Sliding door guides: tips on choosing

Extensive use of sliding doors is understandable, because they save space and have a number of significant advantages. But in order for these positive aspects to be ensured, an uninterrupted mechanism is needed. Create or select it, without understanding the device guides, it will not be so easy.

Doors are divided into the following subgroups:

• Radius. Such a door is always semi-circular, most often it is made of tempered glass. The layer of material is at least 8 mm. Guides for sliding doors of this type can not be cheap, because such structures are very aesthetic and attractive in appearance, and also add a sense of volume, and for such properties you will have to pay extra.

• Coupe. She also saves space. In addition, an original solution helps to preserve it, in which the shutter not only moves away along the wall, but also goes into a niche. It is placed in the "pocket", which is made of metal and plasterboard sheets.

• Doors-accordion. The mechanism of an accordion format door to do at home will be somewhat more complicated than the elements of the previous species, but there is nothing too complicated about it.

Sliding canvases are distinguished by the method of attachment. They can use only one guide or two at once. The first option is preferable in terms of saving time, but the second allows to achieve much greater reliability and stability of the whole structure. It is used when you need to mount a heavy, very voluminous canvas.

The spacing mechanism must in any case provide:

• uniform and smooth movement of the canvas;
• tight closure of the structure (not just entering the doorway, but a complete impossibility to see what is behind the door);
• exclusion of unauthorized closing or opening;
• prevention of hinged doors when the door is opened and closed;
• the adoption of the load from the canvas without deformation of the device as a whole and its individual parts, without changing the gaps between them.

The sliding door mechanism consists of the following parts:

• direct guides;
• rollers;
• restrictive block;
• stopper.

The tracks are made of a large thickness profile, because the constant “riding” of the door parts would otherwise quickly disable them. The upper and lower points of attachment of the rails are located respectively upwards from the opening and on the floor. Each of these parts is either single or double.

Designed for top mounted guide rollers have a different number of pairs of wheels - from one to four. The heavier the installed strip, the more the wheels are used by engineers. According to the type of profile applied, symmetric and asymmetrical tracks are distinguished from the rollers for the top-leading rail.But below, with rare exceptions, the same type of technology is used.

The sliding system used in the hanging door is of three different types:

• lower;
• top;
• mixed

The first type is used very rarely, because it is enough to step on such a guide so that the door is impossible or very difficult to use. And even if this does not happen, the movement without a support at the top is unstable, occurs in jerks.

When the guide rail - one on top, roller parts put it there, and at the bottom provide only clamps, so that the sash does not hesitate when driving. Serious the advantage of this solution is that there is no nut, and the risk of tripping over it is zero. If the canvas is very heavy, or a special smoothness of opening and closing the door is required, it is advisable to use a mixed sliding system. According to professionals, the system without a threshold is more appropriate to use in partitions,interior doors and front doors, and the lower version - in the closet (where its flaws are not significant).

Due to the presence of bearings, roller mechanisms allow you to move doors and partitions, the mass of which does not exceed a centner, gently and without excessive noise. If you choose guides for radial doors, then any detail of this kind is necessarily curved, reproducing the shape of the main blade. However, it is easy to buy such rails, they are still made on an individual order for each project. How many gutters will be in the arc can be said only on the basis of the placement of the sections and the method of their movement.

The spike used in the roller mechanism does not really matter. More importantly, threshold systems are inconvenient for children, for older people.

The profile of the guides is made of only two metals - steel and aluminum. Even professionals have no consensus on which one is better, because both have both strengths and weaknesses. So, aluminum blocks weigh relatively little, they are harder to damage, almost no corrosion occurs, the service life is long enough.If the door is plastic, this solution can be safely applied. But for a heavy canvas, you will have to choose only more expensive and more reliable iron rails.

The subtleties of the installation process cannot be ignored either, because they are of great importance when choosing the optimal design. So, the length of the rails is calculated as follows: multiply the width of the canvas by 2 and add 3-5 cm to the result. Then you will need to leave some more distance for the plugs, and if there is a closer in the door system, its width is also taken into account.

Certain difficulties may appear only when the sections are made of glass, since it is harder to drill holes for fasteners and not to destroy the entire structure. Mortise lock, usually installed in sliding doors, is unlikely to somehow affect the choice of guides, because it does not directly affect them.

The process of installing a sliding door, see the following video.

Never purchase products of lesser-known manufacturers or guides of dubious origin. The risk of getting low-quality goods does not justify such savings.

Sliding doors should be guided with an additional roller mechanism placed in the middle. Thanks to him, such structures can at least partially go into the wall. If you buy a cascade door, purchase rails with an increased number of channels, since each leaf will move in its own plane. There should be exactly as many tracks as the doors can move in one direction.