Bathroom door

alice60

Hi Guys. There are some very knowledgeable people here and I need an advice. After the bathroom installation the Bathroom door cant be shut. A fitter said that it was like that before which is not true. I have been living in the house more then 10 years and it was perfect. Can you please give me an advice which I pass to a fitter how to adjust a door so it could be shut.  I know it could sound strange but I dont want to damage a door and find the best solution.Looking forward to your replies.😃

Monsternextdoor

Shave it down ? Has the Frame had to be altered with the new bathroom?

Realistically you shouldn't be advising a fitter how to adjust a door, If it's his job he should know.

joe90mitch

So it's the same door that has been there for ten years? Were any changes made to the door or doorframe as part of the works? Eg any repainting?

Does it not close at all? Or instead does it catch when closing and you have to give it a bit of welly to shut it?

Finally, was it taken off the hinges at some point during the works? It might be that the screws aren't in as tight now (or the screw holes might have become stripped and so the screws aren't grabbing tightly and so the door is leaning a bit)

cattom

if it was ok before the bathroom was done, then it must be down to who ever did the bathroom to put it right.

FreeBear

If you have had the walls skimmed, then it is quite likely that the plaster has pushed the frame out of line slightly.

Take the door off, remove any locks/catches, and plane ~3mm off the edge. The locks/catches will need to be adjusted and the door handle moved over slightly, but any competent carpenter should be able to do this.

The door will need a bit of primer on the planed edge followed by base & top coat.

alice60

The door was there always and would be shut perfectly as other doors. I watched youtube clips and as I understand it should be lift it up. There is bigger gap between the door and the frame on the hinges sites. A bathroom fitter suggest to sand it, but I think it will damage the door. The door was taken off from the hinges. I really appreciate all your comments. Thank you ever so much.

Jeepers_Creepers

alice60 said:

The door was there always and would be shut perfectly as other doors. I watched youtube clips and as I understand it should be lift it up. There is bigger gap between the door and the frame on the hinges side. A bathroom fitter suggest to sand it, but I think it will damage the door. The door was taken off from the hinges. I really appreciate all your comments. Thank you ever so much.

Very good chance this can be sorted without having to plane or sand it. As Joe90 suggests, perhaps the hinges aren't as sat-in to their rebates as they should be.

Could you post a photo of the whole 'closed' door, showing the gap all around the door? And then a close-up photo(s) of the hinges with the door fully open?

FreeBear

The gap on the hinge side is a little wider at the top than the bottom - That is easily fixed by recessing the top hinge in to the frame ever so slightly. But you'd need to check the gap along the top & bottom of the door.. You should be aiming for a ~3mm gap all round the door/frame. You'll not get that just by messing with the hinges I'm afraid.

alice60

Thank you very much to everyone for your responses. The door was fit by another builder by using a plainer at the hinger side.

Jeepers_Creepers

Hi Alice.

Thanks for the photos. It doesn't look as tho' the hinges have been modified by the bathroom guys - eg raised or lowered - so it looks very much as tho' the door was replaced exactly as it was removed.

So why does it bind now? I suspect that the door - even tho' it seemed to open and close ok before - was always very close to 'binding' against the frame; there never was an adequate gap all the way around the door, but the door handle side was always tight and on the verge of rubbing the frame. All it then takes for it to actually bind is for a flake of paint under the hinge, or the screws need some more tightening. Or perhaps the work to the bathroom did cause a very tiny movement of the door frame, which would usually not cause any problems.

So, are the bathroom fitter guys to 'blame'? Only in the literal sense that, if they had not removed that door, it would likely have kept on 'working'! But, 99% of such doors would have come off and gone back on with no issues at all. Your door is in the 1% of troublesome doors, by having the inherent issue of always being a tad too snug along the handle side, so it couldn't cope with any interference with it.

The fitters could kind of 'argue' that the original setup of the door just wasn't 'proper' - ie an adequate gap all around - so the issue is largely down to this. BUT I'm frankly gobsmacked that they haven't fallen over themselves to offer to sort it - a simple 20-minute job for them.

Don't customer relations exist in the bathroom world?!

MACKEM99

Reminds me of the old MOD workers (DOE) when they arrived to do a job we all said:

"what have you come to break this time"