Beacon Hill - Interior Doors

[WC]

While cleaning the BH that I bought this morning at an estate sale, it dawned on me that there were no interior doors (openings, yes, but no doors).  I have never built or rehabbed a Greenleaf house before.  I assume the previous owner just never attached the doors.  Can you purchase replacement doors easily?   The openings seem smaller than my other houses, but I haven't measured them yet.

[rodentraiser]

You can buy the sheet the doors come on from Greenleaf. The only thing is, I know the doors are sometimes made of layers and those layers may be scattered among several sheets. I'm not that familiar with the Beacon Hill, so hopefully someone else knows more about that than I do.

The other alternative is to purchase prebuilt doors and sub those in instead. The problem with that is the door openings may not be large enough for those doors. The standard door size is 7" x 3", although there is a smaller door available that I think is 6 1/2" x 2 1/2". It's possible to cut the door sizes larger with an exacto blade, but that's usually done before the house is put together. It could be difficult to do that once the house is built and maybe even dangerous, as there's a chance you could cut yourself with the blade.

The other con to buying prebuilt doors is they're made to fit 3/8" thick wood, which means they'd stick out 1/8" on both sides of the wall. Most people just use a little trim and fill that in around the doors, though.

I'm sure some of the other members who have more experience will chime in here.

[havanaholly]

You can always make interior doors.  If working in wood frightens you, use matboard.  Press a piece of scrap paper against the door opening and press with your finger to get the impression onto the paper; trace that with a pencil & straight edge and cut it out and check it against the door opening.  You have a pattern.  I use a utility knife with new blades to do my cutting, using a steel straight edge with a cork back.  You can use chamois strips or Tyvek or twill tape and sandwich half of it between the door and its trims (or just cut two pieces for plain interior doors) and the other half between the wall and the door frame to hinge it.

[sparklepuppies]

The Beacon Hill actually really didn't come with interior doors. You punch out the door opening from the sheet. Then you can use that punch out and embellish it and glue it back in, but then your door would be one layer thick, while the opening is 3 (trim-wall-trim).  I'm pretty sure the instructions say something like that. 

I think most people that build a Beacon Hill buy prebuilt doors like Kelly said, and adjust the wall openings. To add them after the fact, you could use basswood to make your own doors, use two pieces sandwiched together and embellish with wood scraps, then either build a frame and pin hinge, or use chamois strips, ribbon, or tyvek strips to hinge it. 

[havanaholly]

4 minutes ago, havanaholly said:

You can always make interior doors.  If working in wood frightens you, use matboard.  Press a piece of scrap paper against the door opening and press with your finger to get the impression onto the paper; trace that with a pencil & straight edge and cut it out and check it against the door opening.  You have a pattern.  I use a utility knife with new blades to do my cutting, using a steel straight edge with a cork back.  You can use chamois strips or Tyvek or twill tape and sandwich half of it between the door and its trims (or just cut two pieces for plain interior doors) and the other half between the wall and the door frame to hinge it.

 

3 minutes ago, sparklepuppies said:

The Beacon Hill actually really didn't come with interior doors. You punch out the door opening from the sheet. Then you can use that punch out and embellish it and glue it back in, but then your door would be one layer thick, while the opening is 3 (trim-wall-trim).  I'm pretty sure the instructions say something like that. 

I think most people that build a Beacon Hill buy prebuilt doors like Kelly said, and adjust the wall openings. To add them after the fact, you could use basswood to make your own doors, use two pieces sandwiched together and embellish with wood scraps, then either build a frame and pin hinge, or use chamois strips, ribbon, or tyvek strips to hinge it. 

Great minds think alike, Tracy.

[sparklepuppies]

Haha, yep!! :)

[Khadi]

If you want to upgrade your doors, you can buy the premade "narrow doors".  They are closer in size than regular interior doors and require minimal cutting to fit.

[BradsMiniWorld]

The schematic drawing does designate the doors as the pop outs from the door openings.  The instructions do not mention the door assembly, but I embellished the doors and installed by gluing hinges to the opening.

I have a video showing what was done for the doors.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsc_TeoYUVo&list=PLXHh3hA0IAgXFUBmoQTYSW7CNaqK60hW5&index=29