Patio Doors near you

Glass for a large opening is not chosen by thickness alone. The Housing Provisions require the glass used to be of a type within the scope of AS 1288, and set out monolithic annealed glass thicknesses in tables written for wind classifications not exceeding N1, N2 and N3. Toughened, wired, laminated, unframed glazing and insulated glass units are not in those tables at all and are selected from AS 1288 directly, and the code notes openly that thickness depends not just on limit state wind loads but on geometric criteria including aspect ratio and slenderness. Since a stacker panel is tall and narrow, that last point is doing real work.

Wind actions themselves are determined under AS/NZS 1170.2 or AS 4055, except where Western Australia's own changes to those standards apply. Ask the supplier in writing which wind classification they have assumed for your site and where that assumption came from, because an exposed hilltop block or a cyclonic address is outside the simplified tables entirely.

A sliding or stacker door leaks at the bottom far more often than anywhere else, because the sill is long, sits close to whatever is outside, and collects everything that runs down the glass. The installation provisions are specific about the head of the opening, requiring that structural building loads must not be transferred to the assembly and that a minimum ten millimetre gap be left between the top of it and any loadbearing framing or masonry above, with packing along each side and the bottom fixed so those edges stay straight and kept clear of flashing material. The sill is where that discipline pays off or does not.

The two questions to ask before ordering are where water that gets into the track is supposed to go, and what the level is outside. A deck or paving built up level with the sill removes the fall that the drainage detail assumes, and a door that was watertight when the house was built starts leaking the summer after a new deck goes on. If you want a low or step-free threshold for accessibility, say so early, because it has to be designed with the drainage rather than sealed up afterwards.

Weatherproofing is a performance requirement in its own right: the external wall, including the openings around doors, has to prevent water penetration that would cause undue dampness or deterioration, with AS 2047 the route for framed glazed assemblies. Ask how the sill, jambs and head flash into the existing wall, and get it answered before a unit is manufactured.

The moment a wide door opens onto a drop, it stops being a door question and becomes a barrier question. A barrier is required where it is possible to fall one metre or more from a trafficable surface to the surface beneath, and it must be at least one metre above the floor of a balcony, deck or landing, or at least eight hundred and sixty five millimetres above the nosings of stair treads. Openings in it must not allow a one hundred and twenty five millimetre sphere to pass through, and where the fall exceeds four metres the elements between one hundred and fifty and seven hundred and sixty millimetres above the floor must not help a child climb it.

Low glazing has its own rule. Where the lowest visible sight line of a glazed panel is less than five hundred millimetres above the highest abutting finished floor level, it is treated as low-level glazing, and ordinary monolithic annealed glass is only permitted there at not less than five millimetres nominal thickness and with a panel area no greater than one point two square metres. A full-height panel beside a sliding door will almost always exceed that, which is why Grade A safety glazing material is the norm across a wide opening rather than an upgrade.

Both rules bite hardest on a first-floor balcony door, where a homeowner wants an uninterrupted view and the code wants a barrier. Have the designer resolve that on paper before the door is ordered, because retrofitting a compliant balustrade to a finished opening is the expensive way to find out.

Every configuration trades clear opening against sealing, hardware count and threshold. There is no best answer, only the one that suits how the room is used, so compare them on the four things you will actually notice rather than on the showroom demonstration.

Work backwards from the weather that tests your address, remembering that summer runs December to February here and winter June to August. In the north the planning date is the wet season and the cyclone season that comes with it; in the south it is the cold fronts and driving rain of late winter and spring. Nobody wants a wall-sized opening covered in sheeting when either arrives.

In the cyclonic regions the door is part of the building envelope rather than a fitting. The NCC identifies wind regions B, C and D as the cyclonic areas, and the reasoning behind the wind provisions is that an opening created in the envelope changes the pressures inside the whole house, with Western Australia's changes to the wind standards discussing openings produced by impact loading from windborne debris. That is why the QBCC's storm preparation advice for Queensland homeowners includes fitting glass window and door openings with shutters, security screens or the like, alongside trimming trees and clearing gutters and downpipes.

If you are in one of those regions, ask the supplier to state the wind classification the door and its fixings are rated to and who determined it for your site, and have that in writing before the deposit rather than after the first warning is issued.

Replacing a door in the same opening is usually treated as repair or maintenance, but widening an opening is structural work on the wall above it, and the answer changes again on a heritage property, close to a boundary or on designated bushfire prone land, where the deemed-to-satisfy path is construction to AS 3959 or the NASH steel-framed bushfire standard at the level assessed for the site. Your council or a registered building surveyor gives the only answer that counts for your address.

If the door opens towards a pool, raise it early. The NCC requires access to a swimming pool to be restricted by barriers designed to AS 1926.1, with AS 1926.2 covering the water recirculation system and state variations changing the detail, including the depth at which the requirement starts. Pool safety is separately regulated by each state, so ask the pool safety rules in your state how a doorway on that elevation is treated before you commit to a configuration.

Licensing follows the ordinary state lines by value and type of work, with New South Wales licensing glazing as a named trade, Queensland working through QBCC licence classes, Western Australia restricting particular building work to registered practitioners and contractors, and Victoria requiring registration for domestic building work above its threshold. LokalMatch is the front of that process: you describe the opening once, with the configuration you want, the measurements, what is outside the threshold and whether the site is cyclonic or bushfire prone, and installers covering your postcode contact you. Those businesses pay for the requests they receive. LokalMatch does not install doors, does not set or quote prices, and does not vet, rank or recommend anyone.

A door like this is bought twice: as goods, and as an installation. Under the Australian Consumer Law the product must be of acceptable quality, fit for a purpose you made known and match its description, with spare parts and repair facilities available for a reasonable time, while the installation must be carried out with acceptable care and skill and within a reasonable time when none was agreed.

Sliding and stacking doors make the major-versus-minor line unusually concrete. A door that binds, drops off its track or will not lock is not a cosmetic complaint: it is a security and egress problem, and a panel that has failed safety glazing is a hazard rather than a defect. Where the problem is major you choose the remedy — a refund or a replacement of the same type for the product, or for the service, cancelling for a refund or keeping the contract at a price reduced to reflect the problem. Where it is minor the business gets the chance to put it right free of charge. If it refuses or drags it out, you can have the work done elsewhere and recover what it reasonably cost you.

Because a wide opening produces the classic argument about whether the water came through the door or through the wall around it, put the purpose in writing before the work starts. An email saying the aim is a threshold that stays dry in wind-driven rain off the deck is worth a great deal more, two years later, than anyone's recollection of a conversation on site.