We talk a lot about impact windows on our blog. We are, after all, an impact window and door company, and your window openings are the most obvious weak point in your home’s wind mitigation measures. However, impact doors are important too… but which exterior door types are the best for your home?
Impact doors come in many varieties, but not all door types are a good fit for every doorway of your home. Let’s take a look at some of the most commonly-installed impact exterior door types and their characteristics so you can know more about what to look for in your new doors:
Exterior Door Types By Material
There are several different types of materials commonly used for doors throughout the U.S., but there’s only one that frequently gets used for residential homes in Florida! The most common door materials are:
Wood Doors
The most traditional of building materials, wood was the predominant choice for home construction for centuries. However, it’s not a popular choice for homes in Florida in the modern age.
Why?
Because wood has several problems with Florida’s warm, wet, tropical climate and the gazillion bugs that live in our state. Wood absorbs and retains moisture, making it susceptible to wood rot. And if you get termites, you can kiss that wood goodbye!
While wood is strong and relatively easy to source, it’s just not a good material for modern homes in Florida.
Steel Doors
If wood’s a no-go, how about steel? Steel doors boast unbelievable impact resistance compared to virtually any other type of door. Even when you manage to surpass the astounding compressive strength of steel (Roughly 250-550 megapascals, according to Stanford Advanced Materials), the steel is more likely to bend and deform rather than break or shear outright.
This makes steel incredibly resistant to forced entry attempts. However, while great for security barriers, it’s not a great material for residential doorways in Florida.
Why?
First off, carbon steel has a high thermal conductivity, between 36 and 54 W/mK (watts per minute Kelvin) according to Engineering Toolbox. While that’s considerably lower than aluminum (237 W/mK), it’s still far more than wood, PVC, or fiberglass, each of which have thermal conductivities of 0.17, 0.19, and 0.04 W/mK respectively (Source: Engineering Toolbox).
So, if you put in a steel door, you’re going to be carrying the heat from the outdoors into your home with stunning efficiency.
Additionally, steel is prone to rusting when exposed to salty ocean breezes and makes for an incredibly dense, heavy, and hard-to-move door.
Fiberglass
Fiberglass is, by far, the most commonly-used material for panel-type exterior residential doors in Florida. It’s easy to see why.
Not only are fiberglass boards tough, with a compressive strength of about 170 MPa according to MatWeb, they’re virtually impervious to moisture damage and pest infestations.
Fiberglass doors are lightweight, easy to use, and great for insulating your home. It’s why fiberglass is the most popular choice for entry doors in Florida.
Glass
Some doors, like French doors or sliding glass doors, are predominantly made of glass with a frame made of another material (such as PVC, fiberglass, or aluminum).
Glass is tricky to generalize about, as there’s a massive difference between a glass pane that’s a single sheet of standard glass and a pane that’s made of two sheets of safety glass with a laminate interlayer and a low-e glass coating.
The first is really easy to break and does nothing to inhibit thermal transfer from sunlight, the second is incredibly resistant to impacts and provides a strong barrier against thermal transfer (even stronger in impact-rated insulated glass units that have a third sheet of glass with an air gap).
However, while glass is very commonly used in exterior doors throughout Florida, it’s not a standalone material for doors.
Aluminum
A common choice for sliding glass door frames, aluminum boasts a relatively high strength for its weight. However, as noted earlier, aluminum has a major flaw: its thermal conductivity.
This metal transfers heat insanely quickly, making it an efficient conductor, but a poor choice for anyone trying to create an energy-efficient home.
Yet, when used as the core of a frame of more thermally-resistant materials, aluminum is an excellent choice for enhancing the overall strength and durability of a sliding glass door.
PVC (Polyvinyl Chloride)
For homeowners who want excellent energy efficiency, PVC is a top sliding glass door frame material. In addition to having a low thermal conductivity, PVC is largely chemically inert, making it resistant to corrosion from exposure to salty ocean breezes.
Another reason why PVC is popular is that, because the material is extruded in a set color, it doesn’t show scratches as easily as materials that are colored by painting them. This helps make PVC lower-maintenance to own.
However, PVC on its own is not as rigid and durable as metal. The compressive strength of PVC is only about 6.79 megapascals, though its tensile strength is 39.2 MPa (Source: MatWeb).
That’s why impact-rated doors that have PVC frames reinforce those frames with aluminum cores. That way, homeowners get the best of both worlds: the energy efficiency and corrosion resistance of PVC and the strength of aluminum.
Types of Exterior Doors by Door Style
Now that we’ve covered the basic materials used for doors, what about the actual types of exterior doors for Florida homes?
There are a lot of different kinds of doors out there, but the ones we most commonly install are single-entry doors, double-entry doors, French doors, and sliding glass doors.
Single Entry Doors
These are the most common exterior door type for front doors and side entrances in homes throughout Florida. However, single entry doors themselves can be broken down into different subcategories.
- Panel Doors. Have panels in them designed to make customizing the doors easier, allowing the panel shapes in the door to be replaced with glass. The style and number of panels can vary from one door to the next. Some examples have 1 panel that takes up the top or bottom quarter of the door, all the way to six evenly spaced panels, and everything in between.
- Flat Doors. Door with no pre-set panels to make easy customizations from. Often made for easy mass production and standardized installation.
- Linea Doors. Doors that are noted for a more modern style. While different brands of door manufacturers use the term differently, they often have a single tall, narrow pane of glass set near one side reminiscent of a sidelight.
In larger entryways, the extra space around the door frame of a single entry door may be filled with sidelights. These immovable glass fixtures let in light and may also provide visibility, though many homeowners choose to use obscuring glass types and films to inhibit the ability of people on the outside of the doorway to look into the home.
Double Entry Doors
A popular option for front entryways or, in some cases, rear patio spaces, double entry doors combine two doors that swing open and shut to meet in the middle of the door frame.
Generally reserved for larger entryways where a single door would be too small to cover the whole doorway opening.
Double doors pose some unique challenges for installers, as they need to be precisely balanced and set to ensure long-term operation and alignment. If one side of the door sags at all, then the double doors may fail to open and shut properly.
So, if you’re getting double doors, it’s important to work with a reliable and trusted team of expert installers.
Otherwise, double doors are largely identical to single doors, just with two doors that meet in the middle rather than a single door that swings out or in.
French Doors
This is the term that applies to double doors that have a large pane of glass set in a frame, typically on a swinging door—though other opening mechanisms are available from some manufacturers like rail systems or sliding doors.
These are a popular option for homeowners who want a more attractive front entryway or who enjoy having lots of natural light throughout the day.
Glass options vary by manufacturer. Some manufacturers offer clear glass, obscured glass, and/or decorative glass with color tints.
Sliding Glass Doors
A type of door that features large glass panels set in a frame that rolls side to side in a tracked outer frame. Sliding glass doors are a common sight for rear entryways and patio spaces where there is a large doorway to fill.
These doors provide excellent views out of the home, allowing parents to keep on eye on their children from inside the house while the kids are playing outside or just enjoy the view on a pleasant day.
Sliding glass doors are available in a variety of styles, and are often customizable to different heights and widths by adding or removing panels. Some typical sliding glass door styles include:
- Patio Doors. The typical sliding glass door type most people think of when they hear the term sliding door. These often consist of two panels of glass and are available in XO, XX, and OX configurations (X indicates a panel that moves while O indicates a fixed panel). As doorways widen, more panels can be added to fill the space (though some manufacturers may have limits on configuration options for patio doors.
- Pocket Sliding Doors. These doors have a track that extends beyond the edge of the doorway to let the sliding panels move further out of the doorway, allowing more open space. In older doorways, these extended tracks could sometimes be mounted in the walls of the home itself, but modern practice in Florida is to have the rail go along the exterior of the wall instead. Great for homeowners who want to move furniture in and out with ease, as pocket sliders maximize open space.
- Bi-Parting Doors. A type of sliding door with two movable panels that meet in the middle and two fixed panels on the edges. In other words, an OXXO configuration door. Often used to provide an elegant feel and style.
Which Exterior Door Type Is Right for My Home?
That’s a difficult question to answer without knowing more about your home and your preferences.
For example, if you have a doorway that’s 12 feet wide, that’s usually a great spot for a sliding glass door. But, say you have mobility issues and don’t want to step over a door track every time you go in or out. In that case, a set of swinging double doors might be a better choice.
If you want to let in more natural light for your home, but aren’t comfortable with letting people look into your home from the street, then having a panel door with a single pane of obscurity glass might be a better choice than a French door with clear glass.
There is no such thing as a single perfect, one size fits all solution for entryways that’s perfect for all homeowners.
That’s why it’s important to talk to an expert before you start planning out a door replacement! Reach out to Karoly Windows & Doors today to schedule a free in-home consultation to help you find the perfect impact windows and exterior door types for your home!
