I want to replace our front door. I will need to replace the trim and jam? Does the new door come with the jam and trim pieces to replace the old? Wondering how much carpentry skills will be required.

 

You can purchase a complete door unit at your local Lowe's or Home Depot that will be ready to stick in the hole. You also can purchase interior trim kits from same that already have the angles cut and all you would need to do is trim the length of the sides.

Your biggest job will be tearing out the old door unit. Remove the interior trim and using a 2x4 block and a large 2 lb hammer try knocking the old unit out. If it wont budge it may have lots of 16 Penny nails n the brick mold on the outside. You might need to also remove the brick mold and try knocking it out again. If you notice nails that have nailed through the jamb you might need to use a saws-all to run down the sides between the jamb and the framing to cut the nails.


Average homeowner with little skills should not attempt this project. After all it's your front door. If something goes wrong your house would be wide open. I charge twice as much to fix a homeowner screwup, than to do the job from the start and so do most others. It should run you no more than $300 labor to get it done by someone who knows what to do. Thaks a professional about half a day to do that job. Might take average homeowner all day or more.

 

You can replace just the door if your jamb and moulding is in good shape. You will need to route or chisel out for the hinges and cut/drill holes for the lockset. If switching from wood to metal, make sure your old door is square and not altered in size - kind of hard to whittle on a metal door to make it fit

 

Mark is correct about replacing just the door if the jamb is OK. It's probably a two person job if your replacement door is heavy. The only hard part is marking and mortisinf for the hinges.

I disagree with doorsandthings about hiring a contractor to replace a prehung entry door. Assunming you are installing a "typical" door, it's not a difficult job and requires no special tools. In addition to typical hand tools you'll need a level, a package of shims and some caulk. A reciprocating saw is great for removing the old door.

The whole job shouldn't take more than a half day for a couple of guys that know how to use tools and understand plumb and level.

 

If you are replacing a prehung entry door with another prehung entry door, I agree with Wayne- it would be easy. If not, it would be much more difficult and much more involved, which doorsandthings is probably envisioning.

If your door has a sloped wooden sill, you have height issues with today's new prehung doors. What's underneath that sill is often a mystery until it is removed.

Whether or not your current trim can be reused depends on the size of the current opening. If your new prehung door is 36x80, the bottom edge of your head trim will need to be about 81" above the finished floor level. (Many older doors will have casing that is too short to reuse.) Additionally, the distance between your casing from side to side will need to be about 36 1/2". If none of these measurements check out, then your interior trim would need to be removed and likely replaced, unless it is too large, in which case you might be able to cut it down and reuse it.

You basically run into the same problems with the exterior trim. a 36x80 prehung door unit with brickmould will measure 40 x 83 1/8 on the exterior when measuring the outside of brickmould from side to side and the bottom of the threshold to top of brickmould on top. You can compare that with your current measurements to get an idea of what you are in for. Sometimes people will have installed additional layers of siding over the top of the old exterior 1x4 trim, which can be a real nightmare to work on.

You also can have issues with the wall thickness. Most doors you see in big box stores are 4 9/16" thick and are designed for a 2x4 wall with 1/2" drywall and 1/2" sheathing. When remodelling older homes, you almost always have to add jamb extensions (and aluminum threshold extensions) onto the exterior of the door so that the door is the right wall thickness for your wall. This involves removing the brickmould (if it is preinstalled on the door) adding the jamb extension, then reinstalling the brickmould. But sometimes you don't use the brickmould- sometimes you need to make custom sized exterior trim to meet up with your old trim lines. 1 1/8" thick trim works best, which isn't something you can just go out and buy anywhere, you usually need to make it. (Your opening will likely need to be prepped for a storm door, which means the exterior trim opening needs to be just the right size and depth.)

Occasionally, the rough opening will not be the right size, and you'll have to add some framing to the sides, or possibly raise or lower the height of the opening.

As doorsandthings mentioned, you can buy a door that is ready to stick in the hole (with the correct wall thickness). Most often, they are special order if it is an odd wall thickness. This will reduce the difficulty, but it is by no means easy if your current door is the old, original door with wide trim and a sloped wooden sill.

The only point I disagree with is the part about tearing out the old door being the HARD part. I think that's the EASY part. Anyone can tear out a door... but not everyone can put it back together again. Maybe some of this will open your eyes to some of the things that are involved. Not to scare you away from the idea, of course. We're here to help, but you don't want to get stuck with a door that is only part-way done by quitting time! So feel free to ask additional questions as you contemplate your project!

 

I've seen this done on home improvement shows, I'm pretty good with tools. I better wait until summer when there's longer days to attemp this one. Just curious, is brick mold a contractor term? Because I don't see any brick. Is this the front trim that seals the door in?

 

Brickmould is a term used for window and door trim. Usually when people say "brickmould" they are specifically referring to a particular profile, in this case, #908. It is 2" wide, 1 1/4" thick on the outside edge and 1" on the inside edge, with an ogee inbetween. It has a flat area 1" wide on the inside face that is where a storm window or storm door would sit. It's a standard profile, and many people just use it as a generic term when referring to window trim that is roughly 2" wide.