Sliding Glass Door Protection

[DanKellFla]

I have storm panels that fit over my sliding glass doors, but durring Wilma I noticed the glass in the doors flexing. The glass looked like it were breathing. Nothing happened, but I think a storm a little stronger could have popped the door out of the frame and/or broke the glass.

Has anybody else seen this? Any ideas on what to do?

I already had one window break BEHIND the storm panels and the glass flew into the house. Fortunetly, nobody was in the room at that time, but that could have been bad.

[HDGator]

That's the problem with older sliding doors. I've watched mine "breathe" through all the storms in the past two years. I have 3/4" plywood covering them that is braced with 2x4's. The plywood didn't hardly move but the pressure differential had the doors flexing up to 1" to 1-1/2" I estimated. I was glad they didn't pop out of the tracks; but I was ready for it.

Just before I was born, my parents had their sliding doors pop out when Cleo came through in 1964 in Riviera Beach. Their story of the shattered glass and rain damage has always kept me leary of sliding doors.

Probably the best solution is to replace the sliders with doors up to the current Florida Building Code requirements. Even if they are not impact rated, they are now designed and constructed to handle the wind pressure much better than those you likely have in place. I plan on replacing my sliders as soon as I can get around to it...and find the $.

I guess the best solution if money were no object would be to put in new impact resistant doors in addition to a shutter system. But maybe that is just the paranoia of two wicked hurricane seasons getting the better of me...

[Dionne]

There is an alternative. Change out the slider entirely. Replace with a 3'0" metal door with the top half in a french window configuration. In addition, have 18" sidelights on each side of the door. You'll get alot more strength and just as much natural light. The objective is to reduce the size of your glass panels. And the bonus is that they look alot better. Units like this start at around $1200.

[DanKellFla]

Units like this start at around $1200.

That's all? I'll get to that just after I replace my front double doors which is only $2000 for a dull set.
But seriously, my backyard is on a lake and I don't want to lose the view. I think that HDGator has the right solution. But, it will just have to wait. I had minimal damage from Wilma this year, and it still cost me about $3K in out of pocket expense, and my front doors still haven't been replaced. (I have a workable plan for them that should do fine. Storm Panels and braces for the doors.)