by Tom D
(Sherwood Park AB, Cdn)
I have a sliding glass door with the standard e2014 latch. The door will not budge a fraction even. It appears I am unable to get the lock to disengage (this is questionable) to get the door open to possibly remove the locking mechanism and replace it. Is there anyway to get the door open? Or is there a way to find out if in fact the lock is not disengaging to allow the door to open? We do live in Canada and it has been exceptionally cold and we at first felt the door was frozen due to the weather conditions but that does not appear to be the problem.. just can’t get the door to budge at all. Our email address is twdunlop@shaw.ca. Thank you. Tom
Hi Tom;
I would start by pushing the door firmly in the closing position and working the thumbturn lever back and forth to see if the hook would come free from the keeper.
Next I would use my suction cups on the glass to move the door up and down while working the thumbturn.
You could also do this by inserting a big flat screwdriver under the door and levering the whole door up and down carefully.
The goal would be to get that hook to slip out of the keeper so the door would open.
If all else fails, take the 2 screws out holding the inside and outside handles on and pull the handles off. The outside one is going to fall to the ground.
Then see if the rectangular keyslot will operate with a small flat screwdriver.
Worst case scenario big screwdriver between the jamb and the vertical stile of the patio door and just bust it open.
The keeper is usually only made of powdered aluminum magnesium so should break.
but that is last resort because door frame might get damaged. Usually the previous techniques should work with a bit of time and cursing at it.