AceMining Portable Door Lock for Travel and Home

While I low key love this, it’s important to also know that it won’t work on every door. This worked seamlessly on my first work trip, in a fairly nice hotel and general area – probably a more business catering hotel. I later took a trip where I was in a city at a typical hotel chain that I would consider safe and wouldn’t think twice about booking at. For some reason, this didn’t work on the doors in that hotel. Since it was a less safe area, I was a bit insecure about it not working, was even woken up one night by someone who was trying to get into my room (hopefully accidentally) bc they left when I yelled at them through the door. Anyway, all this to say this works great, but I’ll also be looking for other lock versions that are hopefully more universal. I wish I had taken a picture of the door mechanism to share, but I wasn’t thinking of that at the time.

This is a handy gadget. I’m in my 80s and thought it would add a little security. I received the gadget without any instructions. My email to the seller’s email address on an accompanying business card was returned undeliverable. I checked the internet and found installation directions on YouTube. Following those instructions I quickly learned the gadget does not fit my door in any way. It may be good for some doors, but it seems my door is too thick. Take your time before ordering as I will ask Amazon if I may return.

Item is a little heavier than expected, easy to use. Sturdy and a great value

I think, from personal experience, that this type of portable door lock has a dangerous design and can easily trap you by not letting you open the door once you have used it. In short, the design does not consider that most spring latches weaken with age, and the latch does not fully retract to the edge of the door. The 1/16″ or 1/8″ part of the latch still sticking out gets behind the metal of the portable door lock and you are trapped.

I tried out this portable door lock inside my bathroom at home. The flat metal part slipped easily enough through to the strikeplate.

But the tool would not come out, and I was trapped in my bathroom! No one home. No phone on me. The window too small to crawl out of, and besides, the entry doors were all locked and I did not have a key on me.

But I did happen to have a pocket multi-tool on me, a Leatherman Skeletor, and eventually thought to use it to remove the screws holding the lock to the door and removed the inside lock handle and pushed the outside lever to the floor. The door still would not open.

The immediate problem was that the door strike latch spring mechanism would not retract the latch enough, using my multi-tool flat tip screwdriver bit to turn the latch back. I had to use the pliers part of the multi-tool to destroy the mechanism enough so I could force the latch back enough to escape.

Free at last, I found out the problem and why this product and others like it are so dangerous. In a house with wood doors, the latch mechanism spring eventually weakens, and the latch does not fully retract to flush with the edge of the door. In my case, the latch still stuck out about 1/8″ inch or so, which did not effect the door from opening, as there is a gap between the door and the door frame/buck.

But with this portable door lock metal inserted, it took up enough space so that 1/16″ of my latch was stuck behind that metal insert, and that is why I was trapped inside.

I think this type of portable door lock is dangerous. Maybe a commercially installed steel door with a commercial spring latch would be OK, but I would not trust it at all. You’d have to measure the door gap and check if the spring latch fully retracts into the door edge first, if you happen to travel with a micrometer and feeler gauges.

And on a wood door, it swells a bit as the humidity changes, so this portable door lock might just work when you check in, but might not let you check out if the door swelled a bit, say after a hot shower or during a rainstorm.

Dangerous Design! Once trapped inside like I was, the only way out besides busting the door (which is hard to do anyway when you are inside an inside-opening door, and doors are expensive), is to not only remove the lock (which usually has to start from the inside of the door) but to then bend and break the strike latch mechanism so you can physically force the latch all the way back and flush or inside the door edge. Then you need to buy a new spring latch and install it.

I just now went and looked at all 10 doors in my house, and on 8 on them, including one steel exterior door, the spring latch does not fully retract to the edge of the door or within it. All of these doors and spring latches are only about ten years old, and none ever failed to open before.

Do not fit all doors but will make use whilst on holiday

Easy to use! Simple instructions. Added security for my trip with stays at AirBnB.