Mystery Safe repair + Door Alignment Question

[BlueLock]

Recently responded to an "emergency" call for a safe handle that had fallen off. This Old Safe likely dates back to the late 70's when the building went up. The safe has no markings or tags, and appears to be mostly hand-made based on the crudely made parts within. That said, it has been working for nearly 50 years even after a few attacks. Based on the scars, there is evidence of drilling from the left side and hammer dents here and there. No idea if any attacks were successful. Then again, this is just the "drop-side" of the safe. The side with all the goodies is on the other side of the wall, past a couple of locked doors. Note: The question at the bottom of this post...


The Safe (with fixed handle):


Inside:


Inside, under the cover with lock bolt retracted (door bolt extended):


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So... why did the handle fall off? The as-found shaft appears to be much too short for the aluminum handle. There was less than 1/2" engagement. My working theory is, over time, the force needed to pull open the door eventually wore out the ID of the handle, causing it to be excessively loose and wore out the match drilled/match tapped holes. The door does bind a bit, depending on how loose/tight the bolts are. More on this below. Once the handle retaining screw fell out, the customer then started using a Cotter pin to keep them together. This just increased slop in the handle and destroyed the threads. Apparently, they broke the cotter pin every months or two. Each day wore down the aluminum just a bit until it was just... floppy.

I am also wondering if the old handle shaft was broken during an attack because shaft at the fork weld looks like it was snapped off, and the weld is... ugly. (3rd picture above)



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The fix done was to weld on a 1/2 steel piece to the shaft to increase the length approx 5/8" longer to fully and snugly engage the handle inside, and match drill/ream for a press-fit dowel pin all the way through. The handle should not go anywhere unless it is intentionally removed by driving out the pin. If the pin and handle becomes loose with abuse, Loctite is still an option.


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One reason contributing to the wear inside the handle is that the door alignment is not quite right. The 4 bolts are "just a bit loose" because if you tighten them nice and snug, the door moves left upon tightening and binds tightly at the left and bottom. Looking at the closed door, the gap at the top seems larger than it should be, and there is also a gap at the bottom of the hinge. The bottom of the door and top of the hinge have no gap.



Here is the question: What is likely the best way to properly align this door?
Should there be a thrust washer (or brass shim/spacer) underneath the top hinge to better lift the door into alignment? Presumably, a spacer under the top hinge will pull up the door, and better center it in the opening so that it does not bind up anywhere. Or, do I just need to put shims all the way around the door with the bolts loose, then tighten the 4 bolts with the shims in place hoping the door does not shift again during tightening?



Thanks for making it this far. Any advice is appreciated.

~Blue

[MartinHewitt]

I am not an expert door shimmy, but ...

Assuming it is not possible to adjust the door by the four bolts I would adjust the top hinge first and see where this leads me. When I look at the top hinge I see two holes. What is their purpose? Some doors have adjustable hinge pins (and very very few have grease nipples). So I would first try to understand what these holes are for. As you can disassemble this door easily it should not be difficult to find out. I would also look into the underside of the center hinge piece. Maybe there is an Allen screw as a hinge pin which can be operated from down there? In case the top hinge is made to lift the door the bottom hinge might be to tight, because of its orientation. So it may be necessary to modify the bottom hinge. For a quick check a piece of metal foil or even a thin plastic sheet from product packaging could be slipped into the upper hinge.

[BlueLock]

Thanks Martin,

Good question on the holes in the hinges. Not quite sure what they are for. Looking closer at my pictures, the body portion appears to have a roll-pin. The hinge itself is threaded at the end. Beaten and worn, but threaded. I will need to go back and take another look. I will be back there in a few weeks, maybe sooner, and can look at it then.



Looking at the underside of the bottom hinge and taking the top hinge off sounds like a great next step to see what is going on. It is clear that the door is sagging, so hopefully there is indeed a setscrew to push/pull it back up into alignment.

[MartinHewitt]

The threaded hole on the top looks like an adjustable hinge pin or bearing surface. The side hole might contain a screw that prevents the main screw to turn.

[Safecrackin Sammy]

Obviously the door sag contributed to the handle breaking. That door has seen a lot of use for drops over the years.

A lot of these thru wall drops were custom built so no name tags is not unusual. There were hundreds of machine shops that did this type of work.

As far as correcting the door, it sounds like there should be lock washers under the four cap bolts for the hinges. If they dont tighten, you will never get and keep adjustment. With the door open 90 degrees, see if it will rock indicating worn hinge pins. Tape a thin piece of card board etc. on each edge of the door and place it in the opening. Use your cap bolts to hold the door in place. You can use thin washers in between the hinge knuckles if the door needs to go straight up. And you can always file/grind any surfaces that are rubbing that cant be adjusted any other way.

[Raymond]

You can look at the bottom hinge and see just how out of alignment it is.

Most important will be whether there is a ball bearing and adjustment screw inside the hinges, one on top and possibly one on the bottom. Adding a thin spacer washer will definitely lift the door up so it stops dragging on the bottom.

If the Holes for the Allen attachment screws can be drilled a little larger, you can shim the door and tighten the bolts to move the door over. This may result in a smoothly working door but will not stop the hinge from wearing out further.

[BlueLock]

Apologies for the long delay in response. I finally had the opportunity to take care of this recently.

The top hinge ball bearing that was in there had split in half and was being ground into dust, causing a lot of the problem.


Fortunately, the pins themselves appeared to be ok. No wiggle/wobble. Just that the bottom pin was a tad rusty.


A quick clean of the bottom pin with a scotchbrite pad and some new grease on the pins made the hinges happy. With the top ball bearing replaced, the door is working much better and no longer dragging on the bottom.

Also - the side holes in the hinges are definitely setscrews (1/4"-20). The top screw was missing with paint in the threads, and the bottom screw had been painted over to no longer look much like a screw.

Thanks again for everyone's help with this.

~Blue

[MartinHewitt]

Great that it works again!

Have a Happy New Year!