18 January, 2023
exterior doors
Exterior doors are the showpiece of the home, but we have to expect much more from them than just good looks. The wrong choice will cost us a lot, and not just in terms of presentability. We use the doors to our homes constantly. They protect us from the cold, excessive heat, wind, noise and intruders. Behind them spans our secure kingdom. A high-quality door is not fancy but a necessity!
To look at an exterior door for your home from the perspective of its leaf is to start the discussion from the middle. The leaf is only part of the so-called door unit, which also consists of the frame and the hardware. Sometimes the threshold is also listed as a separate component, and sometimes it is considered a part of the door frame.
Regardless, the leaf is the part of the door that will determine the aesthetic effect through which most people will view it.
The leaf may appear in several basic versions. We can have:
Getting a little ahead of ourselves, door leaves can still have various types of accessories that significantly alter their form and functionality.
A typical door leaf consists of three broadly defined components:
The leaf frame in an exterior door, not to be confused with the door frame, is usually either a solid frame, as we most commonly imagine it, or a point frame, which means that it appears only where the hardware is installed. The rest is based on the infill.
The infill is a complicated matter. Glazed exterior doors are one popular infill option. They are more of an element of aesthetics than actual infill, even though it is possible to create door leaves entirely of glass. More often than not, charming and functional inserts are made from glass, placing them within other infills.
The purpose of the infill is to provide the door with thermal and acoustic insulation performance. It achieves this in tandem with sealing.
Typical modern exterior doors have infills of:
It is best when such an insulating infill is on both sides of the hinge, i.e. inside the leaf frame and the door frame.
The crowning glory of a door leaf is its finish. The options available are determined by the material from which they are made. The most popular are:
Lacquer coatings are commonly used on wooden and steel doors. Veneers are typically paired with wooden doors, while laminates are applied on steel and aluminium doors.
We often overlook the door frame when we buy doors in a typical way, i.e. analysing mainly the appearance and performance of the leaf. This is a grievous, potentially costly mistake. The frame is the place that is responsible for the quality of the door installation. Even the best entrance door without a proper frame will not serve well.
What functions does the door frame perform? It is mainly responsible for three things:
The door frame must look good but should also be warm and durable.
When it comes to the types of door frames, there are three choices:
While choosing an exterior door, it is necessary to include the door frame in our budget and the overall concept. Without a dependable door frame, we will never have an effective burglar-proof door or an energy-efficient entrance.
The final part of the door unit, the fittings or hardware, are all the components that serve the practical purpose of operating the door. Fittings turn a rectangular block of wood or other material into fully-fledged doors.
The basic fittings are:
Each of these is a vast subject, but while choosing the entrance door, we do not have to become experts on each right away.
Modern hinges can come in many different forms. However, we will most often use their traditional style. It is vital that exterior doors offer three sets of hinges, not just two, and they provide a means of adjusting the leaf position.
The choice of handles, including knobs and pulls, is a matter of aesthetics. Each of these will provide us with similar utility but in a completely different flavour.
Locks are the most technically complex component. We ought to discuss them with our customer advisor or expand our knowledge in this area, especially if we expect the door to be burglar-proof.
We can order an exterior door for a single-family house from several possible materials. In the first instance, we will almost always think of wood, and if we commit to this idea, we will certainly not regret it.
We can choose a wooden exterior door in the exclusive prestige option or the elegant and affordable option. The prestige options are made of solid wood or pressed wood. The less expensive options are made from plywood.
PVC exterior doors? Yes, although quite a few people still approach this option with a distance caused by their lack of experience with this material. In fact, it is a beautiful and versatile choice, available at an attractive price.
PVC panels can be shaped almost freely: they can be smooth, carved or have a textured veneer.
Aluminium is particularly popular as a material for interior doors. Exterior door models made of aluminium are primarily preferred for their durability and refreshing appearance.
The material offers more aesthetic than practical advantages without limiting imaginative designers.
An almost indestructible burglar-proof door for the home is a steel door. Steel remains more popular in the industrial environment and wherever we require fire resistance than in a strictly residential context. However, modern architecture has long since become familiar with them, and interior designers often use steel, especially in public spaces.
The unsurpassed durability and the possibility of attractive painting and glazing won steel doors many advocates.
The building code also has a say in our choice of entrance door. We must remember that the door is a part of the external wall, and thus it should meet certain standards.
Owners of single-family houses can be at ease, as they are only subject to the PN-EN 14351-1+A2:2016-10 standard, and to a limited extent at that. On the other hand, owners of public-use buildings face countless detailed obligations.
Everyone should bear one thing in mind - thermal insulation. All doors we now want to install as exterior doors to a house should have an Ud of no more than 1.3 W/m2K. Ud is the thermal transmittance of a door, the equivalent of the more common Uw parameter quoted for windows.
There are, of course, many more rules we need to observe. The door, e.g., needs to have a minimum width and height, but this is a challenge for the architect, not the homeowner. The architect is the one who has to bring the design in line with the regulations. Compliance with standards alone is not enough, however.
Practical problems can occur if doors are too large. Massive doors are fashionable and desirable, but if a single leaf is broader than 130 cm, we should expect rapid wear and tear on the hardware. The damage will happen due to gravity combined with the leverage effect putting elevated pressure on the hinges. For such wide passages, it is advisable to use double doors.
The weight of the leaf is also relevant here – lighter doors may be broader but only slightly.
It is also necessary to measure the door correctly before purchasing. The guarantee never covers a wrongly placed order. And it's easy to get it wrong, as the specialists use three different, only seemingly identical measurements:
The height of the threshold and issues such as the symmetry of the opening are also material.
It is best to put the measuring of the door in the hands of a specialist and then ask the experienced professional whether our dream door is realistic and, ideally, also practical.
It is also worth mentioning the direction the front doors swing. We may not always be free to choose it freely.
In the case of flats, there is an obligation to open the door inwards. Single-family house owners are not subject to this requirement.
The vast majority of doors swing inwards, as our doors probably should too. The reasoning behind this is that:
Such entrance doors are a proven and safe choice, as well as being fully functional.
Some doors break out of the pattern and swing open to the outside. As a result:
It is worth considering whether such an atypical solution offers additional possibilities worth utilising.
The elements required for a door to function properly are not too numerous. However, there is no shortage of optional features and equipment which may be highly desirable for at least some users. If they are overlooked, they can immediately begin to annoy as soon as the door is installed or become a nuisance over the years. Therefore it is worthwhile to think carefully before making a decision.
Insurance companies may be the first to comment on our doors, as what exterior door for a single-family home we choose will make a difference to the insurance premium. If we want to limit the expense, the door should have:
The above will still not give us a burglar-proof door, but it will increase its security rating.
It is also indispensable to have the possibility to adjust the position of the leaf because, without it, we may end up having to replace the door in the vestibule. The gap between the door and the floor will ruin the room, or there will be no room left for the leaf.
If we aim for a fully-fledged passive house, we need to be prepared to spend more at the investment stage. We will make money on our decision through lower heating costs for years to come.
To achieve the energy efficiency of a passive house, we must insulate the walls and roof, install warm windows, and use the right doors. What kind of doors exactly?
The matter is clear: an appropriate heat transfer coefficient value must be achieved. As we already know, for an energy-efficient building, this is 1.3 W/m2K. For a passive house, our doors must have no more than 0.8 W/m2K. A typical product will not meet this standard.
When it comes to door materials, the choice is rich, as wooden doors can naturally meet such requirements. PVC exterior doors are ideally suited. We can also use advanced aluminium and steel door systems, provided they have adequate insulation.
In practical terms, security classes are the most important consideration for burglary protection. It is these that the insurance company will request. They determine how difficult it will be for an intruder to enter our home. Even if we do not know how they have been achieved, the RC classes are enough information for us.
The anti-burglary properties of doors are defined by the European standard PN-EN 1627:2012. This is a major simplification, as officials would not leave such an important issue as security with just one document.
The one above is a European Union standard, also adopted by Poland back in 2012. In addition, anti-burglary products have to meet the latest 2021 specific regulations: EN 1628:2021, EN 1629:2021 and EN 1630:2021 for doors, windows, curtain walls, grilles and shutters. These relate to resistance to static loads, dynamic loads and manual burglary attempts.
Is this complicated? Only seemingly, because the details are not at all relevant.
Let us return to our basic standard. It provides for 6 successively numbered levels of security: from the lowest 1 to the highest 6. A door is considered burglar-proof if it is of at least class 3, and a house with a class 4 door is believed secure. While this is only an opinion, many specialists share it.
For convenience, we can assume that classes 1-3 are security against random offenders and 4-6 against people prepared to commit a crime.
An exit door with security class 4 should prevent an intruder from breaking through for at least 30 minutes, even if using a range of specialised, though not the best, tools available. This is a lot to ask, as an attempted break-in will be loud and spectacular.
It is hard to imagine a burglar trying to force a door with power tools for several minutes in the middle of the night. Such a prospect is usually sufficiently discouraging that a burglary attempt will not occur.
What should an anti-burglary door have to be truly burglar-proof? It depends. What counts is the overall effect, taking into account potential weaknesses. This can be achieved, among other things, through:
However, the most common anti-burglary doors are steel doors or doors fitted with steel reinforcements.
The proper installation of a door is crucial to realising all expectations. It is installation quality which determines whether we get all the parameters guaranteed by the manufacturer of a specific exterior door for the house. Remember that when we choose a door, we determine how our home will be separated from external conditions, which is a complex and multifactorial issue.
We should start with what we have already emphasised many times – we will be installing the entire door unit, not just the leaf. This will most often be done for us by a specialist, but it is still worth knowing what should be done and how it should be done.
In layman's terms, the process of installing a door can be divided into 4 stages:
Preparing the opening involves levelling the surface of the masonry and ensuring the right angles everywhere. This is the basis for further work.
Building a threshold and installing the frame can be challenging if the opening is not ideal. Even if it is virtually perfect, it is quite an ordeal, as thermal insulation and waterproofing must be arranged. The latter is particularly important in the threshold area.
Solid exterior doors, like windows, are usually installed using an approach known as warm fitting. It involves creating a dedicated vapour barrier so that the thermal insulation does not become damp and heat bridges do not form. The more energy-efficient the house is, the more attention we need to pay to these issues.
The correct, solid attachment of the door frame to the wall is critical, especially for anti-burglary properties. The most secure door is useless if a burglar can remove it from the wall.
Simply fitting the hardware, and adjusting and equipping the door with various extras, such as a fingerprint lock, are usually no longer difficult. Hinge regulation, i.e. positioning the leaf, can easily be carried out by the user on most doors.
A finished, well-installed door for a single-family house will open and close with ease. They will be impermeable and effectively noise-insulated. Their locks will close without resistance and will not allow them to be torn out.
The list of accessories we can choose for our exterior doors is almost endless. Manufacturers of optional equipment outdo each other with ideas for new features and constantly improve things that already seem to be perfect. This is gratifying because, thanks to such enthusiasm on the part of the manufacturers of solutions, it is easier for us to take care of the priority issue: security.
Let us focus on three items here:
Latching bolts are an alternative to the simplest mortise locks. They are a piece of hardware that appears mandatorily as extra on anti-burglary doors. When we turn the key, they drop a number of bolts into the door frame providing multi-point security. It is not enough to damage a single point to breach such a door.
Code and biometric locks are an alternative to the standard key. Code locks are already the traditional version of these. We release the lock by entering a string of numbers known only to us. Fingerprint-operated solutions are becoming popular, as we do not have to memorise anything or carry a separate key in any form.
Fans of sci-fi gadgets may even be tempted by devices into which we have to look to unbolt the lock. This exciting option is more convenient than code and fingerprint locks and is excellent security-wise.
Door viewers can surprise us too. The simplest of these are traditional peepholes in the door, through which we can peek out and see our visitors. It is worth making sure they are panoramic and preferably electronic so that the image is displayed on a monitor. The best ones connect to the internet and allow us to see the visitor regardless of where we are, talk to them and let them in remotely.
Security and convenience constantly intermingle in the world of door accessories. It is hard to deny that safety elements tend to make life easier for householders.
Again, let's take a look at three items from the extensive range of accessories:
Handrails are an alternative to classic handles. Traditionally, they were exclusively used in public spaces and reigned supreme in private homes, but the outlook is long obsolete.
Handles are convenient to use and fit in with contemporary architectural trends. They will not usually allow keyless entry, which is noteworthy.
Self-closers ensure that doors do not remain open. Especially with a self-locking lock, they are a great functional addition to any exterior door. They can have brake mechanisms that prevent the door from slamming shut.
The most convenient are door closers with a function that locks the door in the open position. They make it easier to move any items through them and reduce the risk of mechanical damage to objects and the people transporting them.
Non-standard glazing may appear in doors fitted with glass. There are more and more possibilities. Venetian mirrors or milk glass are already considered traditional options. Intriguing innovations include Digi Glass, panels that change their transparency in a fraction of a second. We press a button on the remote control or the phone, and the glass changes from transparent to milky and then back to full transparency after another issue of command.
The world of exterior doors is rich, and exploring it is an adventure. It is enthralling, even if we are not planning to replace the doors in our own homes any time soon. When the time to make a decision comes, we will be faced with a veritable curse of abundance. We hope this text will provide a good roadmap for each reader's quest for the best exterior doors.
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Eko-Okna S.A.
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