Why Choose Bifold Doors for your project? The most popular quality these bifold doors have is that they open up your house allowing fantastic views of your garden and letting in large expanses of light. On average bifold doors can provide your opening with around 90% glass, imagine an opening 3 metres wide, you could have up to 2.7 meters of that as glass. There are no other common types of domestic door that can offer this quality. These types of doors are more commonly used for openings which are over 2.5 meters as over this size options like French doors or Sliding patio Doors become an unlikely option for your opening. (If you are looking for Sliding Doors or French Doors and you think bifold doors may not be the option for you then our sister company G&N Windows can help you with both of these). What’s the best material? Bifold doors have undertaken quite the facelift over the past few years; they have gone from non-thermally broken doors used throughout Europe for shop fronts to being the UK’s must have home improvement.
The thermally broken Aluminium bifold doors we supply from Schuco and Origin have been extremely popular with our customers with around 97% of the bifold doors we have sold over the past 5 years being Aluminium. Below are a few points to take into consideration… (Don’t let us sway you too much!) UPVC has a history of expanding at a much greater rate than that of Aluminium, This is more likely to happen during the hotter months, and ironically this is likely to be when you would use your doors the most! Timber is also a product which has a tendency to change shape over time as it is a natural product which is prone to being affected by the weather and needing upkeep over time. There is a larger panel size available with Aluminium doors than UPVC with it being possible to manufacture an Aluminium pane up to 1.2m wide (Sometimes wider) and UPVC only being 0.9m wide, this would mean your UPVC door would have more panes and in turn more frame to obstruct your view, our Timber products are also limited to a 850mm sash width
Something else to take into consideration is the strength of UPVC against Aluminium. As UPVC is the weaker product and only lined internally with Aluminium it does have the tendency to sag and warp over time with the weight of the doors. Whereas Aluminium doors are designed to take the weight of the doors while keeping their shape. Additionally you can have your Aluminium bifold doors in 100’s of colours, finishes and wood grain effects! Why the big difference in cost? Unlike products such as French Doors or Sliding doors each of our bifold doors are bespoke made to suit the needs of your opening and as well as meeting the needs of your design. The benefits the doors bring to your home far out way the cost. This unrivalled product is a great addition to your home. Doors with only 2 openers or which slide alongside each other on a track are able to operate adequately with standard low costing hardware such as hinges and rollers. Our bifold doors operate on a precision engineered system allowing smooth operation for the duration of its life, extremely efficient weather sealing while keeping the door low maintenance.
We guarantee the smooth running of your doors along with a 10 year guarantee on parts and labour*. *Glass guaranteed for 5 years. There are a lot of factors which will affect the U-Value of your bifold door such as: Size, Number of panes, opening configuration and whether to opens inwards or outwards. If desired it is also possible to increase the U-Value of your door with different glass specifications. But we can assure that all of our bifold doors exceed current building regulations and all come with severe weather rating certification. Top Hung or Bottom Hung Bifold doors? All of the Doors that we supply at Herts Bifold Doors are bottom hung. We have seen competitors come across countless problems where customers have not had the correct structural calculations made to support the doors, in some cases we have even seen builders have to redo brickwork to be able to incorporate a lintel or steel as support. This meant that when we found what we feel are the best manufacturers we saw it as a massive bonus that they are all bottom hung.
Top hung doors can also suffer from the top track enlarging over time, allowing the door to move out of line and affect the opening and closing operation. With our bottom hung doors we have had no issues with supporting lintels or calculations relating to the support of the doors as there is very little downward weight on the supporting beam, majority of the weight has been transferred to the bottom rolling track and throughout the brickwork below. This means that bottom hung bifold doors rarely need to be adjusted as there is much less of a chance of the doors dropping. What are the possible threshold options? The main desire for our customers is that they are able to create a seamless transition from inside to outside without having to step over a chunky frame. Your possible threshold options largely depend on your plans for the flooring outside of your bifold door. Although we offer a flush threshold we do not however recommend this, largely as it does not meet current building regulations and with the current weather we are having quite honestly it is likely to leak like a siv!
With this in mind we offer our customers a standard threshold with our Aluminium doors and have a few tricks up our sleeves to achieve a minimal step! We work with adjusting your brick work and sinking the frame to allow your floor levels to meet the threshold to meet your criteria. Take a look at our thresholds page for more information. How do we get a price from Herts Bifold Doors? Click on any of the ‘Get a quote’ buttons on the website to be able to fill in a form which will send an email directly to our sales team or call the office, from here they will run your specifications through our system and reply with your individual price. Alternatively visit our showroom and have a look at the doors yourselves and have a talk to one of our trained representatives.Across our entire range of products we provide sealed double glazed units manufactured from toughened safety glass to British Standard 6206. Each is filled with an inert gas, argon, to improve insulation and reduce heat loss.
With U-Value of 1.1 you’ll be well insulated from the heat of high summer and the cold in the depth of winter. We do recognise, however, that some of you will require something exceptional and in this regard most requests can usually be accommodated. A U-Value is a measurement of thermal efficiency. It is calculated by measuring the rate at which heat is transferred through 1 square metre of glass. The lower the U-Value the lower the heat loss through the window. In order to comply with current building regulations residential doors need to have a U-Values 1.8 or lower. Viva offers Low-e glazing as standard which has a U-Value of 1.2 or better. However this can be improved upon should you require with even higher performing triple glazing. Super Insulated for a Greener Living The clue is in the name, an extra layer of glass makes for two argon filled cavities, giving further improved thermal efficiency for the modern home with a U-Value of 0.9 watts per m2. Reduce heat, retain light for a comfortable living space
For rooms that are exposed to long hours of direct sunlight consider solar control glazing. Solar control glass can be neutral in colour and offers solar protection by 3 means : it reduces a proportion (35%) of the transmission of solar energy it reflects a proportion (39%) of solar energy it absorbs a proportion (26%) of solar energy Compare this to ordinary glass which has a solar energy transmission of 84%, reflectance of 8% and 8% absorption and you can get a better understanding of the impact. Importantly the transmission of visible light is still very high at 70% as compared to normal glass that has 90%. Another means of reducing the heat and light in the room is to opt for tinted glass. We offer grey, bronze or green tinted glass (blue is also available although this does not offer the same reflective qualities). Tinted glass will reduce light transmission from around 90% (normal glass transmission) to 65% and solar energy from 84% to 57%. Instant control at the pull of a cord
In most circumstances it is possible for the glazing in our bi-folding doors to accept integral blinds. This neat solution sandwiches a traditional venetian blind between the internal and external panes of a double glazed unit. Blinds can be raised or lowered as you see fit with the option of tilting the blind leaves to suit your desired light levels. The blinds are hermetically sealed into the glazing so the unit remains thermally efficient and the blind remains dirt and dust free. Offered in three popular colours – white, silver and light grey Manual operated for with a neat and continuous cord loop. Motorised and remote control is available if prefered. Here’s some more examples of blinds for use with bi-folding doors. Keep your window cleaning to the bare minimum with self cleaning glass. This glass has a special outer coating of Titanium Oxide which helps break down dirt and grime with a little help from sunlight and rain. Self cleaning glass is often used in roof applications – for example on our range of skylights.