Shared Knowledge
"Marvin French Doors - How to Remove a Door for Repair"
24 July 2011
Summary: not a difficult job to remove and reinstall but takes 2 people to move door around once out of frame.
Background:
Marvin French doors installed in 1992.
Marvin French doors not installed by Marvin but by home renovation contractor.
Wood rot in bottom corner of one door.
Wood rot not repairable with door installed in frame.
Tools Needed:
Phillips screw driver or cordless screwdriver with Phillips "bit".
Perhaps a long flat blade screwdriver.
How to remove Marvin French door from frame:
On the bottom of each door are 2 plastic caps that cover screwdriver-adjustable track guides.
Remove plastic caps on door to be removed from track but slowly and carefully prizing them out of their holes.
Now recessed in the hole, the metal track guide that is part of the bottom of each door, has either a large Phillips screw head or a smaller flat blade slot. Insert a Phillips first and see if you can find the head of the adjustment screw.
Once you have slotted the Phillips or flat blade in the adjustment screw, start turning the screw one way or the other and watch how the door moves either up or down. The door will move down easier than it moves up.
Want you want to do is move the adjustment screw such that the door is as low in the track as possible.
Next you need to remove the trim piece that runs the entire inner length of the French doors.
If you look on the underside of this trim piece, you will see it is held in place with Phillips screws.
Remove all screws along the entire length of the trim piece. Now my trim piece was snug against the end either door jambs and stayed in place after all screws were removed. Yours could be different so be careful and remove and see if the trim piece is going to fall out or not.
Also note that in all likelihood, this trim piece has been painted to the door frame and so be careful removing it so paint stuck portions come loose more or less cleanly.
With the trim piece removed, you need to remove the wood track that a French door uses as a guide at the top.
Move the door to be removed as far back off the track as you can. It will not completely clear the track or it did not on mine, but yours could be different, so be careful. If you move the door back off the track, with the trim piece removed, there is nothing to hold the door from falling out of the track.
The wooden guide at the time is held in with Phillips screws. You should be able to see and get to 3 screws.
Once all screws have been removed, in a perfect world you should be able to simply pull down and then pull the wood guide out but (1) the wood guide is snug in the groove in the frame and (2) it most likely has been painted in as well.
So using a flat blade screwdriver, being lifting the end of the wood guide slowly. Go slow or you will break the guide as I did.
Once you have the wooden guide loose, pull it out of the door frame while keeping one hand on the door to be removed.
With the wooden guide and trim piece removed, there is nothing holding the door from falling backwards out of the frame.
At this point, it is possible for one strong man to lift the door up off the track at the bottom and sit it on a rug or other soft surface. Remember there are metal track runners in the bottom of the door and if you are not careful these will scratch the floor big time.
Marvin French doors are heavy. I could move it around slowly on one corner but it was too wide to handle easily and thus required another person to actually lift it up on a table to be worked on.
While French door is out of frame:
While you have a door out of the frame: clean the metal track wheels of the door; oil the metal track wheels assembly; if the door has a rod going upward into the frame, check its end and also apply 3-In-One oil or similar down metal rod hole.
Reinstalling a Marvin French door:
Once done with door repair, the door must be lifted back into the frame such that the metal track wheels on the bottom of the door are on top of the frame track.
Holding the door in place, reinstall the wooden rail at the top.
Now level the door using the track leveling screws at the bottom. See Marvin French Doors - How to Level.
Install the trim piece along the entire length of the French doors. Here note that the trim also functions as a door guide at the top and as you screw the trim back into place, make sure your doors are not pinched by the trim piece and cause them to scrap along the vinyl weather stripping on the outer windows of the French doors.