DIY Fixing My Problematic Door Handles

The builders who built my house and the rest of the houses in my project did a shoddy job in certain areas... and doors have been a particular issue. For a while my front door handle kept falling off. There is a metal rod called a spindle going through the door that is attached to handles on both ends via a screw that needs to be tightened with a hex wrench. 

This kept happening to us so often that I kept a hex wrench by my front door. But eventually even with all the tightening of that screw, it kept on falling off, and the spindle looked beat up, so I bought a new handle and spindle from the hardware store, but the same thing kept on happening, even with the new one. Eventually it got to the point where I just said screw it (pun intended), and replaced the door handle yet again, this time with another stronger one, even if it looks ugly and doesn't match. Now the door handle only falls off occasionally, but infrequently.

But that isn't just that. In order for the front door to stay shut, there is a strike plate with a hole in it for the latch of the door to go inside. But the side of the strike plate on my door started breaking off, and I taped it down with duct tape, but it didn't last for long, and eventually the piece of metal fell off entirely, and my door would not stay shut unless it was locked. I tried gluing this metal piece back on with super glue and any other way I could think of, but wasn't successful.

This was a problem because, among other things, my dog kept escaping, because without the door staying latched shut she could just pull the door open...

My brother is a locksmith and I asked him how to fix it, and he told me that they sell pieces in the hardware store that you can buy to replace the strike plate. But since that involved drilling into metal and I didn't have the correct equipment, I hired a guy who was recommended to me to do it... and he did such a terrible job, not knowing what he was doing, and I was directing him how to get it to work at least partially... but the "fix" he did didn't even last a week before I was back to square one.

I found out that this problem had happened to many other people in my building project, and they tried using welders or other similar things, and didn't have much success. It must be that the metal they used was just not strong enough, if this exact thing broke for many people.

My brother recommended a locksmith friend of his who lives in my area who came and fixed the problem professionally, and then wouldn't even let me pay him to fix it, because "how can he charge Josh's sister?" So I repaid him by recommending him to everyone in my housing project, because of how common this issue is.

And so, I thought my door issues were finished.

Until one day I was walking into my room and pulled the door handle to close the door... and it fell off.

Being, unfortunately, quite familiar with what to do when a door handle falls off, I took out my hex wrench to screw it back on... but there was no screw in the handle to even be able to tighten.

I realized I'd need to replace my door handle, but I wasn't in a huge rush, since I was busy. If the door handle fell off, I just stuck it back on.

And then I went out for errands, then needed to come home and get ready for a formal occasion I was invited to... and couldn't get into my room. The door handle fell off into my room, but this time it took the spindle with it, so I couldn't open the door... If that were the only issue, it wouldn't have been so bad, but the outside handle was attached to the door, even without the spindle, so I couldn't take another handle and spindle from elsewhere to insert into the door to open it. When you have about 30 minutes to get ready for an event and can't get into your room, that really isn't good news.

I called my son to try to help me out, to see if he could figure out a way to take off the handle, but we weren't successful there. I tried calling a handyman who'd done different odds and end jobs for me in the past, but he wasn't available for another 2 hours, which didn't help me. I tried to see if I could unscrew the part of the handle that attaches to the door (which I learned is either called the rose, backplate, or escutcheon ). 

To be able to do that, there is a ring that unscrews off of it, to access the screws holding the backplate onto the door. But the screws were so small that when I tried to use a screwdriver to remove them it kept slipping out of the screws (from the part I just learned is called a drive slot) and I didn't have a smaller screwdriver. So I headed to the hardware store to go buy one as well as a new door handle, but fortunately my son was able to unscrew the backplate in the end using that screwdriver, so I only needed to buy the door handle. This cost me $20 for a nice looking one, that relatively matched what I had in my other rooms. 

When I arrived home, I used another handle and spindle to open up the door, but when I went to try to unscrew the ring on the backplate to access the screws to remove them I could not get the ring to turn, no matter how hard I tried. Thinking that maybe it was just a matter of strength, I had both my sons try and neither of them succeeded either. It was just screwed on too tight. No fixing the door before I needed to head out. Oh well.

When I was getting dressed the door spindle fell out again and when I went to put it back in, something was blocking the spindle from entering the door bore (Google Gemini is being really great at teaching me these words that I never needed a name for before.) While I could move it out of the way from one side of the door, I couldn't from the other side, which meant that I would likely be stuck in or out of the room if the spindle falls out again, which I couldn't be sure it wouldn't do. So I taped down the door latch and over the strike plate in the door to make sure the door couldn't latch so I wouldn't be locked in or out of my room. 

I posted online asking for help in how to remove the metal ring from the backplate and people suggested that I use a pipe wrench with a good grip to hold onto the ring and unscrew it. I didn't have one and was too busy to go to the hardware store to get one, so in the meantime I was just living with a door that didn't latch.

A few days ago, I had intended to finally go to the hardware store to buy a pipe wrench when I had a guy over at my house fixing my air conditioning unit. I asked him if he had a pipe wrench that I could use to unscrew the plate, and he did, and fortunately we were finally able to access the screws to remove the backplate and replace the door handle.

It was ridiculous to see how many pieces the backplate had broken into... no wonder I couldn't get the spindle back in there. Fortunately, it was quick work to screw the backplates from the new handle back onto the door. The builders of this apartment hadn't even used all the screws to attach the previous ones to the door, which meant that in other parts of my house the backplates were also falling off because of screws that loosened... So I had to make a few new holes with my drill, but not a big deal. I now had a working door handle!

While I was at it, I decided to loosen the lose backplates for the keyholes, this time making sure to put screws in all the holes, which was especially important because the previously made holes had started to get stripped a bit and really could use larger sized screws or something to be tighter. And then I did the same with the other door handles in my house.

And then with the backplate covers back oil, voila, I have a working, beautiful door handle.

Total cost? $20.

If I'd needed to buy the extra equipment or hire someone to get them to loosen the ring, or replace the door handle themselves, it would have been more expensive... so I'm glad I had the idea to ask the repairman who was already here doing something else to loosen it, because then the rest was an easy DIY fix I'm proud of.

Other door issue we had in our apartment... In my girls' room, the way they built the walls in relation to the door put a lot of stress on the door hinges, which made the wood of the door where the hinges attach completely break off, and my ex fixing it didn't work, so we needed to hire someone to drill new holes elsewhere in the door and redo the hinges entirely. As I said, shoddy work, especially when it came to our doors.

Have you had any problems with your doors? What types of problems? How did you fix them? DIY or paying for them to be fixed? If you had the issues I did, how would you have tried to solve them?