Flyover
Trying not to screw things up worse
I have an aluminum screen door on my screened-in porch that suffers from chronic Won't-Close-Ritis. The previous owners used to have a pneumatic door-closer on it, mounted right up near the top of the door, but it was gone when I arrived.
So I bought and installed a new one in the same place, using the same screw hole they'd drilled in the aluminum door. For a while it worked great.
But....the screw hole only goes through one "ply" of the door, so the screw I put in place eventually jiggled its way loose, and then after a few weeks it completely fell out. (And now I understand why the previous owner had the dang door tied shut with an old shoelace--I have succumbed to the exact same remedy!)
I'm thinking of buying some longer self-tapping metal screws that will go all the way through the door, and should stay in place better. Since it's up near the top of the door, and it's a screen door with a step down to my back yard, I don't really care about the ugly/pointy screw tip(s) that would be sticking out the other side. But I still have some questions:
1) Is there a better way to solve this problem without buying any new major hardware?
2) Do they even make self-tapping screws that can go through aluminum? I've never actually checked, and can't remember if I've seen them before.
So I bought and installed a new one in the same place, using the same screw hole they'd drilled in the aluminum door. For a while it worked great.
But....the screw hole only goes through one "ply" of the door, so the screw I put in place eventually jiggled its way loose, and then after a few weeks it completely fell out. (And now I understand why the previous owner had the dang door tied shut with an old shoelace--I have succumbed to the exact same remedy!)
I'm thinking of buying some longer self-tapping metal screws that will go all the way through the door, and should stay in place better. Since it's up near the top of the door, and it's a screen door with a step down to my back yard, I don't really care about the ugly/pointy screw tip(s) that would be sticking out the other side. But I still have some questions:
1) Is there a better way to solve this problem without buying any new major hardware?
2) Do they even make self-tapping screws that can go through aluminum? I've never actually checked, and can't remember if I've seen them before.