Open the door on a room makeover

Tampa, Florida -   It's simple, it's quick.  It can give an entire room a different look. 

Perhaps your home has the old flat, plain, dark oak doors.  That's called outdated by many standards. Others would argue the metal accordion doors are just... ugly.  A new door or doors can offer an updated, beautiful look.

If you're lucky, you might be able to just change the door by pulling the hinge pins and hanging an updated door, then painting the casing and trim.  Of course the replacement door would have to match the current measurements.  However, in most cases, you'll have to install an entire door system.

Before removing the door measure door jam to door jam so you know what size replacement you'll need.  Remove the old door by pulling off the casing/wood trim.  You should be able to see the door jam frame and how it's attached to the doorway walls.  This could take some muscle.  Pry the jam and nails from the wall and frame.  The door frame should easily slide out of the opening.

Your local home improvement store carries many different sized doors.  Chances are the door you're replacing is one of the many standard sizes.   

Place the new door system into the opening and remember, spacing is very important.  Use a level perpendicular to the floor to level the hinge.  This allows the door to open and close properly.  Without moving the door or frame, hold it in place and nail the door frame to the wall frame.  This is where a pneumatic nail gun comes in handy.  If you don't have a nail gun or don't one, then have someone hold the frame in place while you hammer and nail the door frame into place.

It's important to watch the reveal(spacing).  Make sure the space between the door and the jam is even on both sides.  Once the door is nailed into place, check the spacing again to make sure there's no rubbing.  Again, this allows the door to open and close evenly.  You may have to makes some adjustments.  A "split jam" works really well and allows for certain errors.