Fire door

[catlad]

I am finalising a home extension from before the covid saga! and the building inspector wants me to uprate the garage door to a 30 min fire door, I've no problem with this as I wanted to make this door more secure anyway. My plan was to laminate steel to the door with 1.5mm - 2.00mm sheet steel, making it more fire proof and more secure!
Which he said if fine as long as I can prove it will be 30 mins fire rated. My question is how canl I prove it will repel fire for 30 mins ? Thanks

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Good luck with that, I'd like to congratulate your BCO, I think he may have been so subtly sarcastic it's gone completely over your head.

 

[bernardgreen]

I'd like to congratulate your BCO, I think he may have been so subtly sarcastic

I too would congratulate the BCO

My question is how canl I prove it will repel fire for 30 mins ?

You cannot prove it because it won't

Thin sheet steel is not fireproof as it will conduct heat. Heat from a fire on one side of the sheet will be conducted through the sheet and may ignite flammable materials that are laminated to the steel. ( such as a wooden door )

 

[Deleted member 174758]

To add to the above a "fire door" is really only a part of a complete system comprising the door casing, hinges, latch/lock, intumescent strips, closer and the door itself. Everything needs to be correctly specified and if any single item in that list is not the correct spec or there are any flaws in the installation (e.g. door to frame gap being too big, closer not working correctly, etc) then the "fire door" fails the inspection. Realistically you need to replace the door and it's casing and make sure the installation is up to scratch, not try to cobble yogether a solution when you obviously don't have a clue about how and why fire doors work (go take a look at the FIRAS site)

As an aside I worked on a big hospital a few years ago where we needed to check, adjust and certify over 1000 door sets. In order to prove the methodology the contractor had to build a sample doorset and subject it to a test house burn test. I believe that cost over £10k

 

[^woody^]

For proof you will have to burn it in the frame, at a test facility, and they will give you the certificate. Then you make another one to the same specification.

Otherwise you fit a door of a type which as already gone through the burning process and got the certificate.

Even if you fit a certified fire door and fit your steel plate to it, it will no longer be a certified fire door.