What's Wearing Out on Your Fire Doors? A Fire Door Safety Week Guide

Fire Door Safety Week runs from 22-26 September, and it's a good prompt to properly look at something most people on your site walk past a dozen times a day without a second thought: the fire door.

Fire doors don't fail overnight. They wear out - quietly, gradually, and usually without anyone noticing until an inspection flags it, or worse, until it matters in an emergency.

Why fire doors wear out

Every fire door is a system of parts working together: the leaf itself, the frame, the hinges, the self-closing device, the intumescent and cold smoke seals, and the ironmongery.

Heavy daily use, poor adjustment, and simple wear all take their toll - closers slow down or stop closing the door fully, seals perish or come loose, hinges sag under the door's weight, and gaps around the edges widen beyond safe tolerances.

What we check on every site visit

Here is what we check as part of our Fire Door Safety Week Guide:

◯ Does the door close fully and latch under its own weight, with no assistance?

◯ Is the gap around the top and sides consistent and within tolerance (generally 2-4mm)?

◯ Is the intumescent strip and cold smoke seal intact, continuous, and undamaged?

◯ Are the hinges secure, with no missing screws, and is the door not sagging?

◯ Is the door free of unauthorised wedges or hold-open devices?

◯ Is the vision panel (where fitted) intact and unobstructed?

◯ Are door signage and self-closing device labels present and legible?

If the answer is no to any of these, investigate the issues and have it fixed asap by a competent person, record the repair against the door for assett tracking and audit purposes.

The real risk of leaving it

A fire door's whole job is to buy time - to hold back fire and smoke long enough for people to get out safely and for the emergency services to do their job. A door that doesn't close properly, or has a failed seal, doesn't do that job, however good it looks. Beyond the obvious safety risk, it's also a compliance and insurance issue that's far cheaper to catch early than to explain after the fact.

Fire Door Safety Week Guide - What to do next

Fire Door Safety Week is as good a prompt as any to get every fire door on your site properly checked, not just glanced at. If you'd like a second pair of eyes on yours, get in touch with the Vital team - it's exactly the kind of thing we catch as part of routine site visits, before it becomes a problem.