Hidden door advice

spiderclimber · Post by **spiderclimber** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 10:06 am

Hello all.

So I am in need of some advice, basically just a few more minds thinking on a solution.

I am in the process of completely gutting and redoing my living room. My home is from 1854 and the plaster was past its prime and not work fixing. There was a lack of insulation, knob and tube with some blown in packed around it, live wires just taped in the walls and ceiling, etc. So it needed to come down and be fixed.

We chose to do a custom wains coating on the bottom 40 to 42 inches of the wall, depending on the side of the room as the floor is not square.
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My issue arises from a corner closet that was built to house an air handler for our central air. It is in the corner of the living room and the door doesn't match the rest of the home (6 panel fake board door piece of crap). I want to create a hidden door if possible, so it looks like a bookshelf on top of the wainscoating. It will have a book to pull to release the latch on the inside to get it open to access the air handler as needed.

Ok here is picture or two of the closet

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I already moved the Cold Air return to the other side of the unit placing the grate on a wall in another room.

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This is a picture of how the close the closet was built to the door frame entering to our sitting room.

Here is a picture of the wall minus the finish boards for the wainscoting but with the vent moved.

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Ok so the problem arises that the door must swing out. Every door I have seen online either swings in, or does not have moulding on the outside at all that would interfere with the swinging action. Because of the moulding rail, if it swings out on hinges the moulding would literally have to be removed as it would contact and try to dig into the wall. I don't want a seam to show as I want it to continue the look of wainscoting all around.

My thought was to use drawer slides to slide out the door 6 inches and then allow it to hinge. I know I can find heavy duty slides but is that the best option? I mean when the slides are disconnected from one side as it hinges, is that going to bind the door to non movement? (figuring on 3 slides per side and connected together with a plywood runner per side to cut down on twisting.)

I may use SOSS hinges to get the motion right but I need to figure out how to slide out the whole door before it turns to avoid catching the wall. Any thoughts on the thing would be great. I hope I described it well enough.
I am sure you will have questions so ask and I will do my best to answer them so we can keep the ball rolling.

Oh one last picture. This is my set up to cut all the custom stock. I have 20 feet across right now. It will be sad giving that up soon.

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mrhart · Post by **mrhart** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 10:16 am

Can you show a pic of the air handler and how it is in the closet?
To consider: is the return air you relocated, still going to draw air well from where you moved it to (living room was centrally located). Can you move the air handleer all together? Pics would help.

gypsytinker · Post by **gypsytinker** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 10:24 am

Awesome Idea. I look forward to seeing how you figure it out.

I'd say with the rollers, you will need to keep them all moving together. that would be a lot of weight too...

I know it sounds weird at first, but... what about some kind of casters under it? Maybe the bottom could scoot out a hair more than the top too for a sort of hand-truck-type action... The whole thing rolls, but it tethered/tracked on one corner..?

Just thinking on it. Neat idea.

edit: What if you kick the base-board in a certain spot and it pops out, then you pull the bottom out with that and the whole thing swings open on the wheels. Then you won't have the book case in the way of that traffic area as well.

mrhart · Post by **mrhart** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 10:25 am

you have a PM

spiderclimber · Post by **spiderclimber** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 11:06 am

I have several options and I am just trying to sort which is the best.

First I could do a full bookshelf and say heck with the wainscoting but I want to continue the wainscoting look around the room so that option is at the bottom.

Second I could just put a nicer door back on. Don't really consider that one an option right now. I want something unique and challenging.

Third, I can make the bookshelf pivot above like any other outswinging hidden door and then unlock the bottom portion and just lift it out of the way. It could just be latched into place and removed completely

fourth, i can use sever 30 inch heavy duty slides and the whole thing slides out and you just step over the slide and work with the door behind you.

Fifth, I can use slides to slide the door out a few inches. then unlatch one side and it swings open on hinges.

I am sure there are more ways to accomplish this and probably a better one.

Here is a quick drawing of what I want the door to look like when done.

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spiderclimber · Post by **spiderclimber** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 11:27 am

Here is a picture of a door with similar molding as mine would have. But somehow they can open it. I would assume the molding would bind up against itself unless they cut away the edges and hope no one would notice.

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rpd · Post by **rpd** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 12:37 pm

This looks like it could work.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Hidden-Door-Bookshelf/

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heathicus · Post by **heathicus** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 1:21 pm

Very interesting project at Instructables. At least one thing from that project that could be applied here is the placement of the hinge. Instead of putting the hinge at the traditional edge of the door, put it at the top and bottom of the door, in from the edge.

spiderclimber · Post by **spiderclimber** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 1:46 pm

agreed the hinge could work, just not sure how to hide the split of the door in the molding without it being completely obvious. That is still my dilema

heathicus · Post by **heathicus** » Thu Mar 08, 2012 2:04 pm

Slightly overlap the trim with the door. The door on the short side of the hinge will swing in, so overlap the trim from the wall over the door. The door on the long side of the hinge would swing out, so overlap that trip over the trim on the wall. When closed, they come together.