What You Need to Know about Oak Fire Doors 

Fire doors play an important role in the improvement of safety in any building. Fire doors come with an intumescent strip that acts like a seal, which expands in the event of fire. This expansion blocks the gap that exists between the frame and the door thereby preventing fire and smoke from passing through. New buildings ought to have fire doors fitted on all escape routes including the corridors and staircases. Domestic dwelling with more than one level ought to have fire doors fitted for safety purposes.

Most people fit fire doors as a way of complying with the building regulations or as an afterthought, but this is a grave mistake. In the event of a fire outbreak, a professionally fitted fire door slows down the spread of fire and smoke thereby allowing the fire fighters adequate time to get to the building and save lives. There are quite a number of materials that are used in making such doors, the most common and popular material used is Oak. Below is a detailed review of the Oak fire doors.

 

Why are Oak Fire Doors More Popular?

Oak fire doors are top favorites to most customers looking to buy this particular type of door. Oak offers a reliable sturdiness and great beauty that is different from other materials. It offers a high resilience to damage and stress, therefore making it equal to the task at hand of holding back fire and smoke. Their sturdiness allows the doors made from them to withstand high temperatures (about 250 degrees Fahrenheit) for a long period of time depending on an individual door’s fire rating.

 

Oak Fire Doors’ Rating

Fire doors are made from different construction and material types, and the only way they can be classified is in terms of their ability to withstand fire. In order to determine their fire rating, they are subjected to the BS 476 Part 22 test (equal to the European BS EN 1634), which is used to measure the duration of time a particular door can be able to resist fire spreading in between areas and preventing the spread of flames, smoke and fumes. This leads to the classification of doors as FD30 or FD60. An FD30 door means it can withstand fire for duration of 30 minutes while the FD60 can be able to withstand the fire for 60 minutes. Oak fire doors are capable of withstanding fire for a long duration of time and hence satisfy the official tests well and most of them have a fire rating of FD30 and FD60 depending on their total thickness. These doors are consistent in their fire resistance credentials and this feature remains overwhelmingly attractive to most customers.

 

Fitting the Right Oak Fire Doors

When looking to fit your home or commercial building with oak fire doors, it is important to note that these are not like the ordinary type of doors and some factors have to be considered. A fire door in the ordinary function ought to automatically swing shut and latch in a secure manner in order for it to serve its intended purpose well. It is important to hire the services of professional fire door installers who have the required know-how in their installation and testing. A correctly installed fire door will be able to offer about 30 or 60 minutes protection from fire as opposed to the 5-10 minutes provided by an incorrectly installed fire door. Below are some of the considerations you ought to make when fixing fire doors made from oak.

 

Where should they be fitted?

Oak fire doors are mostly fitted in commercial buildings but they can also be fitted in your home if it has over two levels. It is important to note that loft conversions in private homes also count as additional levels. The fire doors should be fitted on the doorway that leads to a stairwell and to any habitable room. You should also fit a fire door between your garage and the house. If you use your house for both business and living purposes, you should have a fire door separating the business area from the residential area.

 

Signs

It is important to have signs notifying the users of a building that a certain door is a fire door, in order to ensure that it is left unobstructed and shut when it is not in use. These signs are not necessary when you fit them in your home. However, you should let every person in your home understand the importance of fitting the oak fire doors and the importance of keeping them unobstructed and properly shut all the time.

 

What other requirements are needed?

Oak fire doors have a higher density than ordinary doors (about 450 – 650 kg per cubic meter) and come with their own hardwood linings and frames as well. It is important to consult the fire door manufacturer whether a new frame will be needed or not before you purchase the door. The fire door manufacturer will offer further advice on the other things that should be done before you can fit the doors in your home. A fully fitted fire door requires more than just the door itself as the installation process requires a door stop, frame, smoke seals and things like closers, latches, locks and hinges. All these items must be fully compatible with each other in order to allow the fire door to be fully effective. This further illustrates the need to have the fire door installation service to be handled by an expert.

 

Final Words about Oak Fire Doors

Even though there are no legal requirements that every home should be fitted with fire doors, it is important to take all the necessary precautions to ensure that your family is safe. Choosing to install oak fire doors at home will be a great idea due to the safety level they guarantee you during a fire outbreak. Apart from preventing the spread of fire and smoke to other areas in your house during a fire, oak doors are also durable, have a high visual appeal and come in a wide range of beautiful designs. Although nobody wants to test the effectiveness of their fire doors, it is reassuring to know that you are well protected in case something goes wrong and the house catches fire.