by Sheleftherkeyin » 26 Mar 2015 12:05
Sorry, femurat.
Ok, in the UK, we are trained from an early age to lock the door behind us when we leave and everyone in the household has a key to gain access. What we are generally not accustomed to is as I said in the first post, a lock which is self locking on shutting with no fail-safe to regain entry even with a key when there is a key in the inside of the lock.
Although we often have Yale locks, these have a 'snib' which prevent them from locking behind you if you only intend to leave the house to hang the washing on the line without bringing your house keys and again, it's part of our life-training if you like to deal routinely with Yale's without even having to think about it (i.e putting the snib on on a rare occasion it's not already on. What I'm trying to say in a convaluted way is that the snib on a Yale is rarely on in the UK when people are in the house, just the door will be locked with a key left in the lock.
I think the best option for us would be to lose the spring-loaded mech for the bottom pin as this would result in a locking mechanism the same as we have in the UK. The chances of us leaving the property unlucked are low and the chances of needing a locksmith again would be equally low.
I'll think on it overnight and let you know definitively tomorrow.
Thanks again.
NB The White painted plane is 3/4 inch and the varnished plane 1 1/4 inch I would say. The one lock in the middle means there's a lot of give at the top and bottom edge of the door with the locking mech on while the other has posts going into floor and top of the wall so not such a big issue there. My feeling is to fit a Yale at about a foot and a half above and below the main mech but I would welcome your suggestions.