Removing A Deteriorated
Sliding Patio Door

We remove an old sliding patio door and jambs, and repair water damage underneath.

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The seal in double pane glass had failed, letting moisture in between the panes.

Note the foggy appearance at the lower right of the glass. This is all too common with modern windows and doors.

The wood door sash and the jamb (frame) were quite soft and spongy. A closer inspection revealed a major rot problem.

Prior to starting the removal process, we removed the casing (trim) around the inside of the door, to measure the width of the opening in the framing. The bad news was... the opening was only 5'-10" wide, which meant that the homeowner had to special-order a replacement door.

The standard size for sliding doors is 6'-0" wide. 8' units are also fairly common.

Outside, there was a single screw holding a metal bracket to the sill (which was rotted).

After we removed the bracket the fixed pane was easily lifted out. The homeowner was surprised at how little security the door provided.

We removed the sliding pane by lifting it up and then pushing the bottom out.

The sill practically fell out. Note the black marks. They are signs of fungal growth and rot. The sub-floor next to the carpet was badly rotted.

Hey, what's this? In all the rotted wood we found a few bugs. Not termites, fortunately, just big black ants.

And this is in a fifteen year old house! Disgraceful.

We used a reciprocating saw to cut any nails that held the jamb to the framing.

The jamb came out with a few minutes of sawing and prying.

Uh-oh. Water got behind the jamb and rotted the trimmer stud.

We drilled a series of holes just above the rotted part. The cut was smoothed out with a chisel.

A reciprocating saw was used to cut away the rotted OSB sub-floor.

It was pried up with little effort.

A strip of the sub-floor was removed.

Part of the rim joist had begun to rot, so we added a block of wood.

We placed short pieces of wood in between the floor joists, under the floor.

This handy drill bit from Black & Decker drills a pilot hole and a countersink all at once.

We peeled back the carpeting and drilled through the edge of the OSB flooring.

Then we fastened the board to the floor.

We were able to drive screws horizontally through the rim joist and into the connector piece.

We used a flat pry-bar to hold up the connector board while driving in the screws.

A piece of 5/4 x 6 treated deck lumber was used to replace the rotted floor.

We secured the plank with deck screws.

A piece of 2x4 was tightly fitted into the space where the rotted stud segment was removed.

At this point we discovered that the rotted stud was not a structural component but a filler piece. There were two more studs behind it. It turned out that the door opening was actually wide enough for a standard 6'-0" slider door. We figure the builder got a deal on some non-standard doors and just filled in the opening with a 2x4.

Tools Used:

• Reciprocating Saw
• Hammer, Pry Bars
• Electric Drill & Spade Bits
• Chisel

Materials Used:

• Treated Deck Boards
• 2x4 Blocks