How to Build Door Hinges and Hardware

Building Door Hinges and Hardware

The above door hardware and those that follow, were constructed as follows:

I rented an opaque projector to shoot the customers picture onto the wall, which I had taped to it a full size cardboard mock up of the door, panels and size. Next came making the jigs from the cardboard as this project required the outside set of straps to be the hinges as well.

The door was 3′ X 7-1/2′ and 2-1/2″ thick, made of first generation Douglas Fir. It was heavy. The door builder (Samule Arrons of Idaho) wanted the two strap system to help hold the door together in the South Carolina humidity, where it was to be installed. The jigs had to make the straps in and out (meaning that the inside straps had decorative hammering up, while the outside straps had the decorative hamering down – while on the bending jig). Each had to be accurate enough to have the holes within 1/8″ in order to thru-bolt the straps making them work structurally.

I used an old metal planner table as my jig table. It is within .010 of perfectly flat, so that helped. The door being heavy and the hinges having (as the customer demanded) two wraps on the hinge and one on the door pintle. I used thick wall tubing and bored the pin holes large enough to press in a needle bearing (like you would find in an automobile alternator). The weight of the door is carried by thrust bearings and hardened thrust washers available from a bearing supply house. This meant boring a recess in the bottom of the hinge wrap to accept these bearings. The nice thing about doing it this way was the option of using different hardened thrust washer shims available from the bearing place to precicely fit the door to the height in the opening. This arrangement made the door close as if it was sliding on ice.