OT: How to replace sliding glass door latch?

Sheeesh! Go to Lowe's or Home Despot. They have racks and racks of parts... and old farts who've actually done that sort of replacement.

Sliding doors are a PITA. When we built this house we specified no such animals allowed.

Wait until you wear out a track ;-) ...Jim Thompson

Probably. There are hundreds of brands of sliding doors, and almost that many different latches. Just wait till you need a roller you can't find, and have to remove a door to get to it. Then take the door apart to find out which one you need, then find out no one makes it anymore.

most

Maybe you could strip the parts off sliding doors at the Cleveland Wrecking Yard.

"I went upstairs and there were thousands of doors there. I'd never seen so many doors before in my life. You could have built an entire city out of those doors. Doorstown. And there were enough windows up there to build a little suburb entirely out of windows. Windowville."

I find that less and less so. The staff there is getting younger and has less of a clue about such stuff. Although the local RadioShack topped it all before it closed: I needed a phone jack with four contacts and the guy didn't know what on earth one needs the other two for. Seriously.

The only store around here with very seasoned staff is ACE. Was there, don't have any latches.

Oh, I got pretty good at retrofitting stuff that isn't available. And I am not the only one. Our roofer and I stood on the roof, found out that the gable diverters the pro companies offered were . Climbed back down, drew a new profile on the hood of his Chevy truck, his helper carried that to a local metal shop ... bingo.

Ok, I'd have no qualms taking the Dremel to the door and frame to make something else fit. Just wanted to make sure that the taking-out process won't end with "oh dang!". Hoping someone else here already dunnit.

BTDT.

These doors are 40 years old and have required surprisingly little maintenance so far. Pretty heavy, the good stuff.

My son and I had to pull an 8' high panel one time... so heavy I thought were both goners :-(

I've since bought 4 of those vacuum glass grippers (that you pump up). Also handy for picking up granite coffee tables ;-) ...Jim Thompson

Take the door off and lay it down, so that when the mech falls it's only a couple of inches away, not down at the bottom of the vertical member.

Good Luck! Rich

Can't be done from Central Florida. I could get a whole new set of doors for less than the cost of a trip to Cleveland.

If they were good, 40 years wouldn't have bothered them. :)

I can almost picture that. Suddenly a wee hiss is heard ... sluuurp ... phhhht ... "oh no!" ... *THUD* :-)

oked

d the

any

ws

d almost

can't

part

of

Actually, it's in San Francisco. Or was, in 1961.

Well, they weren't bothered. But the latches were :-)

Ok, the rollers on the more frequently used doors need the occasional lube every few years. Plus dog hair removal.

the

That makes it less likely to be of any use to me, then.

Outside sliding doors in Florida lose their rollers due to sand.

I've found an amazing number of parts for doors, windows, and such using a simple web search. If the doors were made in the last 30 years or so, parts are often available. I replaced all the mechanisms in the casement windows before we sold the house a couple of years ago. They weren't a well known brand.

It's Herculite doors, but the good old heavy stuff, installed in 1970. Haven't found latches for that one but if the HW stores don't have something that fits I'll have to go on a lengthy web expedition.

A search on turns up quite a few hits. Don't know exactly what you're looking for, though.

Yeah, but when you key in "Herculite doors" and "mortise latch" (that's the part I need) the number of hits drops to 10, and nothing fits. If push comes to shove I'll try to find the manufacturer. But I am pretty sure I can adapt something, if necessarys with a little frame mod.

What surprised me was that ACE had lots of regular door locks but no slider latches at all. Yet those break a lot more.

It helps when you can identify the brand, but a lot of stuff made in the last 30 years had clear adhesive labels with the brand name. Then an overzealous homeowner removes them.