Door Repair Vancouver: kicked-in frames, hinges, strike plates

A forced door almost never fails at the deadbolt. It fails at the jamb: the strike plate tears out of soft trim, the frame splits along the grain from the strike upward, and the door drops on its hinges. Fitting a new lock into that same split jamb buys you nothing, which is why we repair the frame first and the lock second.

What the repair covers

• Split and torn jamb sections cut out and replaced with solid stock, or reinforced with a steel strike-side plate where the frame is otherwise sound.
• A reinforced strike plate anchored with 3-inch screws into the framing stud, not into the trim.
• Hinges replaced and long-screwed on the hinge side, because a reinforced strike just moves the failure across the door.
• The door rehung and the bolt aligned so it throws fully into the new strike.
• Damaged deadbolts replaced at $80-$160 a door, or rekeyed at $25-$45 per cylinder where the cylinder survived.

If a door has been forced tonight and cannot be secured, that is an emergency locksmith call. We make the opening secure first and finish the carpentry in daylight if that is what the damage needs.

Most doors that stop latching have not developed a lock fault. They have moved. Vancouver damp swells timber through the winter, houses settle, hinge screws strip out of old jambs, and the bolt ends up half a centimetre off the strike hole.

The fix is alignment, not hardware: hinges shimmed or long-screwed back to square, the strike repositioned or its mortise extended, the latch face adjusted, and the door edge eased where the swelling is permanent. That is a cheaper visit than a lock change and it is usually the correct one.

If the lock genuinely is at fault, the fix-versus-replace call is set out at lock repair: fix vs replace.

The single highest-value upgrade on a residential exterior door is not the lock. It is a reinforced strike plate with screws long enough to reach the stud behind the jamb. It costs a fraction of a lock change and it is the difference between a door that holds and a door that opens on the first kick.

Beyond the strike we fit steel jamb reinforcement spanning the strike side, hinge-side reinforcement, and security hinge pins on outward-opening doors. Whole-door hardening, including the cylinder, is covered under high-security locks.

Storefronts, aluminium and glass entries, steel service doors and warehouse doors are repaired to the same standard. Common work is closer adjustment and replacement so the door latches on its own, panic and exit hardware realignment, mortise lock service, pivot and hinge replacement on heavy aluminium doors, and frame repair after a forced entry.

Commercial lock changes run $80-$380 per door by hardware type. Buildings on a key hierarchy are covered at commercial locksmith.

Door repair is quoted on site, because the honest price depends on how far the split runs and whether the jamb can be reinforced or has to be replaced. What is fixed and published is the labour and the lock work.

• Service call, standard hours: $75.
• After-hours labour, 5pm to 9pm: from $150.
• After-hours labour, 9pm to 8:30am: $250/hour.
• Lock change during the repair: $80-$160 a door.
• Rekey a surviving cylinder: $25-$45 per cylinder.
• Commercial lock change: $80-$380 per door.

You get the figure before the tools come out, and it is the same sheet published at prices. If the door needs a joiner rather than a locksmith, we say so instead of quoting for work we should not be doing.

Everything runs from the shop at 4105 Macdonald St, Vancouver, BC V6L 2P1. These are the honest arrival windows, one per city, and the reason there is only one number against each is that we would rather you plan around a real one.

• Vancouver, including Downtown, Yaletown, Kitsilano, Dunbar, Point Grey, Mount Pleasant and East Vancouver: 20-30 min.
• Burnaby: 25-35 min.
• Richmond: 25-35 min.
• North Vancouver, and West Vancouver: 25-35 min.
• New Westminster: 25-35 min.
• Surrey, including South Surrey: 30-45 min.
• White Rock: 30-45 min.
• Delta, including Ladner and Tsawwassen: 30-45 min.
• Coquitlam: 35-50 min.
• Port Coquitlam: 35-50 min.
• Port Moody: 35-50 min.
• Maple Ridge: 35-55 min.
• Pitt Meadows: 35-55 min.
• Langley, including Fort Langley: 45-60 min.
• Abbotsford: by appointment, 60-75 min.

Full coverage map at service areas.