Deciding on a Door Lock
When youre shopping for a door lock, its important to know what your needs and options are. In this article Ill go over all of the basic types, so you know what best fits your needs.
A Privacy Lockset is one of the most basic types of door locks. These locks are the types most commonly found inside of houses and interior passages where privacy is important, but security is not. These locks either have a lever or a knob on one side which locks the door. They have a tiny hole on the non-locking side which can be used to pick the lock in emergency situations.
While interior locks are great for protecting privacy, they are relatively useless for security purposes. For exterior facing doors where security is a concern, you will want to use an Entry Lockset. This lockset is familiar to most homeowners, and has a button on one side coupled with a key mechanism on the other. This is essentially a one way lock.
An addition that can make an exterior door more secure is a deadbolt lock. In a deadbolt, the "throw", which is a metal slug, extends into the door frame. For most people, this variety of lock represents all the safety you'll ever need.
For people who want the added safety of a deadbolt without all of the hassels of drilling that come with interior installation, there are surface-mounted deadbolts. The function of surface-mounted deadbolts is essentially the same as that of the regular deadbolt, but rather than being installed into the door, the deadbolt is screwed onto the interior facing of the door. A metal flashing is attached to the door frame.
Frequently, locks are sold as combination sets, which form a unified security solution for an exterior door. In manufacturing terminology, this combination is called a lockset, and is most often comprised of a deadbolt and a lockset.
One of the less common varieties of locks which you will encounter as a homeowner is a Night Latch. The night latch is a lock which is placed on the interior face of the door, and whenever the door is shut the lock automatically engages. As the name implies, Night Latches are not ideal when used alone, but can be paired with other locks for added safety.
I hope that these explanations have helped to illustrate the main types of door locks. It is important for consumers to understand their options in order to maximize their safety, and one of the greatest impediments to understanding is mis-information. Homeowners must take an active role in maintaining safety as a priority in their own homes.