One of the most obvious reasons why your residence, business, or shop should have fire doors, is the protection it will give you from a spreading fire. An important reason for a business to install fire doors is to help save inventory and equipment from costly smoke, fire, and water damage. When it comes to preventing fires from spreading, quality fire doors are the difference from averting tragedy, to wishing you installed the right fire equipment after one. Many different types of New York City businesses and residences have depended on fire doors in order to contain or reduce the impact of a fire. Here are some more reasons why fire doors are imperative when it comes to protecting your house, warehouse, or business.
Keeping Hazards Contained w/ Rolling Fire Doors
Rolling fire doors are specifically designed to stop a fire from spreading to potentially explosive or poisonous substances in a business environment. These are situations where standard automatically closing fire doors are just not strong enough. Many businesses in NYC have volatile ingredients and flammable chemical solutions involved, such as hospitals, schools, factories, and commercial kitchens. High rated rolling fire doors are the most appropriate and efficient choices when it comes to these types of businesses.
How Do Rolling Fire Doors Work
Commercial rolling fire doors have fusible links that release and close the doors when the links reach 165 degrees Fahrenheit. The fire doors can be tied into fire alarms, and also smoke and heat detectors in order to automatically close the doors in case of a fire threat.
Rolling fire door features include easy testing and auto reset, fusible link cable routing, and motor operated or chain hoist options (Right or Left handed). Rolling fire doors are manufactured to fit most any standard door sizes.
NYC Fire Compliance
It’s a common policy for the New York City Fire Department to mandatorily request that a business or residence install fire doors. Fire doors are certified to industry standards and are rated to prevent fires between or through buildings and adjoining structures. A fire-rating is basically founded on the length of time that a fire door can remain fire-resistant during a fire. A high-rated fire door is able to contain a fire from spreading for hours. Door ratings coincide with the amount of firewall protection that’s involved in any given area of the building.
Where Should I Install Fire Doors?
Protected stairwells should have fire doors installed. Electrical rooms or utility closets are required to have fire doors emplaced. Fire doors also have to be coordinated with emergency exit routes in commercial settings. Residential houses need to have fire doors installed on doors that lead from the garage into the house. New builds and renovations that have three floors or more need to have fire doors installed in every habitable room that is located off of a stairwell.
Wood Vs. Steel Fire Doors
The fire resistance capabilities of wood are normally in the range of 30 min of fire resistance to 130 min, depending on the wood doors fire rating. Wood is an optimum material for residential use, but it may not have a high enough fire rating for commercial use.
Steel is often considered to be much more fire resistant than wooden fire doors, just because they’re steel. But, the proof is really going to be in the fire rating, not the material. One of the highest rated standard steel doors is fire resistant for up to 3 hours. As with wood doors, door frames and hardware must also have the proper fire rating which coincides with the steel door that’s being installed, for the fire door to be fully effective.
Standard Fire Door Ratings
- An 180 min rated fire door needs to be placed with a 4-hour firewall and is normally used in openings with walls that separate buildings, or divide a single building into designated fire zones.
- A 90 min rated fire door is placed with a 2-hour firewall and it’s used with stairwells and elevator shafts.
- A 60 min rated fire door is used with a 60 min firewall and these fire doors are normally used to divide rooms and occupancies.
We forgot to mention another important aspect of having the proper fire door protection – Safety and peace of mind for you, your loved ones, and business employees, plus a happier insurance agency. The pros of having the proper fire doors installed are very strong compared to the cons – Which are none! The only thing that you’ll need to know now about fire doors, is, “who is the best fire door installer in your borough”, and, “what fire rating is going to be required in order for your property to fully code compliant.”
For installing commercial rolling fire doors, New York Gates is the top professionals in the five boroughs. With over a decade of established business in NYC, NYG provides its customers with the highest quality product.
Call them at 1-718-614-0616, or send them an e-mail with your specific needs at info@nygates.com.
