 | Bob Crager of Lewis Street Glass is a 26 year veteran in the glass business. Lewis Street Glass is a leading Wichita Glass company, serving the entire Wichita/Sedgwick County area since 1919. They do anything and everything having to do with glass, both residential and commercial. They also do Auto glass. They are located at 743 South Market, facing Kellogg on the South, and you can reach them by phone at (316) 263-8259. You can email Bob Crager at bcrager@lewisstreetglass.com |
Glass
2009-04-01 14:39:00
Changing out sliding glass patio doors
Answer: Oui Oui...it’s done all the time! French doors historically appear to have originated in France, as you might have guessed, at the latter end of the Renaissance period of art and architecture, with a growth of popularity rising in France and then in Germany. Today those French doors have become a design element in America second to none...well, maybe second to granite countertops in the kitchens! A French door is also known as a French window, and refers to a door that has multiple windows set into it, for the full length of the door. These windows are also known as “lites”, and are rather popular in both new and existing homes for allowing the maximum amount of light to enter and permeate throughout a home. French doors not only look wonderful in all rooms, but add value to your home. They allow you the option of closing off a room from the rest of the house, but still allow you to have extra light coming into a room. This is a nice and acceptable compromise between the open floor plans that people want, and the need for quiet areas in the home.
Traditionally, French doors are constructed with multiple individual sections of glass and mullions. Mullions are the dividing bars between the window lites, or panels. French Doors are also known as true divided lite French doors, or a TDL. A true divided lite means that each pane (lite) of glass that is used in constructing your door is built in separately. This means that if you order a ten lite door it will be built with ten separate lites inserted independently into their own mullions. Some manufacturers use a single lite, covering the entire length of the door, and then add a cheap snap in or glue on ornamental grid trying to pass it off as a true divided lite door. They’re not the same, so don’t be fooled with the imitations. Back to your question. By all means, update your home with the newer décor elements. The French door upgrade is certainly a wonderful addition to your home, and if you do doors and windows right, those could be the very sound reasons why someone would decide to buy your home over several others. At a minimum, the upgrades on windows and doors will give you a lot of additional comfort while you live there. The older sliders are usually a maintenance issue if they’ve been there any time at all, like since the 70’s or 80’s. The rollers become worn, the door starts to drag, and it gets harder and harder to make enough adjustments to allow the door to run open and closed smoothly anymore, to say nothing of the lost energy from the old door not fitting properly anymore. You usually can’t slide the screen open and closed easily either. When the door gets to this condition, it’s time to do something different. And if your door is indeed one of the older type sliders, most of them lose their seals along the way, causing the fogging you see on the glass, and it’s not really very efficient to try to make a repair by replacing the glass and insert, plus the roller mechanisms with new parts. Either a new sliding glass door, or a French door would be a better choice.
Many times, when you start noticing that the slider is in bad repair for all the reasons they get in bad repair, you should probably spend a little time checking out your windows too. Windows have a “lifespan”, just like sliding glass doors, and whether the weather is ice cold outside, or it’s a sweltering dawg days of summer period, the windows are the single biggest source of loss/gain of heat, assuming you have sufficient insulation in your attic and walls for the job at hand. When the windows begin to loosen up, dry rot can set in, and you can end up with an expensive energy loss problem, and not be aware of it if you’re not paying attention to it. Window replacement, with good high quality windows, is just a smart thing to do all the way around. Keeping your home in top condition will make a huge difference in the event that you need to sell your home at some point. If you’re not sure about that, go out and tour some open houses conducted by Realtors on Sunday afternoons, and see what a difference new, or like new, windows make in your overall perception of the home. If the windows and sills are not in great condition, it has a very negative effect on the potential buyers that view that home.
Whether you need residential or commercial information, your local glass dealer can give you some good direction and guidance with regard to repairing or replacing your windows and/or doors for you. They’ll advise you about things like Low e glass, tinted glass, double or triple paned windows, French doors or sliders...all kinds of your glass questions will be answered. Springtime is now upon us, and you should make a call to find out if you need to be concerned about your windows and doors this year! Some info was researched on the worldwideweb… More interesting glass stuff next month...
