I did. Got a great deal on a pair of metal, exterior door handles, like $20 for the pair at Lowes on clearance. I made my doors and they are solid wood. The cut outs were all fully coated with penetrating epoxy. I made exterior gaskets to sit behind the mounting plate out of some left over EPDM.
I thought I had these already in my gallery, but guess I missed uploading them. Anyway, this is right after I mounted them to the door. Please ignore the excess caulk and caulk smears on the aluminum trim (made that from some sheet aluminum I had). You can see the EPDM behind the mounting plate. It was trimmed when finished. The exterior handles point towards the back. The interior handles point forward so I can open the doors. It make it real easy to open if your hands are full, as you just elbow them open.


As a side note, I had an ancient Milwaukee 1/2" Hole Hog that just as I was finishing the second door handle hole the entire chuck broke off. Turns out, that was a common thing with those. I had it for years, but seldom used it in the past couple of decades. Was able to finish the hole with my regular 3/8 drill.
dave