Front door hassles

message from TRK's dad on 19 May 2004

I've got a porch on the house we moved into last October and have had
some front doors fitted by a local joiner about four weeks ago. The
outermost doors - i.e. the ones you walk through first when you come
in off the street into the porch area are a pair which obviously meet
in the middle. Then inside that to get into the house there's a
standard front door, half glazed etc.

I painted the outer doors before fitting in a fetching white shade of
International brand Ranch paint - I trust the International brand from
my boating days, having also given them two coats of wood preserver.
Obviously when the doors were fitted the joiner had to plane the edges
to make them fit. I didn't get an opportunity to re-paint the edges
until last weekend due to inclement weather etc. Last week (before
painting but after quite a bit of wet weather the outer doors became
increasingly difficult to open because they're now touching in the
middle, having expanded. I phoned joiner who told me to seal the
edges with paint to stop water ingress which was leading to expansion,
once it had dried out.

So, after a couple of days of halfway decent weather last week I put
two coats of the aforementioned paint on over the weekend. The doors
are still very difficult to open - but not in the morning, only in the
afternoon. As the front of the house is west facing I conclude that
the heat of the sun on the doors in the afternoon is causing them to
expand, not water ingress. Can I do anything about this or should I
just get the joiner back to shave a bit off one of the doors again (&
then paint the edge for the third time) so there's a bit of room for
expansion ?

This, and the fact that the door suppliers supplied the wrong width
door for the inner one (despite also supplying the frame) and then
tried to palm us off with not refunding the full amount it took for
the joiner to widen it) is really getting on my nerves.

Thanks

Archived message: Front door hassles (UK DIY House Improvement)