Welcome to new Forum Visitors
Join the forum now and benefit from discussions with thousands of other green building fans and discounts on Green Building Press publications: Apply now.
Flush FD30 (or 60) oversize door blanks have been great for me in the past - amazingly cheap and can solve any old/odd door size problem - trim and edge.
I'm not sure eco-friendly and fire protection marry well in a door - though the FD30's I've seen appear to be made of waste material densely packed and veneered. They can be very cheap £30 and up - e.g. Jeld-Wen flush doors. Glazed fire doors are nice but very expensive at £600 ish.
We did buy secondhand glazed doors 1-hour rate where we needed FD30s. Old school type with wired glass on ebay for a tenner each and had to replace the intumescent strip which is not a big deal. Building control where happy with that, though I'm not sure all would be.
Possibly the most eco-friendly if you need new is to get them from you local builder's merchant - although unlikely to be manufactured locally, hopefully they'll have been shipped in a more economical way.
Joiner, yes indeed, nicking the FD30 doors from work would be very cost-effective, but I'd probably lose my job so it wouldn't be so cost effective in the long run.
By eco-friendly I guess I mean that the wood needs to be sustainably sourced for a start, e.g. FSC.
Oversized sounds particularly suitable, given that we're doing a refurb and replacing doors. But how does that work given that FD30s come with intumescent seals and need to be fitted to tight tolerances?
Hi Shevek, currently having "discussions" with the suppliers of our 60 min fire over issues that have arisen regarding its quality or lack of. The door is as fostertom describes a solid core door blank which can be cut to size and re-lipped. I think if you can find a well manufactured version of this type of door it would be a good option. However, my comment is more specifically in respect of it's green credentials. The door appears to be manufactured in the far east, with a core, I have been told, of rubberwood. The only green plus point is that the core timber is made up of sections of timber approx. the size of small kindling wood. So it might be safe to assume that it utilizes waste timber that would have very little value for any other joinery application. I am currently investigating the availability of UK manufactured fire doors but I suspect they will be more expensive.
Ask the door manufacturers for their report on supplier/manufacturing processes and see if there is any genuine carbon/energy auditing. If they cannot supply this then you know to look else where. I suspect that you will struggle with this, if it was me, which it is not, I would then go for the largest producer and rely on economies of scale.