Dear all,

In the midst of repainting the interior of the house (~100 year old worker's cottage), we decided to take advantage of the mess and fix a wonky study door which has been crooked for the 6 years that we have been in the house. I have some ideas how to fix it, but thought I would run it past you good people to see if I am headed for disaster or if there is a better way.

As you can see from the picture, the door does not sit square with the door frame. The lock latch does not go into the catch any more due to the lock being shifted too far down. This has also caused the damage to the floor from the outside door corner coming in contact with the floor (it has not hit the floor in the 6 years we have been in the house, but there is only a paper-width's clearance). The hinges are not loose, but the wood below the top hinge does show some evidence of stress (second picture).

The door itself has equal dimensions at its top/bottom and side-to-side. The floor is level, as are the VJ walls, and the structural beam across the top of the door (I'm sure there is a name for it.. noggin??). The blue wardrobe on the left and it's trim is also level. The two main beams which frame the door however, seem to be crooked (bowed wood I suspect). You can particularily see it in the left beam if you use the blue wardrobe trim as the level reference.

So...

My idea was to shave away the side of the left-hand beam (max. ~ 10mm at the top and tapering down to make it level) and then re-install the door with new hinges. Would this cause any problems, or is there a better solution?



Thanks for any help!


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