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Liberty Closet Door Handle
The handle came off one of the closet doors and I suppose there is super duper mega glue of some kind that will need to be redone. I doubt any super glue will hold as the doors are stiff to open because of the latches, a good thing when going down the road.
Anybody done this before?
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15 Replies
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Joel,
I had one pull off the door. Super glue put it back on and no problem after that. On another one the mirrored face came off and I used contact adhesive to put that back. But if you are saying it broke as in broke in half that sounds like a new one is needed.
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Yup, it broke; I can’t say for certain that the distribution of the breakage was exactly half and half! Assuming I get a new handle from Liberty, do you know how to get the pieces of the old one off the door?
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Mine fell off leaving one leg on the door and the other leg on the handle. I just used the super glue on the two legs and stuck it back on.
I think they are all bonded to glass so I have no idea how to get them off without something like careful use of a die grinder or some solvent that softens super glue.
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In my opinion contact cement is the proper adhesive and probably what was used originally.
Contact cement is soluable in lacquer thinner.
Super glue is not soluable in anything I know of that is consumer friendly. If the handle should come off again it would be a can of worms to attach over the super glue due to the rough surface left behind.
It might be possible to gradually and carefully lift the old handle backing plate by prying with a STIFF putty knife/gasket scraper that is wider than the backing plate. The putty knife should have a wide fulcrum support to distribute the force against the glass door (concentrated or point force will surely break the glass) A possible fulcrum would be a piece of 1/4″ dowell rod on top of a 6″x6″ piece of 1/4″ ply wood. (fasten the wood and dowel to the door with masking tape to keep it aligned and in place)
All this would be easier to accomplish if you took the door off its hinge and worked on a table. There are many screws to take off the hinge, but if you break the mirror door surface you will be takig it off anyway.
Further if you have the door in a horizontal plane you can make a dam of sorts around the handle and flood the area with lacquer thinner for several days to loosen the handle. Possibly prying a little at a time during the soaking process.
If it were me I would first try to pry as with the first method above, you might just get lucky and it will come right off.
JIM
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Joel,
Hopefully Tom Roberts will see this, he had the same problem and fixed it himself.
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Thanks Tom.
Joel, on our coach I got tired of trying to fix the broken plastic mirrowed handles and decided it was time for a change. No offense intended for other Liberty owners but I thought those type of handles looked sort of cheezy. I replaced all of mine with Balwin Brass handles with escutcheon plates as shown in the attached photo. I would be glad to share my approach to installing the new handles in a PM if you are interested. There are tricks to know/learn in order to reduce the risk of breaking a mirrow and be throw into seven years of bad luck! Hope this helps.
Tom Roberts
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Tom: That fix looks much better than oem, imo. Yes, I would like to know your technique but I would think it would be better posted on the thread for other Liberty owners to see; that is, of course, as long as you delete the profanity!
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I also have had Liberty handle failure. So far, I have been able to fix it with glue. But I would also like to see your advice on the changeout. Thanks.
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Joel and John,
An article entitled “Mirrored Handle Replacement Procedure” has been placed in the “Articles” section on this web site. I trust it will be helpful if you decide to replace your door handles. If you try this and it doesn’t work out for you I would like to hear from you.
Tom Roberts
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Excellent article Tom, thanks for all the information and installation detail too!
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Tom:
I pulled one off before i departed the Liberty campground when taking delivery. Liberty has them in stock as i have several spares as know it will happen again.. double stick tape….
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Tom,
I had one come off and I used 3m automotive trim double sided adhesive tape. The tape is only about 1/4″ wide so I used several strips across the entire back of the closet handle.
Never came off again…….and it’s still in place today.
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I used regular super glue several years ago and no problems yet.
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Ditto on the super glue. The door to the washer/dryer on our 97 had one of those handles and super glue did the job.
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I used five minute epoxy that comes in a double syringe – works.
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