How to childproof a sliding glass door that can be unlocked and locked inside and out - eviltoast

My house has a sliding glass door as the main entrance and I need a solution to have it secure from tiny hands. My problem is it needs to be able to unlock and lock on both sides of the door so a pin drop or cross bar won’t work.

  • Andrew1030@lemmy.caOP
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    1 year ago

    Yes this is why I need it to be accessible on both sides of the door. 1 for emergency access and 2 so I and my partner can unlock it coming home from work if the other is sleeping edit added missing word

    • I guess I didn’t understand what you were describing. When we moved in to our house, the previous owners had a deadbolt that locked with a key on the inside instead of a thumb turn, and it was the only way to lock the door. This is a pretty bad idea since it creates a potential situation where you’re stuck inside your house, or have to find another exit. In some emergencies, seconds count. Even if you know how to open the door, you might have someone over who doesn’t, which is why fire codes are the way they are. Someone unfamiliar with the setup, panicking, in the dark, in a room full of smoke, needs to be able to escape without solving a puzzle.

      Because I already had experience with having to replace that lock with an appropriate one for an exit door, I jumped straight to the assumption that when you said “lock on both sides”, you were talking about a key, and not just a childproof latch of some kind. I have the privilege of not living with anyone who is a flight risk, so it’s easy for me to just dismiss it as unsafe. I looked at some of the solutions out there and they seem to be designed to stop toddlers with no dexterity, not an autistic person determined to turn all the things. Sorry if my answer was unhelpful; people are injured or killed every day because they created a situation they didn’t realize was hazardous until it was too late. My intention was only to prevent the downsides of locking the door this way from being overlooked.

      • Andrew1030@lemmy.caOP
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        1 year ago

        To be completely honest my only solution might be to rip out the door and put in a regular door so normal child locks will work. With home and safety checks we will be subjected to, having the door requiring a key on both sides won’t work and will be flagged as a danger. Thank you for your response all input has been extremely helpful including your insight