Building An Exterior Door Jamb From Scratch

The door jamb is the vertical portion of the frame that runs along the sides of the door.

Building an exterior door jamb from scratch.

Building your own jambs is cost effective because you can purchase slab doors cheaper than prehung units. I m building a custom replacement exterior door for a roughly 100 year old house out of cedar. This is the first of three videos on hanging doors for those who want to see nick s not really a workshop w. Installation of any door goes a lot easier if you mount the hinges on the door first rather than on the jamb.

How nick makes a custom door jamb step by step. You can purchase precut boards for this project or you can purchase trim boards and cut them to size yourself. Measure the width and height of the door. Determine the size of the door opening.

Some preformed exterior doorjamb boards will already have weather stripping attached to them. Measure your door carefully and cut the opening to fit using a reciprocating saw. The size of the door opening will vary depending on the size of the door you plan to install. Hinges usually go 8 inches from the door s top 9 inches from the bottom and at the.

Add 1 1 2 inch to the height and cut two pieces. A typical door opening is 2 inches 5 1 cm wider than the door size being installed to allow for the thickness of the jamb material and shims to plumb the jamb. If you re not using premade jamb material or if your walls are a nonstandard thickness you can buy 5 or 6 inch wide lumber and rip cut it to the width of the wall using a table saw. Installing a new door frame is not a difficult task and can be learned by understanding the simple steps involved.

If you have to replace or repair a door jamb it s most advisable to build an entire new door frame.