk doors in aisle 10.....clean up in aisle ten please.....Actually if luck prevails this will be the last factor door I install in my life time. Course I'm not usually that lucky.

Here here to Jacks point, demand better. I guess I just didn't know they could actually make stuff this bad.

[Mark Bolton]

if you refuse to do work with garbage you don't do garbage work. I don't care what the been counter says. When they dug up the pyramids they do not display the accounting government records it was the craft that we hold as the highest order.


i say stop buying this junk and all this BS that money is the only single metric to live by.

That's all well and good provided you have reserves to sack out waiting for better work or plenty of better work to turn down the junk or refuse to install only buy the best.

I think I am in the middle of the two. My work is not so pressure filled that I cant refuse the junk and wait for replacement (and my customers appreciate that) yet I do have to be conscious of turning work.

The door job I mentioned literally cost me over a month over the course of the job. The dozen doors sitting in my shop that I may be able to pawn off on some cash customer walking through the door will pale in comparison to what I lost in that month+.

Its great to drive a stake in the ground buy unless you can shut your job down or force your cuatomers into a major upgrade its an easier said than done event.

[Tom M King]

I hear what you are saying Jack, and in working for a living, I have never used a prehung door. The one I posted about in this thread belonged to a house that my BIL just bought. He called begging, and I was in that town with no tools. He had already thrown away one new prehung door for that opening. I had to ask him to find tools as I needed them. When I needed a chisel, he brought me a pristine old Stanley 750, that looked like it had never been used, minus a handle. I told him it was worth about 40 bucks, and not to hit it with a hammer or anything metal. When we got finished putting in the POS door, he tried to pay me, but I wouldn't take anything. A few days later, a package came in the mail, and it was the chisel. I have plenty of chisels, and I have some extra NOS handles. I'm planning to sharpen it, put an original handle in it, and that will be my Christmas present to him.

I hate prehung doors, but do sometimes get conned into setting one.

[Rick Potter]

It's not just pre hung doors. Yesterday I adjusted the screen door on a slider. It was so out of square that if you lined up the edge of the screen with the channel it slips into, the screen wouldn't move. I had to adjust it so it would move, which left it not quite closed at the bottom while the top was hitting the frame. About a half inch out of square. I guess the installer forgot his level that day.

Rick Potter

[jack forsberg]

That's all well and good provided you have reserves to sack out waiting for better work or plenty of better work to turn down the junk or refuse to install only buy the best.

I think I am in the middle of the two. My work is not so pressure filled that I cant refuse the junk and wait for replacement (and my customers appreciate that) yet I do have to be conscious of turning work.

The door job I mentioned literally cost me over a month over the course of the job. The dozen doors sitting in my shop that I may be able to pawn off on some cash customer walking through the door will pale in comparison to what I lost in that month+.

Its great to drive a stake in the ground buy unless you can shut your job down or force your cuatomers into a major upgrade its an easier said than done event.


I agree with you mostly but i have driven a stake, I have declared war. i have said no, and i am taking my craft back. In the end all we have is our work when the money is all gone. We as the last generation of well rounded trades men need to remind both our patron and the industry what we think. I think all i am doing is standing solid in the current of the unconscious corporation. I am in charge of myself.

Whats wrong with integrity ?

[Mark Bolton]

I agree with you mostly but i have driven a stake, I have declared war. i have said no, and i am taking my craft back. In the end all we have is our work when the money is all gone. We as the last generation of well rounded trades men need to remind both our patron and the industry what we think. I think all i am doing is standing solid in the current of the unconscious corporation. I am in charge of myself.

Whats wrong with integrity ?

I too try to do that though unfortunately most of my work is for people who on their own simply don't know any better because its all they've ever known. I've spent many years on the costly path of educating my customers and will never stop but at least here in the states if your in the main stream your in for a long slog.

There is the juicy stuff out on the fringes but you've got to be well positioned or at least willing to work twice as hard to go after it.

I'll never adjust my standards down to the crowbar crew of door installers I mentioned but I have to find a happy medium to get work done. At least in my experience its an extremely rare occasion for the average homeowner in most areas to pay even a few dollars more. They see the retail junk on every home improvement show and their logic is if it's good enough for TV its good enough for me.

[jack forsberg]

I too try to do that though unfortunately most of my work is for people who on their own simply don't know any better because its all they've ever known. I've spent many years on the costly path of educating my customers and will never stop but at least here in the states if your in the main stream your in for a long slog.

There is the juicy stuff out on the fringes but you've got to be well positioned or at least willing to work twice as hard to go after it.

I'll never adjust my standards down to the crowbar crew of door installers I mentioned but I have to find a happy medium to get work done. At least in my experience its an extremely rare occasion for the average homeowner in most areas to pay even a few dollars more. They see the retail junk on every home improvement show and their logic is if it's good enough for TV its good enough for me.

Keep it up Mark you will sleep better.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hv2Ms3S6ZDA/Ur-bhhzQlLI/AAAAAAAANLs/_gNsDS7FF1A/s1600/crowdsourcing-cartoon.jpg

[Sam Murdoch]

You would think so...but....I live 65 miles from the job site, its pro bono for my SIL, she works for the vendor (not the manufacturer), the old one came out in pieces totally rotten so no backing up, we were doing it on a Sunday after a 65 hour work week, had to completely rebuild a non existent sub sill (really the strangest field condition I've ever seen...the last installer just hacked out the sub floor and the top of the joists/sill plate...and dropped a door into a hole where it sat and rotted), had to rip of that lovely aluminum wrap that comes with even lovelier vinyl siding job, back out the vinyl siding, tear out the casing, rebuild with Azek.....had to make a new construction 4 9/16" jamb fit a 100 year old wall that varies 3/8" from fat to skinny, all of it at least over 5"........started getting dark clouds in the early evening as we hit that "proofing" point. I did tack the thing in with trim heads so I could remove in event of catastrophic failure, which this is not. Add it all up.....If this were for a paying client, they would have a piece of plywood in the opening and an invitation to use the other entrance, and the big box the door came from would have that junk back on their loading dock complete with the garbage poorly mitered FJP brick mold it came with. Hey....if you are going to bother attaching brick mold, how about actually cutting the corners at 45 degrees? I removed it to make casing work with the vinyl siding hacks 25 year old work, didn't give up much of a fight. IN this case, the door had to go in like there was no tomorrow, because there really wasn't. No bringing it back option. Just making it work.

My point is I don't care how much the door costs, it should work as sold. The thing is in level, the gaps are perfect, they set the door too low in the frame....complete incompetence. For the love of god its an adjustable threshold, leave a 1/4" gap and bring the threshold up to meet the door in a nice weather sealing just friction sort of way. Next time I'm going to pick it out my self and set it up IN THE STORE and pile up any that don't work along the back wall after putting my hammer through them. Wild man from borneo making a big old pile of junk doors in aisle 10.....clean up in aisle ten please.....Actually if luck prevails this will be the last factor door I install in my life time. Course I'm not usually that lucky.

Here here to Jacks point, demand better. I guess I just didn't know they could actually make stuff this bad.


My recent experience wasn't as dire or as urgent, nonetheless, the old door and case had been removed and the option of waiting for the manufacturer to send a rep to "inspect my work" (even if my local lumber yard supplier backed me up) would have added no less than 2 weeks to the project. Middle of summer with a sheet of ply over an opening to the client's porch and gardens just wasn't even an option. Added to that my loss of time to pick up tools and move away and the impact on my schedule down the road made me determined to fix the problem warranty notwithstanding.

YES my fault for not having checked the operation of the door prior to the install BUT how to brace a door effectively without being in its opening so that the swing and close can be inspected is not as simple as saying it. Lessoned learned though and if I ever am asked to install another pre hung door (even an $ 800.00 one) I will know before it comes off the truck that it works - whatever that takes and whoever it aggravates.

I did get the door to work well after all and I "persuaded" the seller to pass on a $ 100.00 gift certificate to the client for their forbearance. I have NO IDEA how to impact the manufacturers to up their quality control. I'm cynical enough to believe that that will never happen. The playing field has been leveled to no better than mediocre all across the industry. If we in the Creek or other builder's forums report their great results and with which products then maybe we can swell the curve in favor of those manufactures who produce only excellent product - more posts about success please and tell us what you used.

[Ellen Benkin]

Is there a brand name that we should avoid?

[Peter Quinn]

Probably, but I can't mention it here w/o violating the terms of service because I haven't complained to the manufacturer and first given them an opportunity to make right. Of course the practical reality is that they can't make it right. The old door was ripped out, I could neither wait for them to come and inspect their flawed product nor remove said door and demand a replacement from the vendor. I have put in a few other prehungs that went in without issue, they are not all bad, though the consensus seems to be there is a race to the bottom. I told my SIL she should be replacing the old rotten unit as part of this remodel given a decent steel door only costs about $450....to which she replied". Oh no, I can get one for $250....I should have started running then! I'll reiterate that a decent steel door costs around $450, a really bad one is available for around $250! If I had to charge time and materials, the more expensive unit is a great value. Seriously....insulated SDL glass, foam core steel door in a FJP frame with adjustable (in theory) stainless steel threshold for $250. It would cost me nearly that much for the piece of glass on a custom basis. My guess is they have maybe $100 in materials into this thing, so that leaves about $.11 for manufacturing costs to make margins. I seem to remember steel doors with a full sheet of insulated glass being heavier now that I think about it.....

[Mark Bolton]

Reliabuilt would be one. But to be fair, nearly every door distributor offers simple steel entry doors at a very low price point. I can purchase a simple entry door from my distributor for slightly under 190.00 and its not bad.

I cant speak for Peter and Sam's situation but for me I think these issues come in a wave when the distributor/manufacturers get over extended and things get out of spec. As has been stated, at least the distributors I have been to, these doors are not milled on anything close to a CNC. They are mortised on a door station like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsJ2iDgc3H4 If anything on that machine gets out of spec several hundred doors can go out before it ever gets back to the distributor.

Interior doors are hung even more crudely than that.

There are more automated setups but I have never seen one.

Its definitely true that this has to get back to the vendor/supplier but unfortunately I think as Sam stated, all too often you just have to do your best to get it done and even though you may pass along some harsh words to the supplier the next time you see them I will bet it never makes it very far up the chain.

In my last nightmare I received a phone call from the owner of the door distributor who actually works on the shop floor every day and he basically told me that the garbage he is being sent from south america is very difficult to deal with but, just as me, he has to keep production moving.

Ive long wondered when we will hit the tipping point and people will start to get fed up but even in these scenario's the pain often times never makes it to the homeowner because the contractor is dealing with all the headaches and the bottom line is the sale is still made.

Long been brewing, who knows where it will head.

[Mel Fulks]

Some years back, ten?...can't remember, some of the trade magazines were reporting that specs were going to be tightened up and the industry was complaining. Got a lot of coverage in Woodshop News. Did the new specs get shot down
or were they approved and then ignored?

[Mark Bolton]

Some years back, ten?...can't remember, some of the trade magazines were reporting that specs were going to be tightened up and the industry was complaining. Got a lot of coverage in Woodshop News. Did the new specs get shot down
or were they approved and then ignored?

Spec's for what? Imports or QC out the door?

[Mel Fulks]

I think it was completed unit fit tolerances. Not having to use or make them,didn't read much of it. Don't know either who
was dictating. I remember being amused at the responses from those manufacturing the units saying it would be impossible to meet the proposed new standards. I did once work for a company that had a door unit department and it was poorly managed. I had to make some elliptical casing once for a "custom" unit. Before Micron type machines you could spend most of a day making something like that on a shaper. About an hour after it was done the foreman brought it
back. It had been cut too short and he told me to make another set in a most casual manner. I complained bitterly and he
said something like "well, he's learning ". I replied YOU LEARN SOMETHING LIKE BY BEING TAUGHT. NOT BY TRIAL AND
ERROR".

[Mark Bolton]

I think it was completed unit fit tolerances. Not having to use or make them,didn't read much of it. Don't know either who
was dictating. I remember being amused at the responses from those manufacturing the units saying it would be impossible to meet the proposed new standards. I did once work for a company that had a door unit department and it was poorly managed. I had to make some elliptical casing once for a "custom" unit. Before Micron type machines you could spend most of a day making something like that on a shaper. About an hour after it was done the foreman brought it
back. It had been cut too short and he told me to make another set in a most casual manner. I complained bitterly and he
said something like "well, he's learning ". I replied YOU LEARN SOMETHING LIKE BY BEING TAUGHT. NOT BY TRIAL AND
ERROR".


Hah, That gave me a chuckle.

No idea about the spec's. I have a feeling the main spec' is how many you can get out the door and we'll deal with the rest later.

The salesman for the distributor I had the problems with was in my shop for at least three hours and of course to my face agreed completely that the doors were beyond sub-par but I could tell by his tone that this is just what we are going to have to deal with. Im talking major (in my opinion) splits in the veneer, one door had a crack in the core that came right through the veneer about 5" down the latch stile. Several doors were clearly laid up so not flat that when they (chile) ran them through the widebelt they blew all but a whisper of the veneer off the corners of the doors. A couple were blown clear through to the core right off the truck. You could see how the cores had racked perhaps a degree or two in the clamps. Cracks in the panel glue ups. Several doors had deep/shallow hinge mortises and as I mentioned blowouts at the lock bore. It was a major disaster and this was all from a supplier who had, to date, always delivered doors that a quick sanding spray, and clear, were on the job.

The job had about 30 doors and it was easily a month and a half and I think 3-5 shipments of replacements by the time we had 30 doors that again, I was not happy with, but had to say were good enough to install.

It was brutal.

A job that should have been wrapped up in about 10 days went on for probably 50.

Having never had much trouble with these commodity doors we would sand them and move them to finish and within a second of spraying the stain the problems would pop out. If I had the photos I'd post some but I just setup a new computer and when I saw them in the backup I just deleted them to try to purge the memory from my data bank LOL.

[Peter Quinn]

Reliabuilt would be one. But to be fair, nearly every door distributor offers simple steel entry doors at a very low price point. I can purchase a simple entry door from my distributor for slightly under 190.00 and its not bad.

I cant speak for Peter and Sam's situation but for me I think these issues come in a wave when the distributor/manufacturers get over extended and things get out of spec. As has been stated, at least the distributors I have been to, these doors are not milled on anything close to a CNC. They are mortised on a door station like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsJ2iDgc3H4 If anything on that machine gets out of spec several hundred doors can go out before it ever gets back to the distributor.

Interior doors are hung even more crudely than that.

There are more automated setups but I have never seen one.

Its definitely true that this has to get back to the vendor/supplier but unfortunately I think as Sam stated, all too often you just have to do your best to get it done and even though you may pass along some harsh words to the supplier the next time you see them I will bet it never makes it very far up the chain.

In my last nightmare I received a phone call from the owner of the door distributor who actually works on the shop floor every day and he basically told me that the garbage he is being sent from south america is very difficult to deal with but, just as me, he has to keep production moving.

Ive long wondered when we will hit the tipping point and people will start to get fed up but even in these scenario's the pain often times never makes it to the homeowner because the contractor is dealing with all the headaches and the bottom line is the sale is still made.

Long been brewing, who knows where it will head.

I said I couldn't mention the manufacturer...but apparently Mark can because its not his door in question. Interesting video, I see those guys on a pneumatic assembly bench, but where do the parts come from? I'm imagining some automated jamb routing process, maybe a crude single purpose CNC line to make rabbits in jamb legs, route hinge and hardware pockets, notch the door edge. Or maybe its more basic than that? With the steel door there is no pocket, just a straight notch, charming lack of quality. Video says they can assemble a steel door in 3 minutes....I'd guess they spent half that time on the one I got. Hope they didn't get a performance bonus that day.

For comparison, used to take me and one other guy 30 minutes to route hinge pockets in prepared jamb legs, mount hinges, verify fit, brace the bottom. Glazing would be easily 1 hour per unit, TDL. Cutting glass stops, maybe 30 minutes. Full hardware prep, maybe 20-30 minutes (dead bolt, standard tube lock, latch plate), longer of mortise lock). The only thing we could get done in 3 minutes was to get a cup of coffee at 10 o'clock break!

Honestly, I would easily have paid $40 more from my own pocket to have the door hung correctly. Do they offer that? To the lumber yard clerk "How much for a CORRECTLY pre hung?" Its like upgrading your plane ticket to business class!

[Larry Edgerton]

Although I appreciate Jacks sentiment, those days are gone around here. That is the way I ran my business until the money dried up. I have many jobs out there I am very proud of, but not so much in the last few years. The money is just not there. I am very happy for Jack that he is in a position to be able to draw that line, but that is not always possible as Mark has pointed out, reality gets in the way, and food/shelter are kind of important.

Peter, I feel your pain. I too get so angry at companies that have many times more in machinery than I do, machinery that is capable of very precise work, but through a lack of caring do not keep their setups close enough to put out a good product. I hung some steel doors in a garagemahal project I am working on last week, and had the same frustrating experience. Code requires that the doors be steel, so what do you do? Junk!

Larry

[Phil Thien]

Honestly, I would easily have paid $40 more from my own pocket to have the door hung correctly. Do they offer that? To the lumber yard clerk "How much for a CORRECTLY pre hung?" Its like upgrading your plane ticket to business class!

The last steel door I hung was about two years ago, and it was done in under an hour and worked perfectly. I can't imagine the frustration I'd feel if the door was manufactured incorrectly. And double that if I couldn't exchange for a properly made door because they were all the same.

Ugh, you guys in the trades have my sympathies.

[Peter Quinn]

Update. Its swinging like a $10K entryway! I had to dowel the hinge screw holes, lower the door hinge mortises by 3/32", and pack out the routed too deep at the factory jamb mortises. They didn't just route them too deep...its was a three bears situation.....top mortise was a little too deep, middle was a little deeper, bottom was WAY too deep, so the jamb was in level and plumb but the door appeared to pitch down at the sill towards the lock side. Brillant. Add to that the hinges were not located correctly front to back, meaning they weren't the same depth, which made the door appear twisted in the frame and not close agains the weather strip in the upper right corner, lock side. On a steel door there is not mortise bottom, not possible the way the steel wraps the wood edge. So the hinges have little fingers that you push against the door for alignment. How hard is it to get that right? Add it all up....terrible assembly quality. Things that could easily have been done better with the same materials, just rotten.

So if you buy one of these clunkers.....be advised and prepared to spend and hour or so performing a reassembly. They can be made to work. And if you pay somebody to put one of these in and they tell you "They are supposed to be hard to close and rub..they all do that now...." find another guy, don't accept that low level of performance, its not normal nor acceptable.