Intumescent seals

[The Medway Handyman]

Been asked by a BTL landlord to do some work to bring a small terraced house up to standard.

BCO have specified that the existing door leading to the kitchen should be fitted with intumescent seals and cold smoke seals.

She assures me that the existing door is a fire door, but I'm getting alarm bells ringing.

Two reasons; I thought all fire doors should already be fitted with intumescent seals as standard? And the door doesn't have a self closer of any sort. I thought that should be standard as well?

How do I know its really a fire door?

Not sure what cold smoke seals are either.

Not a job I want really, given the graphic descriptions from my paramedic daughter of the 'house fire, persons reported' calls she attends.

[Brian G]

Not all "fire" doors are fitted with intumescent seals.

1 - The weight of the damn things - (a good indicator only) 2 - They are usually thicker than a 'standard' door (IIRC) 3 - If they are fitted as fire doors - then the 'planted' doorstops are usually thicker and screwed rather than nailed on. 4 - Any glass in them will usually be Georgian Wired. 5 - They may have 'hidden' door closures fitted on the hanging side of the door and into the frame. 6 - when you hit 'em anywhere on the door they feel and sound solid (flush doors).

Have a look at

Not a job I want really, given the graphic descriptions from my

She's quite correct, as an old housing maintence foreman who used to attend these, the sights are terrible.

[Neil]

--------------------------Snipped lots of good stuff--------------------------------------

Hinges will also need to be fire rated as well. Depending on how old the door is and whether its been planed down to fit it may have a printed BS number on top edge. Bloody horrible job especially if single handed trying to maneuvre these pigs so you can rout the edges for the seals. Asked to quote for a job not long ago where the Nursing Home proprietor wanted brush seals fitting after a visit from Fire Officer, only problem being that there was a 9mm gap round head, foot and lock side of the door !!

Neil

[Brian G]

It's not a nice, easy job to do Neil - even when 'all things are equal'. I once had to supervise the fitting of well over a hundred of the damn things (half hour flush fire check) in every room in two large blocks of multi-storey flats (except the bathrooms) - thankfully the front doors were already fire rated.

[Huge]

The door to my integral garage is half-hour fireproof. It has neither intumescent seals or a self closer.

[Broadback]

A visit, or phone call to your local fire station should get some help. They are extremely helpful in these matters and may even be willing to visit the site.

[Brian G]

Huge,

Not half-hour fireproof but half-hour fire check - the door and frame will succumb to the high temperatures of a fire eventually.

As a matter of interest, if the doors are installed in public buildings, then they have to have the intumescent strips, smoke seals and be self-closing along all fire escape routes such as corridors and stair access - as do flats. Private dwellings are different.

Pedantic I know but... :-)

Brian G

[Huge]

Don't tell me, let me guess? After ... half an hour! Right? :o)

Does a BTL count as a public building?

Astonishingly, my house is indeed a private dwelling.

[Brian G]

Nah! You can get one hour fire check doors too!!

And if you have enough cash to spend, you can get doors that withstand over

10,000 degrees of heat for a while - but a thermic lance will give 'em a run for their money mind! :-)

BTL, I suppose that means Bought To Let? If that's the case then no - unless you convert the property into flats, then any doors accessing a corridor or stairway that's a designated 'fire escape' must have them - and be self closing. There may also be a case whereby certain rooms inside the flat may have to have a fire check door fitted.

Ah, there are exceptions in a private dwelling - the access to a loft conversion must have a fire check door and also a door with direct access from a connected garage into the main property (as in your case).

Well I never, I wouldn't have though that from your original post! :-)

All the best Huge

Brian G

[Broadback]

Years ago, when in the RAF I attended a lecture on fire and precautions. Like, I suspect, many people I thought metal doors would be more fire resistant than wooden, not so. We were showed films of rooms in which fierce fires had been lit. The fires "jumped" to the adjacent rooms far quicker when steel doors were used.

[Brian G]

It's the same with lintels and floor joists. In intense heat, a metal lintel or joist will bend, warp and collapse quite quickly, whereas wooden ones will burn on the outside but retain their strength for quite a long period - and that's one of the reasons you will often see structural steel surrounded with reinforced concrete.

[Andy Champ]

ISTR one of the problems with the World Trade Center (sic) in 9/11 was that the impact tore much of the fireproofing off the steel.

Andy

[Brian G]

It was Andy - along with I believe, a design problem with the floor girders to wall stanchions connection that allowed the building to fall like 'a pack of cards' when a the weight of the top sections dropped onto the other floors below.

Brian G

[Andy Dingley]

There's a magic coloured plastic plug in the edge, which by the aid of arcane sympathetic majick can keep the fire demons at bay.

...Or so your BCO or local authority may believe, when you ask them to sign-off a foot-thick solid granite door that _isn't_ marked with these magic sigils. If they haven't got the right markings, and the guy with the clipboard is an arse, then you can find yourself replacing every door in the building for no overall benefit. Talk to the local dispensers of red tape _first_, and find out what they're looking for.

Retro-fitting intumescent seals (to most standards) is however easy. There's a retro-fit seal available, and a router cutter to match. You can't quite do them in situ (I've seen idiots try), but it's an easy job and pays very well indeed.

[Ian Stirling]

Well -- I'd really like to see the design of a building that can cope when you drop floors 51-80 on floor 50.