I’m doing a screen door not any experience just offered to do em for dirt cheap big mistake wanna pull my hair out. What size diameter spline do you put in standard screen doors? I’ve used 125 and 145 and they keep falling out. Can I super glue the sum bich or what?
What did you do with the spline you pulled out? Why not re-use it?
This space for rent!
I had my helper do it because he is a handy guy. And my wifes brother. I paid him commission he’s already tried to fix it twice and now I’m gonna fix it myself. Oh yeah and because I don’t have it anymore.
i think .180 is the most common i’ve come across. home depot carries the most common sizes, along with screen and tools. you only need about $15 worth of stuff to be set up for screen repair. super-easy to learn and a nice up-sell. you can charge $20 to replace a typical screen and do it for $1 worth of material and 10 minutes of labor when you get good at it.
a trick i learned: buy about 20 mini-sized alligator clamps like these, use them to hold the screen taught around the frame, then just remove them as you press the spline it. results in a nice firm screen with no wrinkles or slack anywhere.
Thanks for taking the time to answer my question this is perfect but I gave the guy a lifetime warranty and I got impatient and just super glued the sum bich. If it comes out again I will get the 180 but it will take me an hour to get the superglue out so hopefully this does the trick.
Your frustration is understandable. However the super glue could be a problem next time the client wants to re screen that door. Spline won’t come out. He may have to buy a new one. Take the time to learn how to do it right. Or don’t do it.
lifetime warranty
the lifetime warranty covers your reputation (important), but not your potential labor costs (also important). having to clean up after your own mistakes down the road really sucks. [MENTION=4853]phinkle[/MENTION] is right. chalk this one up as a learning experience and start making $ on screen repair.
What does this mean? It’s ok to do it wrong if you guarantee it?
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Oh gawd lighten up smokey bear. I’m not gonna start a forest fire. As long as he owns the house I will fix the damn screen. I had a helper do it the first two times and I finally did it myself. If the glue messes things up I guess I will have learned a lesson the hard way because I was in a hurry as this is an extremely needy customer and I can’t sit around all day and wait for someone to see that I need help I had to decide and I did. My word is my bond.
Rubber cement would have been a better alternative along with not so correct spline size, yet still unprofessional. Guarantee and warranty do not mean anything if the job is done wrong and unprofessional - which is more important than offering a lifetime warranty on something that needs replacing every so often. You may just as well have said “You know, I’m just learning so I will do it for free.” A good rule of thumb is always when repairing something don’t throw out the old until the new is finished.
In the future not only Home Depot carries supplies but look around for aluminum and screen suppliers in your area for those hard to find spline sizes. Usually they sell in bulk so you would have to buy 1,000’ rolls, and there is incentive to up sell your services - not give it away with the guilt of life time warranty. I’m not trying to sound harsh in any way - just do better business to stay in business.
Becareful when using clips that the screen isn’t too tight or it will bow in the sides of the frame and it will not fit the window correctly when done. There should be a slight amount of flex to the screen so it is both taught and not loose.
C.R. Laurence has a new 3 in 1 multi-spline. One allows for use from .120 to .165 and the other allows for use from .185 to .215 and you can but the rolls in 250’ lengths for $21 to $34 respectively. Great item for mobile screening jobs and they have both grey and black available.
Most sliding doors will use between .140 - .180 spline. I’ll also get the the odd .200 and .225.
I do at least 100 doors a season.
An even simpler and cheaper trick is to cut several pc’s of spline and push it into the mesh and the channel in several spots around the door. then like you mentioned, just remove them as you move along rescreening the door.
good call. i find that if you just drape the pre-cut screen over the frame and clip it as it lays, that produces the proper amount of tension after splining. the minor amount of slack gets taken up as the spline pushes screen into the channel. you definitely don’t want to stretch the screen taught while clipping.
that’s a nice trick too. i prefer the clip method because i don’t have to dig out the old spline as i go. either method will work great though.
good call. i find that if you just drape the pre-cut screen over the frame and clip it as it lays, that produces the proper amount of tension after splining. the minor amount of slack gets taken up as the spline pushes screen into the channel. you definitely don’t want to stretch the screen taught while clipping.
that’s a nice trick too. i prefer the clip method because i don’t have to dig out the old spline as i go. either method will work great though.
whoops! ↑
No spline to dig out. You cut a pc’s around 2" and only push down about a half inch or so so the rest is sticking out.
