Cover for exposed door knob hole

thingiverse

This is a 4"x4" plate to cover a hole left after removing a broken door knob and latch from my basement door. I wanted to replace the knob, but, it turns out that the 60+ year old door is too narrow (1-1/4" wide) for store-bought, modern, door knobs (min 1-3/4" wide) (god bless obsolescence!). So, I was left with holes on either side of the basement door, and wanted to cover the outer one, which faces our TV room. I attached a pull-handle to replace the knob on the outside of the door, facing the TV room, and used a cabinet magnetic "latch" to keep the door closed (I had to shim one of the two magnetic squares a bit from the door frame, and had to chisel a small section along the edge of the door to countersink the other square). The basement side did not require a handle, since it pushes out, easily. than the 2" door knob hole. The handle on the TV room's side of the door is screwed just above and below where the plate will be placed. By coincidence, the handle's edges overlaps this cover by millimeters, so, it could stay in place without glue or screws, but I will attach the edges of the plate to the door with wood glue, initially held by clamps with a wood block in-between to put pressure on all the edges at one time. Since there is nothing to stress the plate in any direction, the glue should work, nicely. If that doesn't hold, then I'll use small screws on the corners. In case you're wondering, I could, probably, have bought a pair of "dummy" door knobs (i.e., they don't turn, and are, typically, used for simple push-pull doors, like this one has become). But, they cost about $15 a set, and, quite frankly, I didn't want that expense, and nobody, here, cares about aesthetics that much! I could have used a round piece instead of a square one, but, I knew that the square would easily cover the door knob hole, whereas I'd have a harder time centering a round one around the open hole (n.b., I left the basement side's hole uncovered, in case someone needed extra help in finding the door, should there be a blackout).