Some advice please
A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?
(London)
--
Vass

Vass wrote:
Some advice please
A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?

Not usually. How many storeys is the house?

With a conventional two storey house, the usual arrangement is to use
fire doors on any new habitable rooms in the conversion, and then add
self closers to any doors that open onto the main escape route from the
loft.

He may have difficulties if the existing doors have glass panels though.

Note also that I have a feeling the rules in this are due to change
shortly.

--
Cheers,

John.

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On Wed, 13 Jun 2007 18:37:02 +0100, "Vass"
wrote:

The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?

Quite possibly, especially if the doors are flimsy modern ones. It
is possible to get wood doors which meet the (mainly) smokestop
requirements without going to full fire doors but many cheap ones
don't.

The requirement for them to be self closing will be removed in the
near future.
--
Peter Parry.
http://www.wpp.ltd.uk/

Vass wrote:
Some advice please
A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?
(London)

It was not the case in 2003 when we converted the loft in our house in
Heston.

We were told that new doors like the one from the loft landing into the
loft room had to be firedoors but existing doors on the ground and
first floors did not have to be changed. If we did change any existing
doors then they would have to be firedoors.

Guy
-- --------------------------------------------------------------------
Guy Dawson I.T. Manager Crossflight Ltd

"Guy Dawson" wrote in message
...
Vass wrote:
Some advice please
A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?
(London)

It was not the case in 2003 when we converted the loft in our house in
Heston.

We were told that new doors like the one from the loft landing into the
loft room had to be firedoors but existing doors on the ground and
first floors did not have to be changed. If we did change any existing
doors then they would have to be firedoors.

Guy
-- --------------------------------------------------------------------
Guy Dawson I.T. Manager Crossflight Ltd


Similar to what we did/were told a few years ago.

New doors in the loft must be 30 minute fire doors

Existing doors of "habitable rooms", (i.e. pretty much everything that isn't
a bathroom or cupboard) opening onto the escape route (i.e. landing and
entrance hall) are OK but must be fitted with self closers.

Existing glazing must be filled in or replaced with "georgian wired" glass.

Any doors replaced as part of the conversion would have to be upgraded to
fire doors.

So what we did was:

- board/plaster over the little "windows" above the bedroom doors on the
first floor
- replace the glazed kitchen door with a standard unglazed door. note we did
this the night before the conversion chaps arrived - if they had done it 12
hours later then it would have had to be a fire door - madness! I left the
painting of it until months later when the conversion was finished.
- and of course had self closers fitted on all these doors and the new ones
in the loft.

Regards,

Simon.

Simon Stroud wrote:
Any doors replaced as part of the conversion would have to be upgraded to
fire doors.

JOOI what about doors replaced not as part of the conversion. Say, as
part of refitting the kitchen some time later. Do they still have to be
fire doors or could you invoke the grandfather principle and install
something that is no worse than what was there previously?

Andrew

On Jun 13, 6:37 pm, "Vass" wrote:
Some advice please
A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors
Is that right?
(London)
--
Vass

I think the rules have changed recently.(April 07)
It used to be fire doors in the conversion, a lobby area and low level
escape windows were all that was needed.


I think that's all changed now and you need fire doors not only to the
conversion
but also to any rooms leading from the staircase in the loft.
But you no longer need the low level windows to jump into the firemans
hand from.

Can anyone confirm this is correct?

Owain wrote:
Andrew May wrote:
Simon Stroud wrote:
Any doors replaced as part of the conversion would have to be
upgraded to fire doors.
JOOI what about doors replaced not as part of the conversion. Say, as
part of refitting the kitchen some time later. Do they still have to
be fire doors or could you invoke the grandfather principle and
install something that is no worse than what was there previously?

I would say they still have to be fire doors, as otherwise they *would*
be worse than what was there previously (ie the fire door). Grandfather
principle does not mean you can go back in history.

Owain

Possibly a poor example. I was thinking specifically about doors that
had not been replaced as part of the conversion and therefore were not
fire doors even after the conversion.

Andrew

On Wed, 13 Jun 2007 20:18:03 +0100, a particular chimpanzee, John Rumm
randomly hit the keyboard and
produced:

Vass wrote:

A mate of mine is in the middle of a loft conversion to a
house.
The council have now insisted he replace all his Pine
doors throughout the house with Firedoors

With a conventional two storey house, the usual arrangement is to use
fire doors on any new habitable rooms in the conversion, and then add
self closers to any doors that open onto the main escape route from the
loft.

Since April (2007), all doors onto the escape route have to be fire
resisting (new or upgraded) to at least 20 minutes. They don't have
to be fitted with self-closers, and there's no longer a requirement
for an escape window in the roof.

Note also that I have a feeling the rules in this are due to change
shortly.

Too late.
--
Hugo Nebula
"If no-one on the internet wants a piece of this,
just how far from the pack have you strayed?"