Best practices for trimming a pocket door: craftsmanship vs. practicality

[Jim Becker]

I have several pocket doors in our 2008 addition and really like them. There are a few other places I wish I would have used them. That said, I do agree that for frequent use, the whole assembly and mechanism has got to be top notch. I'm not sure that's the case with the units our contractor installed. They are "good", but not great.

[Eric Schmid]

The relatively new soft open/close will also assist in keeping the door where it’s supposed to be in open or closed position. They are also quite nice if you have a house full of door slamming teenagers.

I have a rafter lift situation that causes a couple of door frames to move seasonally. I have a pocket door in one of these locations. The soft close hardware keeps the door in the closed or open position.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Just shoot the trim on and forget the screws. In the unlikely event that the door needs serviced, it's easy to remove a piece of nailed on trim. Also it is most likely far enough in the future that a remodel is desired and the whole thing is coming out anyhow. I personally have a deep seated hatred for pocket doors and actively try to discourage, but we still do a dozen or so per year.

The Johnson split studs are garbage in my opinion. Had a call back one time because the customer ran into a wall when moving a couch and bent the wood/steel stud into the door and locked everything up. What a pain. What we do now is just make the interior wall of the room getting the door deeper so we can use 2x6s on flat instead. Makes it a LOT stiffer and the wall thickness is relatively unnoticeable. It does take opening up the inside of one whole wall when doing a retrofit, but the results look good and are very strong. No problem at all with new construction.

[Tom M King]

I remember now that's the way I did it too. I don't think I've ever used those metal things for studs.

edited to add: I used Yellow Pine, instead of Spruce for those flat studs. I kept bundles of wood for a year, or more, when I was building new houses though, so I always had some that wouldn't move. Even now that I'm not building new houses, I still keep a supply, including treated to dry, and reveal which pieces can be relied on. Small parts are run out of the ones that move.