What hinge should i use

Another type of pivot hinge allows doors to pivot open and closed both ways, much like the kitchen doors you see in restaurants. These spring-loaded hinges are larger and heavier than those made for cabinetry. Some hinges add thickness to the cabinetry. To reduce that thickness, consider the overlay hinge. This type of hinge folds back on itself, allowing the door to lay flush against the face of the cabinet. This specialty hinge allows you to swing the door away from the doorframe, widening the opening up to two inches.

Offset hinges are especially useful for areas you want to make ADA compliant. Inside, designers use smaller versions of them on cabinets to achieve a rustic feel. The long hinge leaves or straps add extra support for heavy gates or barn doors. Hinges come in a variety of materials, including stainless steel, brass, bronze, pewter, and copper.

These hinges have a polished copper , aged brass or iron finish and usually feature decorative, antique-style finials. They are installed in one of two ways:.

Primarily used in France, fiche hinges are long hinges which run the full height of the door. They have a long cylindrical barrel which is visible on the outside of the cabinet and rods which are inserted into the cabinet door.

The barrel and rod diameters are given in millimetres. The branches or leaves on the other side of the hinge are screwed or mortised into the cabinet frame. Armoire hinges are smaller than fiche hinges and can be taken apart lift-off design.

They have leaves or branches which are mortised or screwed into position. Screw-in or drill-in hinges are more modern. They are smaller and cylindrical in shape. Screw-in hinges come in different colours — white, brown, grey, etc.

They were very fashionable thirty years or so ago and were used for Formica furniture. Today you mainly find them on low-end cupboards made from chipboard although more often than not concealed hinges are now used instead. Screw-in hinges have two screws housed in threaded inserts which are inserted into the door and the frame.

Screw-in hinges are not suitable for heavy doors. Lift-off hinges have a great deal in common with the cabinet hinges described above — in particular the fact that they can be disassembled. It can be somewhat confusing to tell them apart because the names are not always used consistently by manufacturers. When choosing a lift-off hinge, the key characteristics to consider are the same as for other hinges:.

Lift-off hinges are attached either by screwing or welding, depending on the surface material. For weld-on hinges, when attaching heavy doors it is recommended to use fixing plates to make the installation more secure. Some lift-off hinges have ball-bearings between the knuckles to reduce friction during opening.

This type of hinge is also recommended for heavy doors and windows. This primarily concerns screw-in lift-off hinges.

You can find lift-off hinges with square ends and round ends as well as finial-tipped hinges. Lift-off hinges are usually made from dichromate steel , stainless steel, anodised aluminium or iron. Some PVC models designed for outdoor fittings are also available. Hinge washers or spacer rings are very useful accessories which allow you to adjust or modify the height of a hinged door.

If you've laid parquet flooring in your living room and find that the door is catching against the floor, check the top of the door: if you still have a few millimetres to spare, you can install hinge washers instead of planing the bottom of the door! Hinge washers have different bore diameters , thicknesses and finishes. If you're not sure which way round to install your lift-off hinges, there's no need to panic.

Here's a simple way to work things out! Open the hinge and look at where the fixed part is — that's the side with the pin, not the hole! If the fixed part is on the left, you have a left-handed lift-off hinge. If the fixed part i. Covers are usually pressed or clipped into position and come in lots of different materials — PVC, brass, aluminium and even copper.

Which kind you choose is a matter of personal taste. Just make sure you check the length of the cover , its diameter , and where applicable the bore size.

Concealed hinges are used for kitchen cabinets and are very easy to install. The trickiest part is preparing a template i.

According to Wikipedia: A hinge is a type of bearing that connects two solid objects, typically allowing only a limited angle of rotation between them. Hinges are commonly used in woodwork projects to connect doors and lids. Butt hinge The most common hinge used in woodworking is the butt hinge. These hinges come in sizes from as small as 10mm up to mm. They are easy to attach and are reasonably strong but the common type not very decorative. Butt hinges come in steel and brass, the latter being more expensive but definitely more suited for a project where the hinges are visible.

Butt hinges are the most affordable hinges to use and they can be fitted onto most cabinet doors where the door fits inside the frame as with out Bedside Cabinet. We used decorative butt hinges on our Medicine Cabinet. Butt hinges are used to hang interior or exterior doors onto their frames. For a flush fit, a recess - or mortise - is cut into the door so that the hinge flap sits level with the surface of the wood. It's important when fitting a butt hinge to ensure that the 'barrel' or centre-part of the hinge is placed over the edge of the frame or door.

Only the leaf or flap is mounted onto the door or frame. The leaf or flap with the largest number of joints should be the side which is fixed to the door frame. The cut-outs should be of equal depth, square and plumb, ensuring that the pins are accurately aligned.

Timber movement and shrinkage may mean that the hinges need to be re-aligned at a later date. Their life span is longer than screw-on door hinges. The designs are simple, and you can use them on different types of materials. Ideal applications include vault doors, armoured vehicles, fire doors, shipping containers and construction projects.

The constant opening of doors and cabinets wear hinges down. Environmental factors can also affect hinges. Choosing the right material for your hinge helps prolong its life. For instance, stainless steel hinges resist rust — an important factor if your application is near the ocean or will be exposed to the outdoors — and have the strength to bear heavy doors. Hinges are made in a wide variety of materials with different properties. The one you choose depends on your application.