Door strike mortice tips

tomptat

Hey thx everyone for the advice in the paint dept. Didn't have time to chat last week but now I'm back to chat, and will try to participate this time. I'm hanging doors now and was wondering if anyone had some cool tips and tricks for chiseling in the strike mortice on the door itself (whatever you call that). I've got one done and it looks good, but if there are quicker, better ways than pencil, utility knife, chisel, I'd love to know. I was too cheap to buy a Rotozip or a Dremel, besides, there are so many options... Which leads me to queston 2: What would be the best tool for cutting out hinge mortices, as well as routing drywall? I know they have routers for both, but what if I just want one tool? I guess the drywallrouters would cut ot a hinge mortice ok, but there's not a flat table on them for setting the depth accurately. HMMM...
Tom

jlhaslip

if you only have a few to do, sharpen your chisel and carry on.

I place masking tape on the jamb, mark it and remove afterwards. it seems to stop the splinters.

jaros bros.

Attach it with screws in the desired location. Then score the wood deeply with a new Stanley blade. Remove and a sharp chisel will easily remove the wood since you have defined the border.

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Josh Jaros Remodeling in The Woodlands, Texas
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firehawkmph

Ditto for the chiseling.
Why does everyone think they have to have a power tool to do a small simple job? Hand work like chiseling is good for the soul. You should want to pull the plug once in awhile. It's the only thing that's real anymore. Be the ball Danny......
Mike Hawkins

Thurman

"Hand work like chiseling is good for the soul." Very good words there. That's why I own so many wood chisels, and cannot find the one I want, when I want it. I really do prefer hand chiseling mortises. Thanks, David

CustomBuild

Irwin makes a doorknob installation kit that is intended to give you all the tools necessary to install a doorknob in a slab door. It comes with a really cool template that locates the mortise perfectly and a gizmo that you put in your drill that follows the template, and gives you the outline of the mortise. You remove the template, and chisel out the inside section of the mortise, and it fits standard plates perfectly. The tool gets a 10 out of 10 in my book, and it is cheap, too.

RegeSullivan

I am in agreement with the above posters. A couple of tips and please don't be insulted if you know how to use a chisel properly: I often see a nice sharp chisel used upside down or backward. It may seem counter intuitive but the beveled side goes toward the material. Also, it is rarely necessary to use a mallet. Be sure to score the mortise deep enough an use two hands and push from the center toward the score. This will remove material quickly and give you depth control. If you have been using the chisel backward try both ways on a piece of scrap wood and you will see how much easier it is to control.

Rege

Tom Struble

now i didn't have much luck with the irwin jig,i thought that spiral cutter was pretty useless for me maybe i wasn't running it fast enough,and id rather have a lock bore guide that actually clamps to the door instead of just slipping on jmo

Thurman

Just a follow up comment on what Rege stated about about using a mallet. My granddad taught me to never strike a chisel with the face of a hammer, as in driving a nail. He taught me to use the side of the hammer, and not to "punish" the chisel, just make it cut into the wood. I often score a mortise out with a chisel using a hammer, then finish the mortise by hand power. I spend hours at a time keeping my chisels and plane blades sharp. Thanks, David

retiree

What you need is a bosch colt router and the guide made by Porter Cable. They make a separate one for hinges and another for lockplates. They include the cutter to be used with the guides. A drill does not spin fast enough to use these cutters. The guides sell for about $26. each. The hinge guide is a better bet as it is very accurate. The plates are easily cut with a chisel.

Tom Struble

i have the porter-cable guides for the butts,works good

RegeSullivan

Just for fun I got a scrap piece of maple, started the stop watch on my phone, grabbed my utility knife and a 1/2" Marple chisel out of the tool box, pulled a credit card out of my wallet, traced the credit card with the knife, cleaned out enough material to make the credit card sit flush with the surface, put the chisel and knife back, opened a cold one and stopped the stop watch. 1 minute 39 seconds and the card sits perfectly flush with the surface. I was going to get out the extension cord, bit, template router set it all up but it just seemed like tooooooo much trouble to prove a point that only I might get. So... I just finished the beer. I love power tools but for one or two doors it just doesn't seem like it's worth the trouble to use a router. Also, if ya make a mistake with the router it's usually a bigger one than you make with a chisel. Now if you have a bunch of doors to do... then the router is worth it if you already have the router.

I'm just sayin".

Rege

Schweinehund

I used to chisel, but now I use a Dremel mounted inside their mini router attachment. They also make router bits for the Dremel which work great for this application because they are small and allow you to take off tiny bits of material at a time for fine tuning. I once installed 7 slab doors in one evening using the Dremel for the hinge mortises and the striker.