what do i use to seal gaps in between interior door and moulding

Tom Silva shows a homeowner how to seal a door with weather stripping.

Unfortunately, a door'southward conditions seals, if it has any at all, can rip, compress, bend, or wear out over time, leaving dank wintertime air free to enter (or expensive air-conditioned air to go out). Fortunately, attaching new weather seals is a straightforward exercise, far cheaper and faster than installing a new door.

How Much Does It Cost to Seal a Door?

It costs approximately $100 for materials and labor to seal a door. And when you consider that fifty-fifty a tiny ane/8-inch gap around a typical entryway door is the equivalent of drilling a 5 ½-inch-diameter hole through an exterior wall, closing that gap is well worth the effort.

How Practise You Seal a Gap in a Door?

Any well-sealed door requires two components: weatherstripping, which covers the sides and elevation of the door, and a sweep, which fills the space between the threshold and the door bottom. Hardware stores and home centers sell an array of metal, foam, felt, and plastic products for this purpose.

Tom prefers a atmospheric condition seal organization that includes a tubular silicone weatherstripping that fits confronting the doorstop and a twin-fin silicone sweep that fits beneath the door. Silicone makes an ideal weatherstripping because information technology'due south durable, soft, and has no "pinch retentivity"; information technology remains tight as the door swells and shrinks. The following steps will teach y'all how to weatherstrip a door to keep common cold drafts from entering your home.

Footstep 1: Measure the door gap

Ian Warpole

Before ordering weatherstripping, mensurate the gap betwixt the door and jamb and the door and finish with the door closed. Make sure to take measurements forth both side jambs and the head jamb, then choose weatherstripping for each side that's big enough to fill the largest gap forth its run (3/8-inch maximum).

Step ii: Cut a groove

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Pull a pigment scraper along the stop and jamb to make sure that both surfaces are smooth, flat, and free of protruding nails. Fit the grooving tool'due south Five-shaped base of operations into the corner formed by the jamb and the stop, with the flake pointing up.

Plow on the motor and push the tool upwardly to the caput jamb. This creates a slot 1/8 inch wide and 3/16 inch deep. At the height, turn off the motor and remove the bit from the slot. Reinsert it at the starting point, merely this time with the bit pointing down. (Retracing your path in the slot can widen it likewise much to grip the weatherstripping.)

A steady push to the bottom of the jamb with the motor revving finishes the slot on that side. Repeat the process on the opposite side jamb and the head jamb. If the store vacuum leaves whatsoever wood chips in the slot, Tom gently cleans them out with a small screwdriver before he continues to weatherstrip the door.

Step 3: Insert the weatherstripping

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Tom takes one end of the weatherstripping and pushes its barbed tongue into one stop of the slot. Equally he works upward the slot, he's careful non to stretch the weatherstripping; information technology will return to its original length and exit gaps.

A couple of inches from the slot's opposite end, he gauges the proper length and cuts the strip with scissors. (Another method eliminates the possibility of stretching: Cutting the production to length first, fit its ends into the ends of the slot, then button in the barb at the halfway point. Proceed to push at each of the quarter points, and then on until the entire strip is secure.)

It's not necessary to miter the ends where they meet at the head jamb; a butt joint seals best. To finish, drive the weatherstripping into its slot with a spline roller. Bank check the installation by shutting the door from the exterior and looking for gaps.

Footstep four: Rout the dado

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To seal the door gap in the lesser, place the door on sawhorses and use a square to marker out a 5/8-inch-wide dado centered on the door's lesser edge. Tom sets the router's guide and then a ½-inch flake will cut next to the acme mark when the guide rests on the door's pinnacle confront. On the first laissez passer, movement the router from left to correct. On the second pass, the guide rides on the door's opposite side as the router moves from right to left. Make multiple passes to reach total depth (ane⅛ inch).

Step 5: Attach the aqueduct

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Coat the exposed wood in the dado with primer and paint. And then cut the sweep's 2 aluminum channels just 1/eight-inch shy of the width of the door (to allow for end caps to be installed later). To make sure the cut is clean, Tom clamps the channels in a miter box and uses a hacksaw with a waxed blade. Insert one aqueduct into the dado, center it end to end, and screw it in place, as shown.

Footstep half-dozen: Install the door sweep

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After he fits the blackness silicone sweep into the gratis channel, Tom slides the glides into the aqueduct in the dado, and then carefully rehangs the door. (To avoid the possibility of impairment to the sweep, hang the door commencement, then install the sweep.)

Adjust the glides until no light shows between the sweep and the threshold when the door is airtight. To seal the ends of the dado, snap plastic caps into the ends of the channel and stick squares of adhesive-backed pile confronting the bottom of the jambs.

Step 7: Adjust the glides

Ian Warpole

The cloak-and-dagger backside this sweep'due south adjustability is its glides, which lift or lower the sweep by as much equally ¼ inch. To adjust the fit, just open the door, remove the end cap from the latch side, and slide out the sweep. Turning the glides clockwise raises the sweep; counter-clockwise lowers it. Then slide the glides back into the attached aqueduct.

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Source: https://www.thisoldhouse.com/doors/21016488/how-to-make-your-doors-draft-free-with-weatherstripping