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Glass canopy for front door


vivienz

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I've always known that our site is exposed to strong south-westerly conditions but the storms and seemingly constant rain since October have emphasised just how much, and water regularly gets driven under our front door on the south face of the building.  I need to get some rain protection in place, at the very least a canopy and have seen my heart's desire on pinterest.  Of course, it looks expensive.  Can anyone give me some start points on where to source one of these?  It looks sturdy enough to withstand the winds that come sweeping across.  I don't think a polycarbonate one will look nice or be up to the job and I'm not confident of anything reliant on a couple of fixing points as it will need to be over 2m wide.

 

Any pointers most welcome!

 

 

canopy1.jpg

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5 minutes ago, vivienz said:

water regularly gets driven under our front door on the south face of the building

As nice as this may look I don’t think it will stop any water being driven under the door, is water actually getting inside the threshold ? Could this be fixed by proper seals ? 

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13 minutes ago, vivienz said:

I've always known that our site is exposed to strong south-westerly conditions but the storms and seemingly constant rain since October have emphasised just how much, and water regularly gets driven under our front door on the south face of the building.  I need to get some rain protection in place, at the very least a canopy and have seen my heart's desire on pinterest.  Of course, it looks expensive.  Can anyone give me some start points on where to source one of these?  It looks sturdy enough to withstand the winds that come sweeping across.  I don't think a polycarbonate one will look nice or be up to the job and I'm not confident of anything reliant on a couple of fixing points as it will need to be over 2m wide.

Any pointers welcome.

Our steel chap makes these as customs.

 

We have been involved in the structural design of canopies for commercial properties and I did a lit one, see attached, this is one of ours, I even have photos of it during fabrication somewhere. This one had the impression of it going through the glass in a complete 360° section.  Photo is just a grab from Street View.

canopy.thumb.jpg.8ab7e6653f07fc06bb0150dcf7fd7328.jpg

 

 

 

Edited by Carrerahill
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5 minutes ago, vivienz said:

I think I still want a canopy, though.?

Haha that’s what I thought, but water really should not be coming in, I just built my own timber doors, frames and seals and and have just had 3 days on intense driving rain and wind directly onto the doors and they are working great. Get the canopy but don’t forget what prompted you to buy it !!!!!!!@

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2 minutes ago, Carrerahill said:

I've always known that our site is exposed to strong south-westerly conditions but the storms and seemingly constant rain since October have emphasised just how much, and water regularly gets driven under our front door on the south face of the building. 


like you we are exposed to strong south westerlies and horizontal rain, even on the North side of our new build the wet conditions are incredible. I don’t think a canopy would do much except for heavy rain with no wind (tho better than nothing). I built a porch and am so glad we did, it makes an “airlock”, somewhere for wet boots (and muddy dog) and stops rain attacking my lovely oak from door!!

F75702E3-2D2E-4033-8529-36E3B632C3F1.jpeg

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1 minute ago, vivienz said:

Oooo! That's lovely!

 

Okay, so I'm probably best contacting a fabricator.  Will do and will report back.

 

Thanks!

Fabricator will want drawings unless they are imaginative. 

 

Where are you, one would go on a pallet no bother! If that looks to be helpful let me know.

 

He could send down the metal all powedercoated or galvanised and then have a local glazier supply the toughened or he could ship the lot, we have had projects in London and it made it in one piece and we specified this guy as we felt he knew what we wanted doing and we knew his workmanship.

 

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We also want a glass cantilever canopy, about 2m wide, but so far I've had a struggle finding a fabricator that can make one.  The problem we have is that I can only fit support brackets about 1.8m apart, and this seems to create problems.

 

I did a rough design, that had a stainless steel beam running across the rear edge as a support for the glass, with the main support arms welded to that and projecting out either side, but the only fabricator I found that was initially OK with this idea, lost interest and stopped taking my calls.

 

 

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23 minutes ago, Cpd said:

As nice as this may look I don’t think it will stop any water being driven under the door, is water actually getting inside the threshold ? Could this be fixed by proper seals ? 

 

....and I've just called my window/door people.  A compromised gasket is suspected, so someone will be out to have a look pdq.  Love good customer service - my roof was fixed yesterday, too, barely 24 hours after I rang them about the slates blowing off in the storm.

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@vivienz, in the unlikely event that your impeccable taste would accept something like this, this is what I had been considering before. Its possible to buy the various chromed metal parts from AliExpresss and have the toughened glass made here.

 

Unobtrusive, probably quite cheap, probably easier to mount.

 

1347872168_PastedGraphic1.thumb.png.d02be260e9e10e6177aef736f90324c6.png

Edited by Dreadnaught
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Can I be brutally honest/my usual tactless self? Those fixings look an awful lot like the shower arms I have in my bathrooms.  Okay in the bathrooms, but not over the front door.

 

That's the problem with pinterest - it's responsible for the ceiling feature in my lounge, my wetroom and possibly a canopy.  None of which are/will be cheap.  Damn!

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The design we wanted was a bit like this:

 

image.thumb.png.2bab90494bc1b6fabcc33370f2648fe9.png

The snag was that we found a fabricator who said he could make one up with the supports wide enough apart to clear our front glazing (so they could be bolted to the solid part of the house frame), but he then disappeared without trace, after having sent me some preliminary drawings.

 

I believe that the span between the brackets is the main issue; we cannot fit a centre support as there's nothing to attach it to, only glazing.

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22 minutes ago, Jeremy Harris said:

The design we wanted was a bit like this:

 

image.thumb.png.2bab90494bc1b6fabcc33370f2648fe9.png

The snag was that we found a fabricator who said he could make one up with the supports wide enough apart to clear our front glazing (so they could be bolted to the solid part of the house frame), but he then disappeared without trace, after having sent me some preliminary drawings.

 

I believe that the span between the brackets is the main issue; we cannot fit a centre support as there's nothing to attach it to, only glazing.

 

I've seen lots of examples with curved glass - would that help counteract the span at all, assuming the design would work for you?

 

Like this one.

 

 

curved glass.jpg

Edited by vivienz
photo
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1 minute ago, vivienz said:

 

I've seen lots of examples with curved glass - would that help counteract the span at all, assuming the design would work for you?

 

 

I'm not sure, TBH, but we would prefer flat glass, just so that it is in line with the glazing bar/stacking cill above the front door.  I think a curved canopy might look a bit out of place with the straight line of the frame behind it.  The fabricator we were talking to suggested putting a stainless steel bar across the rear of the canopy (underneath) welded to the brackets at either end, so that there could be an additional support in the centre at the back.  I think this would have looked OK, but suspect he must have encountered a problem with the glass supplier, perhaps, as it just stopped answering our calls.

 

I must have tried at least half a dozen or more canopy suppliers last year, trying to find someone that could supply a wide enough one, so really need to sit down and try again, as I lost interest when the other chap disappeared.  Sometimes it's really hard trying to find suppliers for specific products like this.

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29 minutes ago, Jeremy Harris said:

The design we wanted was a bit like this:

 

image.thumb.png.2bab90494bc1b6fabcc33370f2648fe9.png

The snag was that we found a fabricator who said he could make one up with the supports wide enough apart to clear our front glazing (so they could be bolted to the solid part of the house frame), but he then disappeared without trace, after having sent me some preliminary drawings.

 

I believe that the span between the brackets is the main issue; we cannot fit a centre support as there's nothing to attach it to, only glazing.

Assuming you have a good substrate to fix to I do not see that being an issue. 

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1 hour ago, vivienz said:

I've always known that our site is exposed to strong south-westerly conditions but the storms and seemingly constant rain since October have emphasised just how much

As much as I like the look of them (glass canopies), I would not trust one in the winds I get.

There is also keeping it clean.

And not making it look like a BMW showroom.

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10 minutes ago, vivienz said:

 

I've seen lots of examples with curved glass - would that help counteract the span at all, assuming the design would work for you?

 

Like this one.

 

 

curved glass.jpg

I like the look of this one, however, my worry about this one would be the small fixing area, fine if you can stick two pieces of threaded rod with resin into a piece of concrete but that just looks like a recipe for disaster, with wind loading I could see that loading up those fixings significantly, the result is then damaged masonry etc. if it lets go.

 

The one Jeremy designed spreads the load a bit down the wall and puts a decent potion of the load into compression on the bottom of the arm with the top fixings in tension giving the clamping force required to lock it into place. 

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1 minute ago, SteamyTea said:

As much as I like the look of them (glass canopies), I would not trust one in the winds I get.

There is also keeping it clean.

And not making it look like a BMW showroom.

 

The wind here is pretty fierce - we have no shelter at all between us and the southwesterlies that come in, which is why I like the look of the one with the glass retained by 3 brackets.  It would look not dissimilar in style to the brise soleil we have fitted and then hasn't been a creak or groan out of that through all the bad weather, so I have some confidence in that type of design.  Keeping it clean shouldn't be a problem, just a quick wipe down and maybe a coat of Rainex on it to stop stuff sticking as well (it used to work a treat on the shower screen at the old house where we had hard water!).  As for a BMW showroom, no chance of that with a pair of Fiat pandas parked around the corner - a BMW wouldn't be seen dead around here!

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