Industrial doors are quite different from their domestic counterparts. While choosing a domestic door, managers might think about the appearance. However, a facilities manager considers the door springs failing in the middle of a critical operation and the company losing £4,000 worth of shifts because of it. Aspects such as uptime, throughput, and security matter more than the door’s appearance. These are key considerations for design and procurement over a decade, and cost is a major factor.
This hub describes commercial and industrial doors — the doors used in warehouses, factory units, logistics depots, workshops, and secure compounds. Domestic garage doors have a separate section, as the specifications, procurement details, and negotiations differ significantly.
The Main Types of Industrial Doors
Roller shutter doors are the standard type of door used in loading bays, lock ups, and service entrance doors. A curtain made of galvanized steel rolls up to a drum stored above the door opening. These doors can be insulated or uninsulated, are reasonably priced, and have a long service life. Smaller doors are operated with a manual chain; anything larger than 3 meters is electrically operated.
Sectional overhead doors are the scaled up version of what you would find in a home. They have insulated panels, which allows them to be standard for a variety of places, such as temperature controlled buildings, cold storage, etc. They provide better insulation compared to roller shutters, but are more expensive and take longer to operate.
The point of rapid roll doors is throughput and environmental separation rather than security or insulation. They open and close very quickly at 1 to 2 meters per second, and are used for high traffic openings and places where the doors would cause a significant loss of time. The curtain is usually made of PVC.
Sliding and folding doors work best for very wide openings, such as those found in large workshops, buildings, or even aircraft hangars. They have to slide sideways along a track and as a result, have no ceiling structure.
Fire-rated doors are based entirely on building regulations and are a different category of doors. They are installed to slow the spread of fire and are rated at half hour, one hour, two hours and are certified to BS EN 1634. Choosing a fire door is usually not a free choice, as the spec has to match the building’s fire strategy.
Spec considerations
There are three major influences on a commercial door spec sheet.
Cycle Rate. How many times do you expect a door to open and close during the day? A roller shutter at a quiet trade counter operates around 20 times per day. A bay door at a parcel depot may operate 500 times daily. Cycle rate determines the specification of the motor and how the maintenance schedule is created. If the motor is underspecified, a burnout occurs at the end of year two.
Insulation. U-values are used in HVAC-controlled environments and cold storage units. They mean less for a basic warehouse. Insulated panels add more capital expenditure; savings are realized with non-insulated panels, but costs may increase in energy over a decade.
Security and Impact Resistance. Standard galvanised curtains are for opportunists and require securing higher risk buildings in higher risk environments and distribution centres holding stock and high security industrial doors with LPS-rated curtains, reinforced guides, and extra locks. Impact barriers and bollards are a separate specification and not built into the door.
Compliance is the fourth axis, and no one talks about it until the audit. The doors used by workers and industrial door systems fall under PUWER and the Machinery Directive. CE or UKCA markings are mandatory for new systems.
Loading Bay Equipment
A loading bay has one or more industrial doors. Each loading bay has dock levellers, seals, shelters, and other items to link the building and trailer and keep the gap between them sealed and weather proof. These items should be specified, along with the door, rather than adding them to the order later. Retrofitting a dock leveller to a door opening is costly and will probably not match.
Buying and Installing
Industrial doors are seldom standard. They have to be made to fit specific opening sizes, wall and floor heights, and lintels. A good supplier will survey to check. Treat quotes that do not include a survey with suspicion. The supplier will either be very familiar with that type of unit, from similar builds on the estate, or they will be randomly guessing.
More important than the door specifications are the maintenance contracts. A door left unattended will fail. However, a door that is serviced on a planned preventative maintenance schedule will last around twice as long as a door that is installed and forgotten, until there is a failure.
The pages below describe each door type in detail, including cycle rates, panel specifications, motor alternatives, and the applications that each type of door is suited to.