Archive for November, 2010
I don’t get involved with residential construction very often, but a local locksmith recently asked about the use of double-cylinder deadlocks on single family homes. His position is that he will not install them, but he was looking for a code reference to back him up. When I checked the Massachusetts One and Two Family [...]
An electromagnetic lock is basically an electromagnet mounted in an enclosure on the frame head, with a steel armature mounted on the door. When the door is closed and the magnet is energized, the magnet bonds to the steel armature and locks the door. In order to allow access or egress, the magnet must be [...]
A couple of weeks ago someone asked me whether the exterior exit doors for a movie theater required panic hardware, and in my opinion, the answer is a resounding YES! Movie theaters are considered assembly occupancies, and the occupant load is well over the limit (50 or 100 occupants depending on the code) that would [...]
Next Tuesday is the proposal closing date for the 2013 editions of NFPA 80 – Standard for Fire Doors and Other Opening Protectives, and NFPA 105 – Standard for the Installation of Smoke Door Assemblies and Other Opening Protectives. If you’d like to propose any changes, either submit a proposal online or let me know [...]
I recently received this photo from Michael Wojnarowski of Builders Hardware, and it reminded me of a Powerpoint presentation I ran across a while back. The presentation was created by the Anne Arundel County Fire Marshal Division – Code Enforcement Bureau, and the topic is Maverick Bars. I don’t think the security bars in this [...]
“It’s not what you know, it’s who you know…” …and lucky for me, I know A LOT of people! There are plenty of things that I don’t know but I can usually figure out who to call to get an answer. Lee Echols left a question on the Facebook Fan Page an embarrassingly long time [...]
I saw this door at a restaurant today. The decor is meant to look like a garage, and it’s pretty cool – I especially liked the naked closers. I did wonder about the main entrance door though. It’s tough to tell from the photos, but the graphics from the wall run over the aluminum portions [...]
I spent most of today traveling to Connecticut to do a Code Jeopardy presentation for 31 building inspectors there. I’m pretty sure they thought I was crazy when I said that we were going to play a game, but they enjoyed it and learned something, and I was able to keep them awake even though [...]
There have been lots of changes around here in the last few months…we moved the site to a new server and a new URL, and things seem to be running smoothly. We’ve added an archive in the sidebar, and reformatted the search results pages and the category index pages to match. My coworker, Lindsey Weiss, [...]
I just noticed an article in the Edinburgh Evening News that was worth sharing. No, I don’t make a habit of reading Scottish newspapers, but thanks to Google I see all kinds of news items involving fire doors. The article, entitled “Pupil, 5, Escapes From School,” was about a 5-year-old girl who left school through [...]
A few weeks ago I did a post about egress from an occupied roof, and that reminded me to go back and dig out some courtyard photos I took a while ago. When a courtyard is completely enclosed with no means of egress that leads directly to a public way, the path of egress is [...]
