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Help. Steel door contractor didn't know about "thermal bowing" and now my doors don't open.
Had an expensive set of steel and glass patio doors made. The contractor used a thermally-broken design. The doors face east, getting direct sun until about 1pm.
In late mornings, the doors bind shut and don't open. The doors then free up in the early afternoon. Now, I don't know much about construction but it seemed obvious an expansion issue was happening.
I told the contractor and they tried grinding down the metal threshold as a solution (it was one of the areas the door was catching). Since they would finish their repair work in the afternoon, the doors would be working anyway, giving the illusion of a solution. Next day, doors would bind again. We did this a few times.
Now the contractor is blaming the rough opening as not being designed for the weight of the doors. That *that* is the reason the frame is bowing. Well, unfortunately for him the doors work great on cloudy days.
Realizing they didn't seem to know what they were dealing with, a simple google search spit out "thermal bowing" as a common issue. So common that it's referenced in ANSI Standards https://steeldoor.org/ansi-250-8/.
Am I crazy to think the contractor should've known about this issue and designed the door's clearances/measurements to compensate for expansion? This is the responsibility of the door contractor to fix... right?
What I'm now worried about is all the online info about bowing recommend "adding an awining" or "changing the door color" as a solution. I don't want the contractor to get away with that. The doors should just work... right?
​
#home
source
Had an expensive set of steel and glass patio doors made. The contractor used a thermally-broken design. The doors face east, getting direct sun until about 1pm.
In late mornings, the doors bind shut and don't open. The doors then free up in the early afternoon. Now, I don't know much about construction but it seemed obvious an expansion issue was happening.
I told the contractor and they tried grinding down the metal threshold as a solution (it was one of the areas the door was catching). Since they would finish their repair work in the afternoon, the doors would be working anyway, giving the illusion of a solution. Next day, doors would bind again. We did this a few times.
Now the contractor is blaming the rough opening as not being designed for the weight of the doors. That *that* is the reason the frame is bowing. Well, unfortunately for him the doors work great on cloudy days.
Realizing they didn't seem to know what they were dealing with, a simple google search spit out "thermal bowing" as a common issue. So common that it's referenced in ANSI Standards https://steeldoor.org/ansi-250-8/.
Am I crazy to think the contractor should've known about this issue and designed the door's clearances/measurements to compensate for expansion? This is the responsibility of the door contractor to fix... right?
What I'm now worried about is all the online info about bowing recommend "adding an awining" or "changing the door color" as a solution. I don't want the contractor to get away with that. The doors should just work... right?
​
#home
source
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