How to Buy Door and Window Locks

"Locks only keep honest people out," the saying goes, but high-quality door and window hardware make your house or apartment less attractive to burglars. If you survey your home as a potential target and don't try to cut corners, you'll find security devices you can trust.

Difficulty:

Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Ask your police department for a home security inspection. Or, have a locksmith evaluate your home, explain all security options, and install professional-quality devices. Call members of the Associated Locksmiths of America (aloa.org).

2. Replace hollow-core entry doors with solid hardwood at least 1 3/4 inches (4.5 cm) thick, steel-clad or insulated fiberglass doors. The frame should not have gaps wide enough for a pry bar.

3. Install exterior doors with hinges on the inside. Burglars can pop out exterior hinges and remove a locked door. Install a 180-degree peephole rather than a door chain. Make sure you can't put a hand through your mail slot and reach the lock.

4. Upgrade key-in-knob locks (thieves can jimmy their spring-action latches with a credit card) to ones with hardened steel pins or a dead bolt ($10 to $35). If you like the convenience of a key-in-knob lock, add a deadbolt above it.

5. Invest in grade 1 or 2 dead bolts (under $65), which withstand kicking, prying, wrenching, hammering, sawing and drilling. A single-cylinder deadbolt is key-operated from the outside; a double-cylinder is key-operated from both sides. If your door has a glass pane or is near a window, install a double-cylinder model so a burglar can't break the glass and unlock the door. Keep a key for emergencies near the door, not in the lock.

6. Shop for dead bolts that have a steel bolt with a 1-inch (2.5 cm) throw (the bolt extends that far into the door frame), strike plates secured with 2 1/2- to 3-inch (6 to 7.5 cm) screws, five- or six-pin cylinders and a free-spinning solid-metal cylinder collar. Screws must be long enough to penetrate the framing around the door.

7. Install a steel door pin near each hinge to secure swing-out doors, preventing the door from being pried out.

8. Secure double-hung windows with a nail or bolt. Drill the hole through both sashes at a downward angle to prevent a burglar from jiggling the pin loose. Keyed sash stops ($6) are also available. Be aware that crescent or butterfly latches are easily picked with a knife.

9. Install retractable window grates for worry-free ventilation on basement and ground-floor windows.

10. Prevent sliding doors from being lifted off their tracks by using vertical bolts or antilift plates between the doors and their top tracks. Heavy-duty keyed locks mount on the inside edge of the frame.

Tips & Warnings

• Basement and back doors, as well as the interior door to an attached garage, should have the same level of security as entry doors.

• Give only car keys--no house keys--to mechanics and parking valets. Most high-security lock keys can only be copied with your permission at dealers and locksmiths.

• When you move to a new home, change its locks--or at least the cylinders. You never know who has keys to the old hardware.

• Some building codes prohibit locks that are key-operated on both sides because someone could get trapped inside without the key during an emergency.