A large sliding door is great when admiring the scenery on a sunny day with beach perfect temperature.
But opening it fully on windy or rainy days is less than ideal. Also, the inside handle can be difficult to grab over the countertop when the door is open. And when in town it can feel creepy to expose so much of our 'house' interior to passersby 😅
So I added a midway stop, that can be engaged / disengaged just by dropping / lifting a short rod. It works with the existing door latch, so both door handles also latch / release the door in that new position:
The mechanism consists in presenting another 1/4" catch bar, situated mid course, similar to the existing one:
The build is very simple if there already is some kind of cabinetry or wall present roughly halfway along the door track.
Next to that wall, make a hole in the floor for a 1/4" rod at the very
edge of the floor lip, and away from the wall by the amount needed for
the guiding half hinge that will be used (hinge details below).
Bolt a piece of 2" aluminum angle behind the door's bottom rail. Note: in
the pic above, only the bottom 2 U nuts are used for the bolts. The
upper 2 are just to keep the piece perfectly vertical by compensating
for the bottom U nuts' thickness.
Procure a standard 1/4" pin door hinge. Remove the pin. Drill the pin guides slightly larger so the rod can slide freely. Then install the half hinge in line with the hole on the floor:
Now drop the rod in and mark where it hits the 2" angle piece. Drill a hole
there, slightly larger than the rod diameter. This hole will catch the
end of the rod when it is down, and prevent it from bending if the door
is opened a bit forcefully.
Finally, bend the rod 90° to make a ~2" handle, and install magnets in the up and down positions to prevent the rod from flapping around when driving:
Boop, done !
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