how many hinges on a door

[alco]

I just hanged a new front door. It is wooden panel door, 90 cms wide x 200 cms high and I estimate the weight to about 40 kgs. I installed 3 hinges in way I thought is a standard, 7" from the top, 11" from the bottom, and another one centered between the two. The hinges are 4" x 3" and the best quality I can find. Then my Thai wife told me that all houses she sees have at least 4 hinges on a panel door and some even have 5. Then she called on a carpenter and just like her strongly believe that there should be at least 4 hinges on a door this heavy. I think adding another hinge to those I already installed will make it look ugly. but in the end she wins and she let the carpenter install an additional hinge just below the top hinge. What do you think, is 3 heavy duty hinges is not enough? Back home do you notice how many hinges are there on a panel door? Why do Thais insist on adding more?

[lopburi3]

Mine are all using 3 hinges but they are 5" each (have 6 such wood doors). Wood doors here are normally made from very heavy wood (even if not actually teak).

[nev]

All mine have been installed with 4 hinges, 2 at the top 1 middle and one at the bottom.

[stoneyboy]

Ok I've just looked at my front doors.

See below there are 4.

Edited August 3, 2015 by stoneyboy

[Matej]

Hello

In my current condo the front door have 3 hinges, not massive ones, but decent. I estimate the door weight about 25 kg.

Same back home

The Thais I know, doesn't even have a front door, or any door at all ... so I will not help you with these.

I think, 3 should be fine ...

Weight:

Be sure to distribute weight equally on each hinge.

Security:

The more hinges than necessary won't make the door more secure at all ... if someone decide to rob you, they will probably rob you, almost nothing you can do about that

Good luck.

------------

BTW

She is not a Thai wife. She is just a wife.

Thailand is not so special as many Thais and falangs claim

We are not in constellation of orion.

[alco]

Thanks for the replies. I just found from the Stanley website about door hinges:

"Use two hinges on doors up to 5' (1.52m) and an additional hinge for each additional 2.5' (0.76m)."

What bugs me is that they add the 4th hinge after I already installed only 3, where the third hinge is centered between the top and bottom. The forth hinge is like 2" below the top one and looks obvious that it is a later addition. In my opinion it looks ugly. My wife said she is more concern about safety and is afraid that the heavy door will fall and hurt us. Should have looked better if the 4 hinges are equally spaced like in the picture of stoneyboy. But anyway I just stop thinking about it and move on.

[wayned]

Good hinges are sold in "sets" of two. I built my own house(s) American ranch style. I have 15 doors. Except for the solid wood front and back doors

which have three hinges , all of the other doors are hung with only two hinges. Except for the louvred wooden bathroom doors, the inside doors are light

weight hollow core wooden doors. The thing that I miss most about the hinges here is the removable hinge pin.

[Brit_Doggie]

Threesome to me is good including hinges, no steel fire resistant door involved making weight 60+kgs, well done that man.

=

[Crossy]

All our solid hardwood doors are on three 4" hinges except the big folding door which has four at each fold.

The door with four hinges has them grouped with two close together at the top (where the maximum stress is).

[rawhod]

All our doors are quite heavy wooden doors and our carpenter put 4 on each. Two near the top, one center and one bottom.

They look alright. Like all things, if you don't like at first, you will soon stop looking and forget.

Back in the UK all the doors on my house have 3 butts, however the standard UK door is 80cm wide and not such heavy wood as in Thailand.

You are in Thailand...what the hell.!!!!!

Edited August 4, 2015 by rawhod

[PattayaClub]

Thanks for the replies. I just found from the Stanley website about door hinges:

"Use two hinges on doors up to 5' (1.52m) and an additional hinge for each additional 2.5' (0.76m)."

What bugs me is that they add the 4th hinge after I already installed only 3, where the third hinge is centered between the top and bottom. The forth hinge is like 2" below the top one and looks obvious that it is a later addition. In my opinion it looks ugly. My wife said she is more concern about safety and is afraid that the heavy door will fall and hurt us. Should have looked better if the 4 hinges are equally spaced like in the picture of stoneyboy. But anyway I just stop thinking about it and move on.

A standard US door is 7 feet (2.1 meters). A standard Thai door is 2 meters. According to Stanley, then, three hinges is enough. I am not sure of the reason why, but Thais seem to think you need a ridiculous number of hinges. I have seen as many as seven or eight hinges on a single door. What the ----?

When I built my house, I went with the Western standard (as I did with everything), and used three (3) hinges per door, properly placed, as you describe. Oh sure, I caught a lot of grief from everybody (Thai), wife included, but I stood my ground. No problems at all. I can tell you this, the worst case scenario would be door sag of some kind (bad doors). No door is going to fall off and hurt anybody. With all due respect to your wife, that fear is nothing but typical Thai hysterical insanity that is unaccompanied by critical thinking. The irony of it is all the total acceptance of so many insanely dangerous practices all over (e.g., working on a 4 story scabbed together scaffold with no safety harness), and then worrying that a door will fall off. Go figure.

There is this. My doors are all glued (and quite heavy). Many (most?) Thai doors are assembled without glue and will sag over the years. Perhaps this is the reason for so many hinges. Or maybe a lot of hinges stops ghosts from coming through the door. Could be almost anything.

When building my house to Western code, every time my method clashed with the Thai method, I caught a lot of grief. I just told them it''s my house and I want you to to do it my way. I did all the wiring and plumbing personally. I've never found a Thai that could do it properly.

Edit: I just looked at the in-laws double front door. They are 80 cm doors with five hinges on each door, evenly spaced, 10 in all. Overkill.

Edited August 4, 2015 by PattayaClub

[Matej]

Good luck

Edited August 5, 2015 by Matej

[Matej]

Thanks for the replies. I just found from the Stanley website about door hinges:

"Use two hinges on doors up to 5' (1.52m) and an additional hinge for each additional 2.5' (0.76m)."

What bugs me is that they add the 4th hinge after I already installed only 3, where the third hinge is centered between the top and bottom. The forth hinge is like 2" below the top one and looks obvious that it is a later addition. In my opinion it looks ugly. My wife said she is more concern about safety and is afraid that the heavy door will fall and hurt us. Should have looked better if the 4 hinges are equally spaced like in the picture of stoneyboy. But anyway I just stop thinking about it and move on.

A standard US door is 7 feet (2.1 meters). A standard Thai door is 2 meters. According to Stanley, then, three hinges is enough. I am not sure of the reason why, but Thais seem to think you need a ridiculous number of hinges. I have seen as many as seven or eight hinges on a single door. What the ----?

When I built my house, I went with the Western standard (as I did with everything), and used three (3) hinges per door, properly placed, as you describe. Oh sure, I caught a lot of grief from everybody (Thai), wife included, but I stood my ground. No problems at all. I can tell you this, the worst case scenario would be door sag of some kind (bad doors). No door is going to fall off and hurt anybody. With all due respect to your wife, that fear is nothing but typical Thai hysterical insanity that is unaccompanied by critical thinking. The irony of it is all the total acceptance of so many insanely dangerous practices all over (e.g., working on a 4 story scabbed together scaffold with no safety harness), and then worrying that a door will fall off. Go figure.

There is this. My doors are all glued (and quite heavy). Many (most?) Thai doors are assembled without glue and will sag over the years. Perhaps this is the reason for so many hinges. Or maybe a lot of hinges stops ghosts from coming through the door. Could be almost anything.

When building my house to Western code, every time my method clashed with the Thai method, I caught a lot of grief. I just told them it''s my house and I want you to to do it my way. I did all the wiring and plumbing personally. I've never found a Thai that could do it properly.

Edit: I just looked at the in-laws double front door. They are 80 cm doors with five hinges on each door, evenly spaced, 10 in all. Overkill.

Construction workers wearing flip-flops is just the tip of the iceberg, as you have already mentioned.

Nowadays, many people are also suffering from bigorexia. The more, the better. Everyone wants to have the biggest car, house ... the best computer, phone ... who cares whether they really need it or not.

Same with hinges.

I definitely salute your approach.

Keep going and don't forget that craziness is behind every corner in this country.

[bankruatsteve]

All our solid hardwood doors are on three 4" hinges except the big folding door which has four at each fold.

The door with four hinges has them grouped with two close together at the top (where the maximum stress is).

Our Thai door guy said the door was heavier at the top and thus needed the extra hinge. I didn't understand or accept that.

Now you say there is more stress at the top. What causes that? Are doors actually more heavy at the top? This is very bemusing for me.

[alco]

I told my wife and the carpenter that before the door falls on us it will give tell-tale signs like sagging or screws getting loose. And as responsible home owner, we will respond by then before an accident. The carpenter told us that termites may eat the whole length of the wooden jamb from the inside slowly without us knowing before it is too late. But if that is the case, how will 4 or 5 hinges help if the whole jamb is hollow. There could be something else they are not telling us. It maybe have something to do with beliefs of good luck and spirit.

[Crossy]

All our solid hardwood doors are on three 4" hinges except the big folding door which has four at each fold.

The door with four hinges has them grouped with two close together at the top (where the maximum stress is).

Our Thai door guy said the door was heavier at the top and thus needed the extra hinge. I didn't understand or accept that.

Now you say there is more stress at the top. What causes that? Are doors actually more heavy at the top? This is very bemusing for me.

Ok, I'll bite.

It's not really the stress that differs, but its direction.

A door is a dynamic system (it moves) so the stresses on the hinges and fixings are actually constantly varying in magnitude and direction. Not easy to understand, so let's take a simple static view.

The door will try to rotate about the bottom hinge, making the force at the bottom effectively pushing in to the frame, placing the bottom fixings and hinges under compression, their strongest direction.

At the top the stress is away from the frame, meaning that the force on the top fixings and hinges is all in tension. The top fixings will tend to be pulled out.

Think about an overloaded shelf, the top fixings invariably pull out first.

[chiang mai]

4 hinges on all solid wood doors in my house.

[eyecatcher]

All you guys with 4 hinges 5 hinges..............just go and check how many nails........thats why!

nothing better than a good screw.