On Jun 21, 3:12 pm, Steve wrote:
On Jun 20, 12:35 pm, "
wrote:
The front door of my house is out of square. The top of the door
slopes down from the hinge side to the lock side leaving a gap. Do I
need to shim from the bottom? TIA

Ok, here's some more info and some pictures... hope it helps....

Gap is as follows:

Across Top: 3/8" @ latch side, 1/8" @ hinge
Down Latch side: 3/8"
Down hinge side: 1/8" @ top, less than 1/8" @ bottom

http://picasaweb.google.com/rob.ainbinder/FrontDoor?

authkey=ixsc9CH9pWk

That's a massive gap on the latch side. It looks more like 1/2". This is
a more serious problem than the top. The misaligned top is cosmetic.
Upside: The gap is nice and straight.
Downside: The latch is barely catching.

The top is out of square, but I can't tell if it's out of level. I'm
guessing that the door frame is racked down a little on the hinge side.

Somebody once applied caulk to the top hinge-side corner of the casing,
which tells me that corner separated once upon a time. That makes me
think the house has settled some. It's not terrible settling, or you'd
have cracks in the wallboard running up at an angle from the door
corners.

If you hired me, my best solution would be to rehang the door. That's
about a four- to six-hour job. It's not hard, just time-consuming:
remove the casing; cut the door out of the wall with a reciprocating
saw; rehang the door; reapply the casing; caulk; paint.

My second-best solution would be to put shims behind the hinges to close
up the gap on the other side. I wouldn't try to do anything with the gap
at the top, because it would require pulling the door out of the wall.

I like to have about 1/8" gap at the top, bottom, and latch side, with
1/16" at the hinge side. You might not be able to get that with the door
and frame you have. The door might have been replaced once upon a time,
and replacements are never as good a fit in the frame as a pre-hung
door.

--
Steve Bell
New Life Home Improvement
Arlington, TX

Well, it doesn't show in pictures but, the gap at the top and the side
are allowing light and air from the outside to enter the house. So,
it's a bit more than cosmetic.
We are the first owners of the house this has been the only door.
We did have the warranty tech out to attempt to resolve this issue...
no luck. The house is not in warranty any longer.