Cat Doors for Installation in Walls

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If you’re installing a cat flap through something thick like a wall, it’s no good simply fastening one side of the cat flap to each side of the wall and thinking you’re done. You absolutely must “frame out” the wall to prevent moisture from getting inside and causing something ugly like dry rot or mold.

A few of the cat flap designs will accept tunnel sections or “wall liners” to do this framing for you. Each one is a particularly length, say 2”, and you glue enough of them together to span the thickness you have to go. You want to stop a little short of the full wall thickness because the cat flap will add its own, for example, 0” – 2”, to give you a snug fit. Of course all seams must becarefully sealed with high quality caulking for water tightness.

We like this approach. A wall installation through dry-wall and stucco, for example, is not hard to undo if you sell the house and the buyer doesn’t want a cat door in the wall.

But we do think this might be a good time to hire a licensed contractor to do the job. Better to spend $100 and get the job done right than $10,000 later to get rid of dry rot or $6,000 for the casket you’ll need if you accidentally cut through a power line.