MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
...any Building inspectors ?
(Loft conversion)
What’s the deal with fire doors vs smoke detectors?
We’d rather not change all of our doors, they are original 1930s doors,
1. Original 1930s panel doors
2. If they have to be changed do the frames need to be changed ?
3. Will Installing smoke detectors in every room eliminate the need for fire doors ?
4. Any other way round this ??
5. Don’t want to ask builders as all they see is ££££ and would rather have info before asking builder regs guy.
6. What ££ looking at per door ( basic door) fitting ? Frame if needed ?
Many thanks in advance
Just been through this with a mate after his house was re-done.
He had to have smoke detectors linked together on each floor and every room off the main landing and hallway had to have fire doors apart from the bathroom but only as there was no boiler in the bathroom.
Firedoors are very expensive depending on what you pick.
The frames will need changing unless you get thinner doors that will fit the existing stop and have the intumescent strips inside them as opposed to cutting a channel in to the door frame.
Don't skimp on the hinges, get the proper fire ones designed for the doors.
The building inspector should have told you all this sort of stuff, if not you should have been advised of it by the person who drew up your plans and at least the people doing the roof should have thought about!
We had our loft converted around 10 years ago.
We had linked smoke detectors fitted in downstairs hallway, 1st floor landing and 2nd floor landing. New loft bedroom has a fire door with self closer and bedroom window opens wide enough to escape from.
Existing 1930s doors leading off hallway/stairs/landing were retro fitted with self closers.
We were told we could avoid changing all the doors by having mains smoke detectors in every room (which we did).
It's acceptable to run the alarms off the lighting circuit and have them radio linked so it's fairly easy to fit them. We did still have to add a fireproof board to the back of the door to the loft space and cellar and replace the glazing in the Kitchen door with fire glass.
A lot cheaper and less disruptive than changing all the doors.
There is an intumescent card available which you apply to the door panels in conjunction with intumescent and neoprene seals to the frame. The door has to be a certain thickness. Sorry can't remember the name of the card.
Envirogragh intumescent card.
You can machine the smoke seals into the frames rather than the doors by pinning on ply the same thickness as the doorstop (12 or 15mm) and wide enough (say 30mm) to allow the router fence to clear the architrave (leaving a say 30mm wide trench to allow the cutter to access the doorframe). This leaves a flat surface for the router to work off; pull off the ply when finished and finish the corners with a stanley knife and chisel.