Expert: James - 2/21/2009

Question
James,
i recently bought a home in north carolina and started to update immediately. one of my first projects was to change all of my door hardware from brass to satin nickel. to my surprise i found that my front door had a third bore about 1-1/2" below the primary bore.it's a schlage handleset with a 5" oval trim piece on the interior to cover the extra bore. to top it all off the distance between the primary bore and the deadbolt bore is 5-1/2" so any large handlesets that would cover the extra bore will not work because of the extra distance from the primary and deadbolt bores. is there anything that i can do other than get an unprepped door slab and bore it myself to match existing jamb mortises.

Answer
Hello James,

Can you attach a photo so I can get a better idea of what you mean?

You may be able to use a wrap around plate to cover up old holes with the exception of the bottom hole to a handleset which can be covered up with JB Weld (on metal doors) or wood putty (for wood doors) then sanded and painted.

A 5-1/2" CTC for deadbolt to handleset/knob/lever isn't common so any wrap around plate you get should be blank and drill the holes yourself, or use 2 small plates but that won't look as nice.

James
www.jmlock.com