Hi,

I am moving into this new place where the bedroom doors are these double french doors (they open into the room). I was wondering how/what kind of lock I can install, since neither door is stationary, the floors are wood, and it's an apartment and I don't really want to drill holes into the floor and the door frame. I just like having a lock on my bedroom door or having SOME way of keeping the doors closed.

 

If the work is done well, bolts on one door (top and bottom) won't look bad at all. These are made to mortise in to french doors and want (often brass) plates nicely set into the floor and frame.

Then the doors will close properly too, as they should.

The only way to secure those doors without installing hardware in wood, is a bar from wall to wall, dropped into brackets. You can fill & paint over the bracket screw holes later.

 

Thanks a lot!!! For the first option, I would be required to drill a hole in the door frame at the top and then another into the hardwood floors, correct? I would be willing to do that if there was a way to repair it after. We're renting so I'm concerned that we'll lose our damage deposit if I drill holes I can't fill or fix in the hardwood floors.

 

Kay
There are also throw bolts that screw onto the interior door face, and have a small plate that installs between the upper jamb and the door. Not as secure as the ones mentioned previously, but less work to install, and the screw holes would be relatively easy to repair.

I'm presuming you are looking more at privacy issues as opposed to security? These would only be for use from the inside of the room. Otherwise, a bolt of some sort on one door, then a locking knob on the other for securing from the outside.

What do you have now? Just handles of some sort, and ball catches on the top of the doors?

 

No, the first option is no temporary fix. It's setting in proper hardware these doors are meant to have. It's no more reversible (or inappropriate) than a soap dish mounted in bath tile. Your landlord should be fine with this improvement if guaranteed the work will be done well, and at no cost (put that in writing).

Bolts mounted on the door face, then removed, offer nearly the maximum security you'd get out of french doors anyway. Because in any case one would break things, make some noise, and get through if determined. The surface bolts are much easier to install than the mortised bolts. They will look like something a tenant installed.

 

I went in and looked at the apartment today to make sure, there is already a hole in the top of the door frame where I assume they had put a bolt prior, but there is no such hole in the floor. Each door has a super old knob on it (ie. there's no sort of latching or locking mechanism on either knob...functionally they're more like cabinet handles cause they don't do anything, hence why the doors won't stay closed).

I think based on what I saw the best option would be to install the bolt as someone suggested that slides into the top to keep one door stationary, then to replace the knobs so that they can somehow lock into each other? I'm not SO concerned with security as privacy, as far as I'm concerned if they can get into the apartment one more obstacle is really not going to stop them.