Fire doors, fire and smoke seal required on the side?

[ivanakos]

Hi,

We had a loft conversion done recently and we had many issues with the builder.
Two questions please

1) pieces of timber were added to the existing frame and can see the light through it, not sure what reg there is for this (frames) but that doesnt look fire resistant to me ?(look carefully and you can see the light through)

2)The doors has only fire and smoke seals on the top is this required on the side (or anything else required on the side for the matter)

If they need to rectify I would need pointing to the relevant reg cause they are very hard to work with.. also there is draft from the custom access panels on the loft and I dont think that should be the case.

Thanks

 

[^woody^]

Get your building inspector out.

That don't look like a fire door.

 

[Nakajo]

It looks like a hollow door to me

 

[Newboy]

And non-compliant door stops

 

[Newboy]

Any chance of a photo of the hinges, latch and handles?

 

[ivanakos]

Any chance of a photo of the hinges, latch and handles?

As requested.

 

[ivanakos]

Bwt contacted the building inspector that came to visit me (organized by the builder)
got the following response:

According to the guidance within Approved Document B, volume 1, fire doors in protected corridors within dwellings should be to a FD20 standard as a minimum. FD20 doorsets are no longer manufactured and have not been for a number of years. As such, the Building Control Alliance have provided a guidance document (attached) on the installation of fire doors in protected corridor situations in dwellings/flats.


The Building Control Alliance is a combination of Local Authority Building Control (LABC) and the Association of Consultant Approved Inspectors who provide guidance (amongst other things) to create a consistent approach to Building Control across the industry.


In respect of fire doors in the situation described, FD30 fire doors without intumescent strips and cold smoke seals will be accepted as being to the accepted FD20 standard as outlined in the attached guidance note (see attached link).


http://buildingcontrolalliance.org/...4/BCA-GN-9-Fire-Doors-in-Dwellins-1-Jan13.pdf

I note some important points on the doc that they send:
However, certifiers of fire doors (such as BWF and BM TRADA) have, over time, ceased to certify fire doors to a FD20 standard. The minimum rating of a fire door is now predominantly FD30, with intumescent seals being necessary to achieve this rating.

I also note:
FD20 doors are therefore no longer available under independent certification schemes such as BWF – CERTIFIRE and BM TRADA – Q mark

So they do need the seal to be FD30s, The way that I interpret this is that the doors in the property have passed without the seals as an FD20 (minimum standard), in order for them to be FD30 they would need the seals to achieve the rating... on the contract with the builder it says that they would "fit half hour fire check doors" not 20 minutes ones...

 

[ivanakos]

Any chance of a photo of the hinges, latch and handles?

The handles are the original ones (pre fire doors)

 

[Notch7]

Looks like a standard hollow door.

FD30 doors are 44mm thick.

Stops need to be 25mm thick, I think, cant remember if need to be hardwood.

Fire door hinges are class 11 -cant remember if they are needed on 30min.

 

[PCAnimal]

I opted for interlinked smoke alarms in everyroom. I thought it gave good piece of mind as kids room get protection.

I'm not a pro but that looks shoddy

 

[KenGMac]

In the document you refer to there is supposed to be a label fixed to the top edge of the door?

I have generally assumed that a fire door[no matter what rating] had a hardwood edge strip?

Last year [OK up here in Scotland] I obtained and fitted a half hour Fire door, it had a label and was lipped on all edges? at the same time i obtained and fitted three other flush panel doors all were lipped, the latter were not fire door rated.

As for the abysmal attempt to install the ironmongery? bluntly the attempt has failed.

From the images posted, the additional door stops appear to simply be of cuts found on the floor somewhere.

In all the workmanship is best described as being less than poor.

Ken

 

[lt8480]

Generally all the doors in the hallway should be FD30, not just the loft room, this only seems to relate to one door - have all the other doors been inspected.

The builder may be useless, but the inspector should be picking this up and sounding the alarm bells not you. That's the point of having an inspector.