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resolvedDear CCE,
The door saga continues:
The internal workings of one of the (antique) mortice locks are damaged.
Can anyone recommend an iron mongerer or locksmith?
Edina lock & key can’t repair it. Replacing it with a modern mortice lock would require repositioning the door handle and keyhole.
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Bill
Tricky - I doubt any locksmith would offer a repair to a Victorian lock. Perhaps you could try an architectural salvage yard, they might have some similar locks in stock. Although you are probably more likely to get an entire door, rather than just the lock. I know people who have found things here (although I have never used them myself):
I've done this before by just repositioning the door handle and keyhole and using a modern mechanism. The holes don't normally have to move far if you buy the right size of mech.
The door handle position change is relatively easy, as the boss in the new position will likely cover the old hole.
For the keyhole, you need to use judicious amounts of high-performance filler, sand, repeat, until you've covered up the old bits of the hole.
This is also one of the reasons why it's never a good idea to "dip and strip" doors - traditional tenement wooden doors would have always originally been painted gloss white anyway.
Thanks for this. Sara may have found a similarly sized mortice lock for us.
Quite apart from the redecoration issue, the internal doors had so many layers of paint and varnish, that the upper ones were peeling off.
And has white always been the traditional colour in Edinburgh tenements? When we were organising the refurbishment of the tenement staircase windows next door, the decorator told us that the traditional colour for window frame exteriors had been green.
I'm not sure what I'd do here, but filling and painting the old holes would be relatively straightforward, it's just that then you wouldn't have antique victorian hardware on the door.
@Dave - you can normally put the antique handles and escutcheon back on to the modern internal lock/latch unit
With regards to removing layers upon layers of peeling paint to create a firm and smooth base, there is no substitute to doing this by hand with a sanding block and varying grades of sandpaper.
And yeah, I'm pretty annoyed at former owners' DIY attempts to paint the doors in gloss without properly keying it to the surface first, too
@MrSRD, things went a bit weird in the 1960s and 70s.
Windows:
Originally, most windows were painted dark brown or bottle green. However, window joinery, including fanlights, should normally be painted white or off-white to maintain uniformity (brilliant white should be avoided
[External] Doors:
Doors should be painted in an appropriate dark and muted colour
Page 15:
https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/downloads/file/27028/listed-building-and-conservation-areas
I think internal doors were also sometimes originally painted in a "fake wood effect" i.e. a brown, with grain-like streaks. But they were always painted. The stripped/bare wooden door craze only started in the 70s, as gembo alludes, and has had various "come backs" since, and/or never died out completely.
There are other reasons not to dip and strip, like the damage / splitting that gets caused to the panels and beading, exposure of all the previous flaws / repairs, drying out of the wood, separating of mortice joints and so on...
Oh, that's interesting! So actually windows aren't heritage at all but artificially white
There was definitely a layer of ‘fake wood’ on our doors. I think it was described as ‘church varnish’: a mixture of turpentine and linseed oil.
We’ve used ozmo oil to try and keep the stripped wood from drying out. I’d also be a bit concerned about layers of lead paint if attempting to sand. And finally, the finish on one of the doors has definitely been marred by inept use of a heat gun. So it seems that any approach has its risks and trade-offs.
Oh i have done that with a heat gun, also Nitromors nightmares and good point about lead paint, i will use this to avoid ever sanding again. When I was creating marti’s Imaginary Wine bar [cleaning out the garage into a skip) we flung out a door that was stripped. By dipping 20 years ago. Still sticky in patches. Though been in damp garage. Also two big doors with thumping great coat hooks that we hadnt even bothered trying to strip. Ten doors downstairs [definitely loved their doors] five upstairs. A mix i think of pine and something like Deal? Is that a wood that is less soft? Two doors with one side each varnished. The others all eventually ended up painted white. Some with glass put in. Some with Glass taken out. MrSRD if you were not such a lovely fella I would be cursing you for this flashback. But I am over it.
“There was definitely a layer of ‘fake wood’ on our doors”
Scumbling
Kevin McCloud used to love a bit of scrumble glaze
@gembo sorry I was triggering ..
@neddie
...former owners' DIY attempts to paint the doors in gloss without properly keying it to the surface first, too
MrSRD, I have PM'd you re the lock repair.
Cheers
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