Gasketing & Thresholds
An astragal is a piece of molding used on a pair of doors or between the top and bottom leaves of a Dutch door, to provide security, protect against weather conditions, prevent light or sound transmission, or to retard the passage of smoke, flame, or gases during a fire. On a Dutch door the astragal is [...]
One of our specwriters recently received a memo from an acoustical consultant regarding a school project that he was working on. The memo referenced a standard called ANSI-ASA S12.60 – Acoustical Performance Criteria, Design Requirements, and Guidelines for Schools. This standard was developed by ANSI and the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) in 2002 (reaffirmed [...]
One of my (non-hardware industry) friends commented recently that she’s been reading this blog and can’t believe how complicated doors and hardware are. It’s true! There are a thousand ways to screw up a door and I’ve made my share of mistakes over the years, but at this point I often spot problems from across [...]
The 2007 edition of NFPA 80 contains an important change regarding the clearance at the bottom of a fire rated door. In previous editions of this standard, there was a somewhat confusing table (Table 1-11.4) listing different allowable clearance dimensions depending on the flooring material. The 2007 edition simplifies this requirement, allowing 3/4″ clearance under [...]
The 2009 edition of the International Building Code (IBC) contains an important change that’s easy to miss if you’re not looking for it. I stumbled across it a few months ago when someone asked me about the exception for cross-corridor doors without positive latching in I-2 occupancies. This exception is found in Section 709 – Smoke [...]
“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 [...]
No, seriously…when do we need to use overlapping astragals? This question was brought to my attention by my pal Liz Lenox, of the Metro-NY office of Ingersoll Rand Security Technologies. We were talking about why pairs of 3-hour-rated fire doors have a mortise exit device and a vertical rod exit device, rather than two vertical [...]
If you’re just tuning in, I’m working on a series of posts regarding smoke doors. I think part of the confusion about smoke doors lies in the multitude of different types of smoke-resistant construction – smoke barriers, smoke partitions, smokeproof enclosures, smoke compartments – so I’ll tackle those next. The requirements for the smoke door [...]
Last year I taught a 2-day class with my friend and mentor, Zeke. As Zeke and I prepared for the class, we had friendly disagreements about several code requirements. I hate to be wrong, so whenever he disagreed I would flop open the code in question and read aloud until he cried “uncle”. But there [...]
According to the International Building Code (IBC), every required exit stairway that extends more than 75 feet ABOVE the lowest level of fire department vehicle access (high rise buildings), and every required exit stairway that serves floor levels more than 30 feet BELOW the level of exit discharge must comply with the referenced sections on [...]
This is the 6th post in a series about fire doors and the results of a recent (unscientific) survey. For anyone who is just tuning in or has lost track of this series of posts, I conducted a survey about what the general public knows about fire doors and I learned 2 things – 1) [...]
I need some help, and after giving the architect my suggestions I told him that I’d ask all of you for ideas. The building in question has a large assembly space on the 5th floor roof. There is a pair of doors that swing from the roof deck into the building. Everything was fine until [...]
I saw this church from the highway on our way into Roanoke, Virginia last week – it’s St. Andrews Catholic Church, and I just knew it would have some nice doors. As soon as I approached the building from the parking lot, I spotted the meeting stile gasketing. Most people would probably see the building [...]
