Fire door ratings are as important as the fire door itself. It gives you an ample amount of time to prepare for the worst and most of the time, when the fire outbreaks will be solved. Here are some reasons why you need to give importance to these things.

Fire is in a way, a good type of energy as long as it can be controlled and properly applied and handled. The reality is that most of our comforts these days are pretty much impossible without fires. In fact fire is considered by many as both a friend and an enemy as it can be useful in a minute, and the next, it is already causing severe damage to both life ad properties.

Fires are very hard to control and once it picks up its momentum, it can demolish everything in its path and this is one thing that we do not want to happen inside our homes, apartment buildings or even office buildings. This is the reason why governing bodies have created certain building codes and this paved the way to the installation of fire doors with the right and proper fire door rating to ensure that everyone who occupies a certain structure is completely safe whenever fires happen.

Fire doors are made from very strong materials that are coated with classified chemicals to make them fire proof. They are then tested rigorously until their rating is finally defined. It is very much recommended that you become aware of these ratings as this can be the difference between safety and danger; the difference between life and death.

Fire door rating is also defined as the time that the fire door is able to withstand the fire. Remember that the fire door is not designed to withstand the flames indefinitely as the extreme heat caused by fire can make its materials weak after a certain time threshold-that is the rating.  The ratings can be between 30-120 minutes. After this certain time elapses and still the fire has not been put out, the door is bound to give in.

For instance, you installed a fire door that is labeled as FD30. The numbers that follow the "FD" label is the number of minutes that the door can survive the fire. Thus, if it's an FD 30, it tells people that they have less than 30 minutes to spend evacuating since this door can shut down tightly that no smoke or heat can escape to safety or to another room.

Nevertheless, presence of mind a great deal of common sense is greatly needed if you are trying to escape a burning building. So it is highly advised as well that every now and then, the occupants of the building are subjected to fire drills and must be familiar with the labels, the fire exits, the floor plans, where to grab the extinguishers and such so that whenever fire happens, there are no panics and evacuation is done safely and in an organised manner with the help of fire doors.

So when purchasing a fire door, make sure that you are aware of its fire door rating. The higher the rating is, the better opportunity you have to escape to safety. And most importantly, make sure that the fire doors are always regularly checked by licensed and professional inspectors to make sure that it is in good condition when it is needed.

Installing fire doors is one thing. However, keeping them active and well-maintained is another thing to worry about. Therefore, before you do anything, you have to make sure that these fixtures are well maintained and regularly checked out by professionals.

In fire incidents, most of the loss of lives is not even caused by the actual fire itself. In most cases, the victims were rendered helpless when they started to inhale the toxic smoke which causes difficulty in breathing and results in them being unconscious. The actual just finishes the job by burning their bodies and that is not a very good sight.

Fires can actually start anytime and anywhere and mostly, at places where people least expect them to start. There are so many factors that can make a fire start. It could either be from natural causes to human errors but whatever the case is, when fire is out of control, it is very hard to put them out. This is especially true if the fire happens inside a building. As you know, buildings are confined spaces and if in the event a fire starts, it is going to be very difficult to escape to safety especially with lots of people in it.

In order to prevent this from happening, the government has established a  law called the building codes that mandates all structures, old and new such as buildings, apartments, malls and even some homes should have fire safety-system installed with them. This will ensure that everyone occupying the structure has a better chance of surviving in case a fire breaks out.

One of these fire safety features are fire doors. These doors are basically special fixtures that are made with strong materials that are coated with classified substances to make it fire resistant for a certain period of time. It ranges from 30-120 minutes and after which, it can give in to the intense heat that the fire can give, unless the fire rescue arrives on time to put the fire out. In a sense, the fire doors serve two purposes. One is that it can be a barrier against fire and the other is that it provides a passage for everyone to escape to safety.

But the integrity and the durability of the fire doors depend on how well it is maintained after it has been installed. Just like an ordinary thing, fire doors are subject to the usual wear and tear especially if it is being used constantly particularly if they are placed in an area that has a high traffic such as corridors or even hallways.

There is no better way than to have them maintained by special professionals who are trained to do such fire door maintenance. They are the ones who would know if there are non-functioning latches, missing screws, if the door itself is no longer self-closing or if there are missing labels. They can also instances where there are installed kick plates that are not the proper type or if the gap between the door and the floor is not proportionate.

Call a professional firedoor maintenance technician today and follow their advice so that you could guarantee that the fire doors will work effectively during fire accidents.