Whether your business is located in Metro Atlanta or Northwest Georgia finding commercial door hardware can be difficult. Northstar lock and door is your go-to when it comes to hard to find door hardware. You can find most residential hardware at any of the big box stores, but locks for a business or office are not as easy to find. If you are able to find commercial lock hardware somewhere that you can just walk in and purchase it oftentimes it's not something that will last longer than a few m...
Read More
Author: johnk
locksmith near me
More often than not the words locksmith near me are used to search for a locksmith.
If someone is just stranded somewhere and they have no knowledge of any surrounding service providers no matter what it might be they're kind of in a bad position.
Every would be con artists have been given pretty much free rein on the internet. All they have to do is build a website and start unlocking cars for people. So before you type in locksmith near me and just go with someone ...
Read More
Marietta Ga locksmith
Looking for a Marietta Ga Locksmith? We started our business in Marietta and still serve the area every day. If you're locked out of a vehicle, or a home or even a business look no further. We have perfected the fine art of breaking and entering...lol
Obviously we are not the only Marietta Ga locksmith, but we are the only locksmith that also installs commercial doors. We install hollow metal doors, commercial wood doors and storefront doors. We not only install the doors but also install a...
Read More
Locksmith in Marietta
For years we were the only locksmith in Marietta. I started the business October 25th 1999 off of Whitlock Avenue. When I first started the business it was kind of between phone books so I didn't really have any advertising. So I had to do with the old fashioned way I bought business cards and I walked from one business to another business to another business dropping business cards introducing myself and hoping someone would call me in the future.
Believe it or not it was actually a ver...
Read More
Locksmith Marietta Georgia
The locksmith Marietta Georgia turned to in 1999 is still in business going on 25 years. The business was started right off of Whitlock avenue. I was 24 at the time. I had worked for several different companies that specialized in many different kinds of locksmith work.
Being a well seasoned locksmith in Marietta Georgia was definitely very helpful. Whether it was access control, commercial work, residential work, or even automotive work. Not to toot my own horn but my skill set was pretty d...
Read More
Panic bars or crash bars
There are several names for these products. Although I've heard panic bars. I've also heard crash bars, and then lastly I've heard the term rim exit device. The funny thing is, if you were to ask a manufacturer of one of these devices what they would call them they would call call them rim exit devices. But I don't think I've ever actually had a customer call me at any point in time and ask for a rim exit device. If they did I would probably fall over. Heck I've been a locksmith for 25 years, a...
Read More
Securing your business when you lose an employee.
Securing your business is first thing you must do when you let an employee go. You want to make sure that when you cut ties with this employee, they will no longer be a threat in any way shape or form. There are the obvious things such as all information needs to be immediately unaccessible.
Any property that the employee has of yours needs to be back in your possession. Do not give the employee any idea that they're going to be termonated until you have that property back in your possessi...
Read More
Community pool locks and HOA pool locks
Every year we have lots of different HOAs that call us looking for us to rekey their pool. We also can modify gates to install push button locks or proximity key fob locks. We work with lots of communities but we're always looking for more. This particular type of work for us is some of the most enjoyable work.
If your neighborhood should have a community pool or tennis area that needs to be secured, we can do that. We cut thousands of keys every year for neighborhoods just like...
Read More
locksmith in Cartersville Georgia
NorthStar is a locksmith in Cartersville Georgia. Not only do we work here but we also live here, So we are a local locksmith in every since of the word. We are extremely familiar with the area. This helps us get to you quickly.
If you should happen to be locked out of a vehicle or a home or even a business You're going to want someone there quickly. However most people certainly don't want to pay emergency rates to get someone there quickly. If you should need a locksmith in Cartersvil...
Read More
Who’s the closest locksmith to my location
At one point in time You could simply type in closest locksmith to my location and you would actually get the closest locksmith to you. Nowadays there are call centers and companies that do nothing but sell leads to locksmiths. This can be pretty problematic. People that need a locksmith quickly certainly do not want to wait for information to travel from one company to another company. When you go through one of these services obviously the locksmith who is buying the lead is paying for them....
Read More
Detex door exit alarm
One thing that all businesses run into eventually is internal theft. Today we're in Woodstock, Ga installing a Detex door exit alarm. These door alarms work with a magnetic loop sensor so when the door opens the door alarm will sound. If someone would like to walk out of the door without the alarm sounding they will require a key. Once the alarm sounds you have to have a key in order to turn off the alarm.
The one we're installing here in Woodstock, Ga is not being installed to prev...
Read More
kwikset lock failures
kwikset lock company has been around since 1946. They've had many designs and redesigns over the years. In the last few years kwikset has had a lot of quality control problems. A lot of the knob locks have had failing latches. People are quite literally getting locked inside of their homes because of these failures. The last thing you want if your house should never catch on fire is to not be able to get out, because of a latch failure.
Kwikset latches fail in a way that will not allow ...
Read More
Commercial Door Replacement
We try to avoid commercial door replacement by repairing the metal, aluminum, or wood doors you have. However, when someone uses a crowbar of some kind to break into a commercial door replacement is unavoidable. Paint your doors routinely or they will rust. Once a door is rusty and there's just no fixing rust. This is why many aluminum doors will outlast steel doors.
Metal door replacement is a bulk of our business because of rust that is completely avoidable. It is not uncommon for wood...
Read More
Quality lock hardware
There's a very large difference between the quality hardware that we install compared to 90% of the lock and door companies out there. We've been in the business for 23 years now. In turn, what this means for you is we know what lock hardware is good. We also know what lock hardware is garbage, and what quality hardware will stay on the door for 5 years maintenance-free.
Most locksmith companies' primary objective is to buy low and sell high. They buy it low and sell it high. These companie...
Read More
Changing locks or Re-keying locks
Changing locks....There are a lot of different terms that describe the same. A lot of people refer to it as rekeying. I've heard it described as we tumbling. I just call it a lock change.
Essentially when we re-key a lock what we're actually doing is replacing the pins inside of the lock. So when will you say that we're changing locks, We change locks with different sizes of pins. Therefore the old key will no longer work and a new key will. The benefit to this is it's cheaper than repl...
Read More
Copy of our Georgia locksmith business license
Here is a copy of our state of Georgia locksmith business license. When you choose a locksmith choose a Licensed locksmith. When someone is in business they carry the necessary insurance and licensing and someone that just operates out of their car doesn't. Having a business license in the state of Georgia requires you to have no felonies on your record.
If someone should say that they have a Georgia locksmith business license and not actually be one according to their business licens...
Read More
Certificate of Commercial liability Insurance
Commercial liability insurance it's really only something that comes into play if something really bad happens. However if a door should fall and shatter on a car we have you covered. A million and one things can go wrong this is why I choose to stay covered. Unlike many we don't just have liability insurance we have workman's comp as well. If someone should drill through their hand they're covered. When you choose to do business with Northstar you're doing business with a company that plan...
Read More
Locks are only as good as the doors you put them on.
We repair and replace a lot of commercial metal doors and here lately we've run into this particular situation quite a bit. Someone will cut a door in half at the bottom so that they don't have to open the door and trigger the magnetic alarm contact at the top of the door. What they do is just open the bottom of the door by using a grinder and a cutting wheel. Our new door has a preventative on the inside of the door that keeps this from happening but as you can see the old door they didn't ha...
Read More
Door Closers
At the top of every commercial door there's a hydraulic device called a door closer. Door closers control the rate a door closes. They keep doors from slamming on fingers. They also keep glass from breaking from hard door slams.
There are a few different types of door closers:
surface mounted closers
Concealed overhead closures
shotgun closers
Floor closers
Door closers typically run anywhere $120 and in rare cases all the way up to $500 but most of th...
Read More
Adding a window to a commercial door
In a commercial environment hollow metal doors become dangerous without a viewing window. How many times have you seen someone get struck by a door just simply because the person that was opening it had no idea there was someone behind it? That's why windows can be so beneficial. Even if it's a small viewing window it gives someone the opportunity to see someone coming.
In hospital settings you almost always see a viewing window in most of their doors. There's just so much foot traffic that ...
Read More
The E-plex 2000 push-button lever lock saves time and money
The E-plex 2000 push-button lever lock has become a go-to to the locksmith community for over 10 years now. It's ideal for situations where you have under 100 employees. The lock enables you to assign an individual code for up to 100 users. When you terminate an employee you just delete their user code. Making it possible to change the lock without having to call a locksmith out every time you terminate an employee.
A KABA E-Plex 2000 push-button lock installed for $650.00
Th...
Read More
We specialize in commercial door and hardware installation and repair
We were working on some commercial doors and hardware on the job we were on today in Marietta. We installed two half-surface continuous hinges, 5 door closers, and stabilized 8 frame legs that had become disconnected. Whereas most door companies would have replaced the doors and frames. After the door repair, We were able to extend their doors lives for at least another 10 years. This will give them worry-free operation for 10 years instead of selling them a brand new door and frame.
Here l...
Read More
Commercial lock and door repair in Marietta
We're one of the very few commercial door repair companies that work on all different types of commercial doors and locks. When these double doors started to sag they dragged threshold so they didn't close properly. This door had a push bar that had broken off and had somehow gotten lost in the shuffle. So we supplied a new aluminum push bar and installed two full surface continuous hinges on both doors. We scheduled this door repair early in the morning so that we were not underfoot. By the ...
Read More
Worked on a few locks and doors in Cartersville
Today we did a little work on the locks and doors on the Cartersville city hall bathrooms. Bathroom doors get so much traffic that eventually the locks, hinges, door closers, and even the doors themselves fall into disrepair. These are some pictures of a very simple job that we did for Cartersville City Hall. We just simply added a few bolts and then replaced a lock. A mortise lock body that had just simply worn out over 30 years.
We do a lot of work for the city of Cartersville as well...
Read More
Pool gate locks and keys
Time to get the pool gates locks ready for action for this summer. Every year neighborhoods and homeowners associations change the keys on their pool gates. Is that time of year that locksmiths practically bathe in brass shavings, and we love every minute of it.
Time to decide who has paid their homeowners association dues.
This It's also a good time for homeowners associations to decide whether or not they would like to renew someone's ability to use the pool. Whether someone has not pa...
Read More
Quick response is a lifestyle
Needless to say when it comes to the locksmith business or the commercial door business quick response is a must. When locked out of your house or locked out of your car or business you can't schedule that. It is an absolute emergency at times. Businesses have to open on time. People get locked out of offices that are critical to the function of not only businesses but also places like the police stations and hospitals and schools.
As hard as it is to believe even business doors Just fall of...
Read More
Safe openings
In the twenty years of offering safe service and being a locksmith for Cartersville, Kennesaw, Acworth, and surrounding areas we have opened thousands of safes. We do Sentry safes, Winchester safes, Cannon safes, Brinks safes, and probably far more Safe openings than what I could even begin to list.
How much is a safe opening?
This depends on the safe, but Sentry safes are $150 Some of the Cannon safes are about $200 but any safe that has hard plate will be more expensive. Hard plate is a...
Read More
Getting your locks changed or rekeyed
I was changing some locks in Cartersville and I was speaking to a customer and evidently, a lot of people don't realize that you don't have to replace all of the lock hardware on your home anymore. You can just simply have your locks rekeyed. At a fraction of the cost.
Is it less expensive to rekey locks or replace them?
Most locksmiths charge somewhere around $15 per keyhole to rekey locks. After a lock is rekeyed anyone that previously had a key will no longer have an operational key. "...
Read More
We open safes and this one in Rockmart, Ga had to be drilled.
We open safes. Here are a few of the safes we've unlocked, and serviced:
Sentry
Cannon
Winchester
Safari
Amsec
Fire King
Needless to say, if you're looking for someone to unlock safes we've unlocked hundred of different models. The list of safes that we've opened continues to grow. We can unlock safes without a combination. Most importantly we can change the combination to your safe if you should lose an employee.
We can change rotational dials to push-butto...
Read More
Master Key Systems
Master key systems, when implemented by the wrong company, can be extremely complex, confusing and frustrating. For example, we recently worked on a church in Cartersville, and I could kind of see the early signs of what I call the master key system haze. Confusion had set in. But most importantly she had at least figured out what employees were going to be given access to what areas at the church. Which is extremely untypical by the way.
Master keyed lock setup
Master key setup ...
Read More
Is it cheaper to rekey locks or replace them?
In short if your looking to rekey more than two locks YES!
The cost of quality lock hardware has gone up significantly in the last few years and the quality has gone down, so re-keying is a great alternative. Although they may have self re-keyable locks now they simply don't hold up. Just as a precaution before I start offering a new product I always use it. The new Kwikset smart key locks that I installed on my home only lasted 18 months.
The average cost to rekey locks is somewhere arou...
Read More
Hollow metal doors with full glass installed in Atlanta
I was really excited about this particular install in Atlanta. We installed 2 new hollow metal doors with full glass, 2 new door closers, and 2 new panic bars with ADA compliant lever handles "handicap compliant".
This particular opening previously had two wood doors with tiny little rectangular pieces of glass. The limited natural light made the whole hollow way very dark. This door had also started to swell "like most commercial wood exterior doors" so it was time to change the doors. The...
Read More
New Push-Button LSDA Combination Grade 1 Lever Lock
Lsda in the past has introduced many push-button locks to their lineup however most of them were residential combination locks, and to be quite Frank most locksmiths wouldn't sell them. Because they were kind of an Asian import that wasn't of shall we say "exceptional quality".
This new LSDA commercial push-button lock is extremely high quality. The first thing you notice when you hold the lock is the weight of a lock. This is not a rinky-dink contraption that isn't going to last. This is a...
Read More
Installed a few hollow steel doors in Cartersville
Hollow steel door installations can get a little hairy at times. This is one of those rare occasions where we both walked away from the job and agreed it went super smooth. We installed two hollow steel door with two rekeyed lever locks on two new panic bars, with two new door closers . Lastly we installed two full surface continuous hinges
One very rusty door in Cartersville with a perfect frame gets a door swap.
After installing the new hollow steel door in the doorway ...
Read More
We unlock big rigs / semi trucks / or big trucks
We unlock big rigs and unlock semi trucks quickly and professionally. Unlocking semi trucks or big rigs has been part of our business for 20 years. We offer emergency response to unlock semi trucks or big rigs in Emerson, Cartersville, Kennesaw, Adairsville, Calhoun and White Georgia. We also unlock big rigs or big trucks in Kennesaw, Acworth, and Marietta. Our response time is just 45 minutes to an hour in that area, and we don't necessarily consider that an emergency response time. However a ...
Read More
Push-button locks installed in Rome, Ga today
I just installed some push-button locks. We also install deadbolts otherwise known as bolt locks in Rome, Ga. I asked the customer if there was a reason why they had chosen to put combination locks on all of their doors? Laughing they responded because we keep locking ourselves out over and over again.
A few Other locks other to consider
Well needless to say push-button locks have become very affordable here lately. Installing them has not always been an affordable option. Here's somet...
Read More
Northstar a Marietta locksmith that installs doors
Today's required Marietta locksmith installs doors and today was a pretty simple install "for a professional that is." It was in my old stomping grounds in the Marietta area. I originally started my locksmith business off Whitlock Avenue in Marietta.
Today we installed a new set of commercial doors with windows. We then installed a new threshold and 2 vertical rod panic devices. Northstar installs doors all over but today we did the work for a church in Marietta.
This is one job that was...
Read More
Commercial door repair vs replacement
One of the services that we have consequently become very good at is commercial door repair as well as commercial door replacement. Keep in mind a lock is only going to be as secure as the door you put it on. Even hollow metal doors will eventually rust away. This is the calling card of an inexperienced Atlanta locksmith company or door company. This kind of commercial door repair is preventable.
A correctly installed door cap on the door below would have kept water from seeping into th...
Read More
Problems with the Kwikset smartkey product line.
Sounds like the perfect solution anytime you want to re-key your locks you can just simply do it yourself, right? I was one of the first locksmiths serving the Marietta area that found out the product was made from poor materials. Within weeks there was a YouTube video on how to unlock Kwikset SmartKey deadbolt locks with a flat head screwdriver in seconds. Kwikset has come a long way however with their smart key product. Kwikset smartkey locks aren't quite as vulnerable as it was when it was f...
Read More
Replacing Storefront hinges or pivots Vs. Installing A Continuous Hinge
We went out on a Kennesaw Locksmith Call and found one of the most common problems with commercial storefront style doors are failing storefront pivots, otherwise known as storefront hinges. Storefront pivots attach to the top and the bottom of the door and sometimes you'll see one or two more holding the storefront door to the frame of the door. Overtime with wear and settling these hinges will either cause a door to rub at either the top or side of the aluminum door frame or on the threshol...
Read More
Adams Rite Storefront Locks
Adams Rite Storefront Locks
Adams Rite Storefront Locks are found in most aluminum-style storefront doors. They all come with very similar problems, most of which are very easy to solve. For instance, when the cylinders just suddenly start rejecting keys or not releasing the keys There are only a few different styles of Adams Rite locks and they come in similar back sets.
Firstly the deadbolt
Available in 3 back sets 1 1/2" 31/32" 1 1/8"
This lock works great for single or double aluminum gl...
Read More
The risks of social media
The risks of Facebook
Here are just a few pieces of information you can learn from the average Facebook account.
where you live
if your married
If your single
Age
where you work
what you drive
what you wear
what schools your kids go to
what schools you go to
where you shop
work history
what your email address is
what your phone number is
what hours you work
who your family members and friends are
where they work
what schedule they work
w...
Read More
We unlock cars trucks and big rigs
Unlocking cars trucks and big rigs, semi trucks, or tractor trailers certainly takes a professional. In short these locks require the locks to be picked. To clarify using traditional tools to unlock one of these vehicles can very easily lead to injury as a result of the height of the vehicle. Subsequently, Northstar has 22 years of experience unlocking these vehicles.
Consequently any inexperienced tow truck drivers have gotten very injured attempting to unlocking unlocking cars trucks and ...
Read More
Glass storefront
Glass door fronts are a staple of our customer base. The locks on glass door fronts are unavailable from any hardware store. So when it comes time to fix them a locksmith must be involved.
If it isn't the lock hardware that is going bad. It's the door closer or pivots causing the door to drag or not close correctly.
There are several different types of overhead closers they're the concealed door closers which you cannot see they're in the header of the door. Then there are the surface...
Read More