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Sometimes I’m called upon to install Samsung mortise locks that customers have purchased from Amazon. These are not my favorite locks to install and I would not install one in my own home.

Samsung offers a variety of sleek digital locks with lots of cool features, including keypad entry, RFID key fob entry, and fingerprint recognition. These locks look like they were designed for the set of Star Trek: The Next Generation. They’re like a 20th-century conception of a futuristic lock. And they usually work. As far as I can tell, none of them have the capability of wirelessly linking into a smart home system. I’m sure that’s coming.

My biggest qualm is that they require a nonstandard door preparation. If you don’t already have a Samsung mortise lock in your door, installing one will require some significant door modification. Regardless of what kind of lock you currently have, it will be necessary to put new holes in your door. If you currently have a standard mortise lock (made by Baldwin, Sargent, Corbin Russwin, etc.), you will also likely have to fill in some of the spaces that are already in the door to assure a snug fit. I suppose this would all be fine if you expected this lock to last for 100 years like those other ones would. But this is a piece of electronics you’d be mounting to your door. Just like with your laptop and your smart phone, it’s likely that in a few years you’d want a new model. Would you then have to stick to the Samsung line because that’s what your door is prepped for? Are you confident you’d still want this brand in a few years? Will Samsung still be selling locks by that time that require this same door prep? Unless you’re pretty comfortable with the idea of replacing your whole door with the next lock change, this should heavily influence your consideration of this line of locks.

I also doubt how focused on security the designers of these locks were. To their credit, these are mortise locks, which are typically more secure than the standard cylindrical locks we find on most doors. The backup key holes are located in a part of the lock that would make them hard to pick. Additionally, they cannot be bumped and the keys themselves are relatively hard to duplicate (which is not always a great thing). Finding someone to rekey the locks would be a particularly interesting challenge. The strikeplates for these locks are lightweight and come with very short screws. It’s certainly possible to install a heftier strikeplate and to secure it to the frame of the house using long screws. But the fact that this isn’t included with the lock makes me think that withstanding a brute-force attack is not the main purpose of these locks. And as far as I can tell, none of these locks have been scored by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), which is the principal authority for rating locks.

Although Samsung’s locks are packed with cool features and aesthetic appeal, the actual security they provide does not justify their high cost, the difficulty of installation, and the problems you encounter when you want to replace them.

In my opinion, Schlage makes the best and most reliable keypad deadbolts. They offer two basic levels of deadbolt.

For $100 you can get the no-frills BE365. This is a good Grade-2 lock. It’s not incredibly intuitive for first-time users, though. It has a knob on the front of it under the keypad. Under normal circumstances the knob spins freely and does nothing. But the user code engages that knob so it can be used to throw or retract the bolt. I’ve seen people punch in the code and then scratch their heads waiting for the deadbolt to unlock itself, not realizing they have to manually control the bolt with the knob. Once you’ve used it once, it’s easy. But this may not be the best option for Airbnb. Also, using the backup key with these locks requires a lesson. Half the time after I’ve given this lesson, my customer will say something to the effect of, “Well, I hope I never have to do that.” The key is principally for use when the battery dies. The 9-volt battery lasts for about three years. Changing it requires the removal of two screws. Installation is fairly simple, except that without a bit of door surgery the BE365 cannot be installed in doors with a 1-1/2” bore; it requires the more standard 2-1/8” bore.

For around $200 you can get a Grade-1 lock with all the bells and whistles—either the Schlage Connect or the Schlage Sense. Both of these have light-up touchscreens and both have bolts that are battery-powered so nobody will be confused. Using the key in these locks is also just like with a traditional deadbolt. With the right auxiliary equipment, these locks can be controlled with an app, both locally and remotely. These locks can be installed on doors with either bore size. They take 4 AA batteries, which can be replaced without the removal of any screws. Batteries last about a year (depending on use, of course) and for a much shorter period if the latchbolt rubs against the edge of the strikeplate as it extends and retracts.

So what’s the difference between the Connect and the Sense? Well, the Connect links up to your smart home system with Z-Wave technology and the Sense connects to your Apple TV via Bluetooth. For the Connect, Schlage would like you to buy the Nexia Bridge and pay $10/month for the rest of your life to use the more advanced features of these locks. But you can also remotely access the lock through some home security systems such as ADT Pulse. Another option is to buy a Samsung SmartThings hub for $99 and control it with that. The Sense does not work with the earliest versions of the Apple HomeKit, or if the HomeKit is placed too far from the lock. Once you have them all set up, the Sense and the Connect are mostly the same. I’m fairly confident that these locks can be hacked, but I don’t know how to do it and I doubt that your neighborhood meth fiend does, either. And to be fair, those glass windows all over your house are also very hackable.

One more thought before you make a purchase:

Think about all of the hardware on your door. For typical use, your keypad lock should be the only thing on your door that locks. This may mean replacing the locking doorknob with a passage knob (which has no locking function). Imagine that your front door is the regular point of entry for both your kids and your cleaning lady. Your cleaner arrives during the schoolday and gets in with the entry code. On her way out, thinking she’s being very conscientious, she locks both the knob and deadbolt. Your kid doesn’t carry a key because he loses everything and is supposed to be able to get in with just a code. So now he’s going to be calling you at the office when he gets home from school because he’s locked out. Isn’t work supposed to be your respite from stuff like this? Don’t be stingy; plan to also replace the doorknob if appropriate.

Last week I got a call from a restaurant in Woodinville that wanted to replace the failing hardware on its bathroom doors. I suggested I come by with a couple of commercial-grade privacy levers and put them on the doors. Privacy knobs and levers are what we have on our own bathrooms and bedrooms. They lock from the inside more as an indicator of occupancy than an obstacle to entry. They can be unlocked without a key – sometimes with a toothpick or skewer through a little hole on the outside half, and sometimes using a coin in a slot that sort of looks like a keyhole. The restaurant manager said he’d prefer keyed entry levers to provide a real sense of safety in his single-occupancy bathrooms. And he needed this done quickly.

I had reservations, but did as the customer asked. Most commercial-grade knobs and levers have a key difference from residential-grade ones. Rather than having a simple button to lock the door or a turnpiece to lock it, there’s a turn-button that both pushes AND turns. When you just push the button in, the door remains locked until 1) someone opens it with a key from the outside or 2) someone turns the knob or lever from the inside, whereupon the button pops out to the unlocked position. But if you push AND turn, the door remains locked until the turn-button is deliberately returned to the unlocked position (by twisting back to the unlocked position). The trouble is that from the inside, the door always feels unlocked, so you can always turn the knob or lever and walk out without unlocking the door. This is how almost all commercial-grade keyed levers function, and it often causes lockouts. But this is what I installed because it was all I could get quickly to meet the customer’s specifications.

As I drove from the restaurant to the next job, I was kicking myself for not pushing back harder on installing those locks. The management had the keys to the bathroom in case a customer accidentally left one of the doors locked, but I realized it was way too likely that customers would walk into a bathroom, push and twist the turnpiece upon entry, and then walk out of the bathroom without thinking to unlock the door. I wondered to myself how long it would be before I got a call from them. Sure enough, before I’d reached my next job the manager of the restaurant had reached the same conclusion and wanted me to come back to change the locks.

I wasn’t available to return until the next day, so I had a bit of time to think about a solution. These were relatively expensive entry levers I put on his doors, and since they had been installed in bathrooms, it wouldn’t have been right for me to put them back in the boxes and sell them as new to someone else, even if they’d only been in use for half a day. I didn’t want to charge the customer more because I knew I was at fault for failing to stridently object to that lock option. I also didn’t want to eat the cost of these locks myself.

So I came up with another solution. I disabled the turn function on the turn-buttons, so whether a customer pushed or pushed and turned, the doors would never remain locked upon being opened. This was NOT a factory setting. I did this by removing a piece of metal from the lock with a cutoff tool. On the fully assembled lock, there was no visible change to the hardware. But inside the lock, a piece of the chassis had been removed. Since making this change (see photos below) I have not gotten a callback. However, these were ANSI Grade 2 levers, rated for 400,000 cycles. Maybe my alteration will significantly shorten the life of the locks. If I get called back to this restaurant in a few weeks, months, or years, I’ll come back to this post and edit it into a cautionary tale about how not to fix a lock.

Is your sliding glass door locked? Is it secure?

Yesterday I had two very similar lockout calls. On both calls, I showed up and the customer pointed to a door at the front of the house, expecting that I would bypass the offending lock. On both calls I did a tour around the house to find an easier way in. On both calls I quickly got in through the sliding patio door. The first one was straight-up unlocked. That was easy enough. On the second house, the door was locked and I opened it in a matter of seconds without any tools.

It’s easy to leave your sliding door unlocked and let it sit like that for days or weeks. But even when it’s locked, it’s not always that secure. Patio door locks tend to be kind of dinky. Like the majority of locking doorknobs out there, they’re sufficent for keeping out toddlers and the merely curious, but not someone more determined to get in. The kind of patio door lock with two hooks is markedly better than the kind with just one, but retrofitting your door to accommodate that is not worth the trouble. There’s an easier solution.

When I look at sliding glass doors, I check for three things:

1) the dinky little lock should work (to keep out marauding toddlers);

2) should that lock fail, be defeated, or be left unlocked, there should be something in place to keep the door from sliding open;

3) there should be something in the upper part of the track (above the door) to prevent the door from being lifted directly off the track.

Assuming you already have the dinky lock in place and it works properly, the rest of the job is cheap and easy.

To prevent the door from sliding, you could buy and install a Charley Bar, which is a square aluminum rod that sits across the door at about waist level and is, in my opinion, very ugly. They also make locks that sit at floor level and secure the door with a peg that goes into a hole you’ve drilled into the track or the frame of the inactive door. Usually when I encounter these, they’re broken or the peg no longer aligns with the hole because the house has settled and shifted.

Even though it’s too simple a solution to profit handsomely from, I favor the ol’ wooden rod in the track. Specifically, I buy these cedar rods from Home Depot for $2 apiece. They’re 2″ x 2″ x 3′ and tend to fit really snugly right in the track. I’m always careful when I pick them from the pile because many of them are warped or knotted. I like to lay them on the floor to test them for straightness. When I get it to the house, I lay it next to the door and carefully mark where I need to cut it, making sure not to cut off any more than necessary. Sometimes if they sit loosely in the track, they can be flipped out of the track from outside the house.

Occasionally instead of using the cedar rod I cut down a chrome shower curtain rod and cover the ends with cane tips. It’s a lot more attractive and I charge a big markup to reward myself for my ingenuity. In my own house, the cedar rod is good enough.

The next part of this project involves preventing the door from lifting. Check the track above the door. If you see a piece of plastic glued in there, you should go open a beer to celebrate a job well done. Otherwise, you need to put something in there. One option is to cut off a wafer from the end of the remaining cedar rod and screw that into the upper track. The space between the door and the top of the track varies between doors, but you might want the piece to be about 3/8″ thick. Cut two pieces to install above each end of the door in its closed position. Test that they’re not too thick for the door to slide past them before you do any more work. As close to the edges of the wafer as possible, drill some holes and then counter-sink them with a larger drill bit so that the screws will be flush with the surface of the wood. Again, these blocks need to extend as far down as possible without interfering with the motion of the door.

Now screw the pieces of wood into the track. Mark and pilot the holes if necessary. But if you have any sitting around, I’d recommend using 1-1/2″ self-tapping flat-head screws. If you don’t, I’d recommend just using whatever you can find. It’s not that important. You can glue them in place if you want. You can even tape them. But be careful! Cedar is soft. Screw these blocks in too tightly and they will split. Seriously, just breathing too hard around them is almost enough to make them split. If one does split, you have the option of taking the wood, throwing it away, and just leaving the screws in place. That’s a totally legitimate way of doing this project. If you do end up tossing the wood, you’ll be happy that you placed the screws as close to the edges of the track as possible, as the door is often hollow in the middle. Screws in the center of the track won’t keep anyone from lifting the door. Once the pieces are in, test the door for lift. If you can’t lift the closed door off of the track, it’s time for a beer.

Before you put too much work into this project, remember that your door is made of glass. If you were serious about home security, you would put bars on your windows and you wouldn’t have an entry point that could be bypassed with a few light blows from a hammer. You really don’t need to go overboard here, as the goal is to prevent easy break-ins. There are companies out there that will charge you an arm and a leg to put shatter-resistant film on your glass door. As I see it, the biggest benefit to this is that when someone breaks out your window it comes out in one piece and then the cleanup is easier.

As ever, we should not forget that that we all live in glass houses.