Thread: That kind of a shed day.

Yesterday I was looking forward to a whole relaxing day in the shed but I could not even get into the shed.

Started off by getting soaked from standing in the rain in front of the door for 10 minutes, wrestling with the key in a jammed lock. It's jammed before but I have always managed to wriggle it open within a few tries. Then I tried the spare key - no luck. This lock is one of those cheap locks (came with the shed 10 years ago) with a push button lock on the inside knob and a keyed external knob, I have never thought of this lock as a proper lock that would prevent anyone with serious intent from breaking in, its more of an "opportunistic thief deterrent". To improve the security I installed a HD sliding bolt lock which I use when we are away. Mind you, someone with a portable angle grinder could get through that in about 10s.

Anyway I eventually gave up with the keys and decided I would have to try and break in but then realised all the decent tools for doing this were inside the shed but I did have a few things in my car I could use. The back door is the weaker door but I though I'd quickly try a big screwdriver on the front door and see how far I could lever the front door back and sure enough I discovered the door striker plate could be easily bent back far enough for me to pop the door open! Well I thought, that's one good thing I've discovered and at least I can fix that.

Once the door was open I got the door lock off easily enough. The old lock was a rough as guts installation and installed crooked so this is what probably cause the lock to fail. I unjammed the lock and cleaned it up and applied CRC and lithium grease. By now the lock was now working sort of intermittently but as soon as I put it back on the door it would always jam (always remembering to leave the back door open of course) probably because it was installed crooked. After about a dozen times taking the lock on and off the door I decided the lock was too far gone so I went off and bought another one.

Get home - of course new lock is not quite the same size as the old one so will not fit in the current holes and new holes need to be cut about 30 mm closer to the door edge. This would be easily enough on a wooden door but this one is Colorbond lined on the outside, over a steel frame and flat sheet metal lining inside. I have a serious set of carbide tipped metal cutting hole saws which got me so far but they were not big enough for the hole required on the outside and, have you ever tried using a hole saw close to an existing hole AND on the sides of Colorbond ribs? In frustration I got out the angle grinder and chewed open some ragged holes that were large enough, but of course left the original holes right next to the new lock

Finally got the lock in and beefed up the striker plate - all good. Then I was left with the old roughly cut holes to patch. Fortunately I still had some pieces of the Colorbond used to original cover and line the shed so I cut out pieces and pop riveted these over the holes. A quick spray with some "Surf Mist" touch up paint and I was done. By now it was 2:30pm and I was stuffed so had to have a nap!

So much for a relaxing day in the shed.