Lock changes
Lock change in Villajoyosa, on a day you choose
A key that has grown stiff, a multipoint handle you have to lift with both hands, a sliding door that no longer catches, or simply a new home and someone else’s old keys. All of it is planned work: you send a photo, the right part comes in the van, and it is fitted on a day you pick.
- Booked on a day you choose
- Photo first, right part in the van
- Price agreed before work starts
Planned, not urgent
What gets changed or repaired
- Euro cylinders: the part your key turns, replaced like for like or with a stronger one.
- Anti-snap and anti-bump cylinders: made to resist the two commonest ways of attacking a cylinder.
- Multipoint locks: gearboxes serviced or replaced, keeps adjusted on doors that have dropped.
- Sliding terrace doors: catches and locks that no longer meet, on aluminium and PVC sliders.
- Rim locks and night latches on secondary doors, storerooms and garden gates.
Old wooden street doors with mortice locks, like those of the painted houses inside the walls, are treated differently and have a page for old-town doors. Locks on a door that has been forced are on the break-in page.
By the sea
Why locks in La Vila wear the way they do
Most of the town is a short walk from the beach, and the air is humid for much of the year: relative humidity averages roughly 62 to 68 per cent, highest in December. Salt and damp work their way into cylinders and into the gearboxes of multipoint locks, so a key turns a little harder each winter until one day it does not. Sand does the same to the ground-floor doors and sliders closest to the beaches.
The cure is usually a clean and a correct lubricant before the cylinder is ruined, and a replacement when it already is. Do not use cooking oil or general-purpose grease in a cylinder: it collects grit. A freshly repainted door or façade can cause the same symptoms for a different reason, explained in the guide to a door that sticks after repainting.
Sliding doors
Terrace sliders in the towers and flats near the beach
In the towers of La Cala and the newer blocks along the coast, the sliding terrace door is often the weakest door of the flat and the one that fails first: the catch no longer meets its keep, the wheels have worn, or the lock was never more than a hook. It can usually be adjusted, the lock replaced with a proper one, or a secondary lock added that does not stop the door being used.
How it is booked
From a photo to a door that locks properly
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Send photos
The lock plate on the edge of the door and the cylinder from outside, on WhatsApp or by email.
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Hear the options
Which cylinder or part, why, and the price, agreed before the work starts.
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Pick a day
Planned work is booked in normal working hours, on a day that suits you or your tenants.
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Fitted and tested
The new cylinder is fitted, every key is tried, and the door is checked from both sides.
New home, new cylinder
When changing the cylinder is simply sensible
After buying a flat or a house, after a tenant or a cleaner leaves, when keys have gone missing, or when a holiday flat changes manager. In a town with 1,782 registered tourist dwellings, including flats in ordinary residential blocks, plenty of front doors have had more keys handed out than anyone can count. Owners who let flats will find more on the page for holiday rental hosts, and the guide to a tourist flat in a community block.
If the old lock has let you down already and you are shut out, that is not planned work: go to how a locked door is opened. To book, send your photos from the contact page.
Asked on the phone
Cylinders, handles and buildings
Do I need to measure the cylinder before I book?
You do not need to. Send a photo of the door edge with the lock plate, and one of the cylinder from outside, and the size and type are worked out from those. It is measured again on the day before anything is fitted.
I have just bought a flat. Is a new cylinder enough, or the whole lock?
In most cases the cylinder is enough: it is the part the keys work, and changing it means no old key opens the door. The whole lock is replaced only if the mechanism itself is worn or broken.
The handle has to be lifted hard before the key turns. Can that be fixed?
That is a multipoint lock asking for attention: the door may have dropped, or the gearbox is wearing. Often an adjustment of the keeps and a service of the gearbox is enough; sometimes the gearbox is replaced.
Can the locks of several flats in one building be done on the same visit?
Yes, and it is the sensible way for owners and managers with more than one flat. Say how many doors and send a photo of each lock so the right cylinders come in the van.
Next door on the chart
Often booked with a new cylinder
- Securing a forced door A forced door made to close and lock on the first visit. Then, when you are ready, a stronger cylinder, a guard plate or a high-security lock.
- A locksmith for holiday lets Guests shut out at midnight, lock changes between lets, and a locksmith a manager can send to a flat without being there.
- Old wooden doors in the historic centre For the painted houses and the narrow streets behind the camera-controlled entrances: the locksmith comes in on foot, and old wooden doors are repaired rather than replaced.
Guides that end on this page
- A tourist flat in a community block · 5 min read
- The door sticks after the façade is repainted · 4 min read
A lock you have stopped trusting?
Send a photo of it on WhatsApp and pick a day. Or ring if you would rather talk it through.