Ready to give your home a facelift? Changing up your exterior door could make all the difference in the look and feel of your home. The first thing you need to do, however, is know how to measure the exterior door. This will give you a good idea of what your options are for the new door you choose.
People install new exterior doors for a number of reasons. For some, it’s aesthetics. For others, it’s because their current doors aren’t providing the level of security they need. Whatever your reasoning, if you’re going to consider a new door, you need to know the exact measurements. Find out how to accurately measure an exterior door in 4 simple steps.
The first step is to know what size door you currently have so you know what size your space can accommodate. Start bymeasuring the height and width of your existing door.Pro tipfor measuring a door: round these measurements up to the full inch to avoid going too small. The best thing to do, however, is to be as precise as possible. Also consider the issues your current door may be giving you. If it is too big or too small for the space, you’ll want to account for that so you don’t make the same mistake with the new exterior door.
The next step for measuringyour exterior door accurately is to note the jamb width.Start measuring from the rear of the internal trim to the backside of the external trim. Measuring the jamb width is crucial because this jamb width will be required when ordering your new exterior door. Having the exact measurements of the jamb width ensures that the inside trim will fit flush against the wall without any need for additional jamb extensions. To measure the jamb width accurately, do it at eye level; this should reduce the risk of parallax error.
The next thing you need to do is determine the rough external opening. This is critical so you can understand how much space you have to work with. To get the most exact measurements, gently remove the interior trim. Begin by measuring the width of the opening between the frames. Then measure from the top of the aperture to the bottom of the sill. To guarantee that it’s the right fit, compare these measurements to the basic opening requirements of your new exterior door.
The final step for measuring for your new exterior door is to take measurements from the top of the trim to the bottom of the sill. Compare these measurements to those of a conventional pre-hung door with 2-inch-wide molding trim.
We outlined the 4 most important steps, but there is a bonus step involved. Step 5 (and possibly the most important step) is to make sure that you choose highquality door hinges to make sure your new exterior door lasts for a long, long time. Find just what you need when you shop at Hinge Outlet, Inc.