Stan Harrison: Simply replacing doorknob can be complicated

Stan.JPGStan Harrison
I reached for the laundry room doorknob and pulled.


The knob fell into my hand -- again -- just as it had many times in the past 1 1/2 years.

If I don't remember to press it to one side and pull gently, it pops out.

I know what you're thinking. "Why doesn't he just replace the doorknob already?"

The laundry room doorknob is one of those seemingly small household repairs that would make my life simpler. But just thinking about the amount of time and energy it might take to accomplish the job is enough to stop it dead in its tracks.

If you think replacing a doorknob isn't all that difficult, you might be in for a few surprises.

Task No. 1 is to find a doorknob that matches the broken one as closely as possible in style and color. There's nothing quite so ugly as a room filled with mismatched doorknobs. I know. From my kitchen table, I can see four doorknobs and a sliding-door handle. Only two match, and one of those is the broken doorknob.

A true match can be difficult -- especially for our laundry room doorknob.  (Anyone seen a knob that comes in a color called  "antique copper?")

I firmly believe this is part of the "doorknob conspiracy" theory, which maintains that manufacturers routinely change styles and colors on purpose. They know that instead of replacing a single doorknob, you'll need to buy an entire house full. That's the only way all the knobs will ever match again.

The next challenge is to wait for a sale on passage doorknobs, the kind without locks. There are occasional sales on lock sets. But how often do you see an ad that says, "Huge passage doorknob blowout sale?" Home improvement centers know that when you need a doorknob, you need a doorknob. You won't be able to wait for a sale. I'm still trying to prove them wrong.

Then there's the door. The size of the doorknob hole has changed. What used to be a standard-size hole 25 years ago is no longer standard size. It's significantly larger. A new doorknob simply won't go into the old hole.

To get a new knob to fit, a special bit is needed to bore a larger hole in the door. Doing that involves taking the door off its hinges and lying it perfectly flat. Make one mistake while drilling, and it will be time to shop for a new door.

And a solid six-panel door made of hemlock -- if you can find one -- isn't going to come cheap. (Merry Christmas, dear!)

The new door would need to be coated with polyurethane and hung. Just hope the standard size of the door hasn't changed, or you'll be tearing the frame out of the wall and resizing it in order to hang that new door.

Tearing out the frame could mean ripping off the casing, creating more expense.

In my case, the jamb also would need to be replaced. Reversing the laundry room door several years ago left chiseled openings where the hinges and strike plate once were.

New hinges would be nice, too.

And I thought all I was doing was replacing a doorknob!

If my knob was to somehow break so I couldn't open the door, I would no longer be able to do laundry.

I can't do laundry much anymore anyway, not since I turned an adult large wool sweater into a size 3T. Thankfully, it wasn't my sweater.

I poked the broken doorknob back into its hole, pressed it to one side and pulled gently. The door opened.

Perhaps living with a broken doorknob isn't so bad after all.


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