Interior Garage Door

[High Desert Ranger]

Think that someone has replace the garage door of the house I'm living in. Is the door between the house and the garage supposed to swing into the house or into the garage. I think it's suppsed to swing into the house that way if someone breaks into your garage, they cannot just take your hinges off and get into the house.

 

[REDRUM]

Make sure it is a fire rated door for that location.

 

[IlovemybroncII]

I would say swing in but there are door that swing out so someone cant just kick the door in and you cant take pins out of hinges

 

[odie1969]

I have seen doors swing both ways, the most major thing is to have a fire rated door. Also those doors should be sprung so they self close.

 

[Nhaz]

If someone is going to break in by kicking a door in. You want to re-enforce the frame of the door with a steel frame instead of a standard wooden one.

Even then the steel frame needs to be well secured to the house since you can still kick in a steel frame if its not well attached. 4 inch screws every 4 inches will stop lots. Don't use nails.

 

[EnglishDan]

Mine swings in to the house and is not self closing

 

[Will]

I've never seen an entry door swing outwards, and a garage door is an entry door.

I wouldn't worry about security that much. If I were going to break into a house I sure as hell wouldn't try to kick in a door. I would slap a piece of contact paper over a window, quietly break the window and go in. I'm pretty damn strong and I don't like my chances of kicking in an entry door. Maybe an aluminum trailer park door, but not one you can buy at Home Depot. I mean, if it were installed with a few wire-nails instead of decent screws anyone could eventually batter the frame out. But a thief would have to be a complete idiot to hammer away at a door when a nice, crispy pane of window glass can be broken by your average gerbil.

 

[bigcountry]

today with the double pane windows are pretty strong being in the vol. fire dept. we have tried to break them with our ladders and it takes a lot of strong hits to break in. back to the post i wouldnt be to worried about the door if its got a good dead bolt and a fire rated door, if its in the garage i wouldnt be to worried about it cause they(thief) would have to take out the main door to gain access to the house door

 

[babytruck]

swing into the house. thats the code in kansas.

 

[spdcrazy]

all four of my last houses had the door swing into the garage. but yes keep it fire rated, and self closing.

 

[IlovemybroncII]

I think the door should swing out and have no glass in it to break where someone could break it and unbolt the door and a good thief will have a gaget with the codes to open a garage dood or you might just forget to shut it then said thief can go in and shut it and be in a nice quiet place where no one can see him or her work on the door and have a nice place to pull in and load your stuff up

 

[GoodOld85BlueBalls]

Fire rated, swing in with self closing hinge is what is code in Colorado. Anything newer than 15 years ago must have it.

 

[LittleHorse]

mine swings into the house, is pretty heavy duty. I assume it's fire rated because though the house is old, the door was new when I bought the house.

I agree that if someones breaking in, it's going to be fairly rare to go in through the garage entry door. Someone that has the skill/equipment to get into the main garage door is going to have the tools to cut through a window, or is probably there to steal stuff out of your garage, not your house. Or they could just go through one of the other two doors in your house that require them to only defeat one door to get in.

My main garage door opener has a rolling code system, so you can't just set the remote to the opener, you also have to set the opener to the remote. There may be stuff to get around that too, but it's probably more complex than anybody is going to have in Pryor, Oklahoma.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

The door should swing into the house and be fire rated. IMHO, if you want security, you should have a deadbolt on it. Self-closing is not always a requirement. It's usually only required when there is no standard door knob on the door.

I've seen a number of older homes that the access door to the garage swings into to the garage and is not fire rated. Our old house had one of those with an integral garage.

Bottom line is that if a thief wants in, he's going to get in. The best you can hope for is to slow him down some. Locks are to keep honest people honest. Keyed deadbolts properly installed (the ones that have a key on both sides) are the best way of slowing down a criminal. But like Will said, then the windows become the weak spots.

At our old house, there were several times I found myself accidently locked out. 90% of the time I could spring the garage door to gain access (no garage door opener). The few times I found the garage door solidly caught and not easy to defeat (or the door at the top of the steps locked from the other side), I simply opened an exterior door or window. It's really not all that hard to do. The only concern is that if someone sees you and calls the police, they can pinch you for B&E even though it's your own house.

 

[High Desert Ranger]

The door that is on there now feels solid enough to be a fire rated door, but it don't see the usually tag on the door. I plan on replacing the door because I've already had to replace the the screws in the hinges because they were stripped. As it sits now I can see a gap at the top of the door when the door is closed. I already planned on using a fire rated door.