Antique Door Deadbolt Question

[lovesickest]

I am refinishing an antique exterior door for the back door(no pics of that tonight -- sorry !) and have been stumped again by the problem of a lock set. We went through this with the front door. It seems that the mechanism for contemporary deadbolts are too long for the existing holes in the door -- meaning that either we would have to cut into the door, moulding, etc. to install a contemporary deadbolt mechanism -- or use what is currently in use on the front door:

locksetolddoor.JPG (1.72 MiB) Viewed 618 times

This is not very secure, but this is all that could be found that fit. Can anyone offer advice, or a brand/model # etc. of a deadbolt that will fit an 1870's/80's door ?

* apologies about the gigantic image file* Can someone shrink it ?!

[KristenS]

Someone call for a resize?! (My Spidey-sense was tingling...I knew it had to be OHW calling me!)

[lovesickest]

Thank you KristenS ! Now about that deadbolt conundrum...Any problem solvers out there ?

[dpsours]

Is the door in question painted? If so, you can cut new holes for a new deadbolt and fill and paint over the old ones.

[SkipW]

I'm going to be VERY blunt here....I don't see how the cutting of holes and patching for a modern deadbolt could look any worse than that industrial lockset and the mangled woodwork around it. As mentioned, since it is a painted door, after the work was done a nice patch and paint job would be in order and would look great! Sometimes you need to go backwards a little before going forward to overcome the wonderful "updates" of a previous owner.

[lovesickest]

The problem is about the distance between the molding around the windows and the edge of the door. Modern deadbolts seem to have a greater length(ie the mechanism which is the deadbolt -- sorry -- no correct terminology here) than the distance required for the original lock set. To use a modern lock set, the molding around the window would need to be cut into pretty radically which is something I am trying to avoid. I will post a photo of the door in question today(the photo is of the front door, which obviously needs some work). I suppose the other solution would be to reposition the location of the deadbolt, so that it is below the doorknob, and to patch over the existing holes where the lock had originally been.

[dpsours]

I hear what you're saying. We faced the same problem on one of our doors. The original mortise latchset had a deadbolt component to it below the knob, like this:



We decided that rather than trash the door, we'd just use the existing deadbolt, which requires a skeleton key. Not incredibly secure, but burglars don't pick locks these days anyway.

[SkipW]

I'm not positive, but I think there are modern deadbolts (Schlage used to make one) that you can turn the bolt part to shorten or lengthen to suit your needs. But it may only be to alter to 2 3/4 and 2 3/8 backsets.....

Or they do make narrow stile locksets but they may involve a lot of work to get them cut into your door....

http://www.jmlock.com/narrow-stile-deadbolt-cylinder-kit.aspx

A picture will really help understand the window trim (assuming the window trim for the window in the door )

Someone like Casey or Sooth who have extensive woodskills might be able to guide you in modification also.

[jwesevich]

Nearly all of our interior doors have the same setup as DPSours' (I have to dig up that thread about getting skeleton keys to fit). Our front door has a keyed deadbolt below, but the key must be lost to history, as someone added a modern one above. I would hitup the locksmith, but then we'd have to deal with a big hole in the front door. Ah well...

jeff

[Alexander]

Just an option. I had the old mortise lock retooled where they drilled it so the original deadbolt could be used with a new cylinder. on the outside is the locking cylinder and on the inside a thumb turn to lock it and they drilled the lock and the new cylinder triggers the old locking system. they also rebuilt and oiled the old mortise lock so it works wonderfully without a the old keys that work as well as hairpins. Sort of the both of both worlds.

Alexander