patio door opening regulation

Section62

gwynlas said:

casper_gutman said:

23.5 inches is very narrow for a doorway. My house has a timber door that size, and it was quite difficult when we needed to replace it as all off the shelf doors were too wide and many couldn't be cut down enough to fit.

I'm puzzled that you refer to "patio doors" (plural) being so narrow though. Surely this isn't the total width of a double door opening? If there are two doors can't you open both and get a 47 inch opening? That would usually be plenty for moving furniture in and out.

They are patio doors that slide within overall opening not french doors that would open fully to give a double door opening.
If they are not considered to b exit doors on a fire route then there does not appear to be minimum width

The other situation where there is a legal requirement (building regulations) for door width is if the property is designated as an 'accessible' one.

casper_gutman

Albermarle said:

casper_gutman said:

23.5 inches is very narrow for a doorway. My house has a timber door that size, and it was quite difficult when we needed to replace it as all off the shelf doors were too wide and many couldn't be cut down enough to fit.

I'm puzzled that you refer to "patio doors" (plural) being so narrow though. Surely this isn't the total width of a double door opening? If there are two doors can't you open both and get a 47 inch opening? That would usually be plenty for moving furniture in and out.

I think 'patio door' usually refers to one with a sliding door, where normally only one side opens. If you have two doors opening outwards, they are usually referred to as French doors
I would guess the OP has a sliding door.
We have one and when fully open the width is 29/30 cms, which is pretty much the same as a  normal house door. 

Oh, fair enough. I've always just assumed patio doors meant doors to the patio, and could be sliding/french/bifold. It all seems a bit loosely defined - a Google search for "patio doors" shows me examples of all three, and the pages with sliders mostly call them "sliding patio doors".

I wonder if french doors might have been better for the OP - uPVC frames tend to be wider to it was likely a bit of width would be lost, and it's a shame the installers didn't flag this up beforehand and give the option. :-(

Albermarle

Section62 said:

Albermarle said:

...
We have one and when fully open the width is 29/30 cms, which is pretty much the same as a  normal house door. 

You mean Inches?

Yes, obviously I have gone too metric !

Section62

casper_gutman said:

Albermarle said:

casper_gutman said:

23.5 inches is very narrow for a doorway. My house has a timber door that size, and it was quite difficult when we needed to replace it as all off the shelf doors were too wide and many couldn't be cut down enough to fit.

I'm puzzled that you refer to "patio doors" (plural) being so narrow though. Surely this isn't the total width of a double door opening? If there are two doors can't you open both and get a 47 inch opening? That would usually be plenty for moving furniture in and out.

I think 'patio door' usually refers to one with a sliding door, where normally only one side opens. If you have two doors opening outwards, they are usually referred to as French doors
I would guess the OP has a sliding door.
We have one and when fully open the width is 29/30 cms, which is pretty much the same as a  normal house door. 

Oh, fair enough. I've always just assumed patio doors meant doors to the patio, and could be sliding/french/bifold. It all seems a bit loosely defined - a Google search for "patio doors" shows me examples of all three, and the pages with sliders mostly call them "sliding patio doors".

I wonder if french doors might have been better for the OP - uPVC frames tend to be wider to it was likely a bit of width would be lost, and it's a shame the installers didn't flag this up beforehand and give the option. :-(

I think 'patio doors' (plural) is normally used to refer to a sliding door arrangement which comes as a set usually with one sliding and one fixed panel. 'Doors' because there is more than one panel.

A door (of any type) leading to a patio could be a 'patio door' (singular) because it is only one doorway.

Before bifolds became popular the choice to fill a hole larger than a single door was between 'french doors' (swinging) or 'patio doors' (sliding).  Maybe with bifolds in the mix, the latter term needs to be updated to 'sliding patio doors' to avoid confusion?

sheramber

If these doors are smaller than the ones they replaced what was done about the extra space in the opening?