Lock Replacement in Springfield, MO

Fitting new locks to old doors

Springfield has districts old enough that a new lock has to suit a door built for an earlier one. On Walnut Street the design guidelines list Italianate as the earliest house type, then Queen Anne, catalogue-built houses, bungalows and period revivals. In West Central the city puts the average house at 102 years old. A door that old may have been cut for a mortise lock, whose body sits in a pocket in the door's edge, and a modern lock may not fit that pocket. A replacement therefore starts with measuring the old cutout, the door's thickness and how far the cutout sits from the door's edge.

Walnut Street: new hardware, same door

Walnut Street's guidelines lean toward keeping what is already there: every part of a historic door, screen and storm doors, hardware and knobs included, and repair in preference to replacement in kind. Staff approve most door work, though trading an original door for another type or style can go to the review board. That favors fitting new hardware to the existing door over buying a new door. Choose hardware that suits the door's period, and hold on to any original knobs that come off.

Window locks on the rental checklist

The checklist for the West Central rental pilot, based on the International Property Maintenance Code, has two window items. It flags openable windows within six feet of grade that lack locks or have locks that do not work (Sec. 304.18.2), and required emergency escape and rescue windows that cannot be opened from inside without keys or tools (Sec. 702.4). A new lock on a low window that is also a required escape opening should therefore work by hand from inside. This is general information, not legal advice.

What to describe in a request

• The street or neighborhood, and whether the house is on Walnut Street or in West Central.
• The door material, and roughly how old the house is.
• What the lock is doing: worn, loose, sticking or missing a deadbolt.
• The size of the existing cutout, if you can measure it.

If the lock can be saved, lock repair may be enough. The lock replacement page covers the service itself, and Springfield covers the city's older districts.