New locks

Today after picking up stuff for the bathroom renovation and learning all about toilets at Home Depot, we tackled our first project at the house.

We actually have no clue how much having locks re-keyed costs, but given the condition of the locks, we decided that installing new ones would be our best bet. Plus, why hire a professional when we can hack it together ourselves?

Here's what we started with this afternoon.

Is that scotch tape on the knob? I don't even know.

The first adventure was figuring out how on earth buying new locks works. We decided on Schlage because it was a brand name we knew but it wasn't the insanely expensive brand. We knew we wanted a keyed knob and a deadbolt for the front, plus a keyed knob for the back. The packages have 6-digit codes printed on them, and they helpfully suggest that if you want locks that are keyed the same, you match the codes. I think that system might just be designed to frustrate though, because if you get the knob-and-deadbolt value pack, the codes will absolutely not match any of the single knob codes. No way, no how.

After a long wait in line, we discovered that Home Depot can in fact re-key a lock for $5.00. We decided that was totally worth it and waited while they switched the single knob to match the value pack.

Already feeling pretty confident in our mad lock-purchasing skills, we tackled the front door first. The above picture is of course the outside view. Here's the inside, which was only a little better.

We forged ahead with little thought to reading the instructions. After scraping out the hole in the door a little to fit the deadbolt, we attempted to assemble the lock. Apparently it matters if the deadbolt is extended while you do this, and the rotation of the thinger on the outside part matters. So we did it a couple more times until it seemed to actually operate like a lock. Success!

On to the strike plate. It probably took 20 minutes and a dozen or so swear words to remove the old one. Those were some seriously monster screws, man. Devon dremeled (that's a verb, right?) the door jam so that we could sink the new strike plate in nicely.

After driving in our own seriously monster screws, we discovered that the door would both close properly AND lock. We're good.

The knob was much easier to install, though when we attempted to screw the strike plate to the door we were greeted with a black hole of crappy wood and old screw holes. I mentioned that we thought this was a single-owner house. Now we're not so sure, because the locks have clearly been changed a BUNCH of times.

Giant screws seemed to do the trick on the strike plate, though, and after finishing the knob installation the door would still close and lock! Amazing!

Here's the result of our work.

Hopefully nobody will look at the door jam for too long. It's totally sturdy and functional, but it looks like a mess.

At the edge of the new deadbolt, you can see at least two previous paint colors - bright yellow and hospital green.

Someday we'll repaint the door. Maybe.

After finishing the front door, the back door was a breeze. I forgot to take 'before' photos, but you can just use your imagination. The knob was yucky and there was a random bit of wood nailed to the door jam. Now it's all better!

If you read this entire post about locks, I commend your dedication. I hope for your sake that we find more exciting projects or that I get bored with blogging sooner rather than later!