Steel roller shutters

Commercial and domestic roller shutters

The commercial jobs are shop fronts on a high street, warehouse and industrial unit doors, loading bays, kiosks and serveries, plant rooms and bin stores. The domestic jobs are garages, side passages and the rear of a house that opens onto an alley. The build is the same either way: a galvanised steel curtain of interlocking laths, 75mm pitch for a shop and 100mm for a wide warehouse door, in 0.7mm to 1.2mm steel depending on the width and the abuse it will get, runs in steel guide channels and rolls onto a barrel inside a box at the head. Where there is no lintel, or the brickwork will not hold a fixing, we make a steel goalpost frame so the shutter hangs off something solid. Widths of 7m and more are possible on a heavier barrel.

Solid, twin-skin, punched and polycarbonate curtains

The curtain decides what the shutter does for you. A single-skin galvanised lath is the plain security shutter and the cheapest. Twin-skin roller shutters use a double-skinned lath with insulating foam in the middle, which keeps heat in and stops the curtain drumming in the wind, so they suit a heated workshop or a shop with a flat above it. Punched laths have a pattern of holes so the window display can be seen at night and a passing patrol can see in. Polycarbonate roller shutters go further, with clear panels set into the laths, and many councils prefer them on a shop front because a blank steel wall deadens a street after dark. Tube-and-link grilles do the same job for an arcade or a car park entrance where you want air to pass through.

Motors, manual operation and safety

Anything under about 8 square metres can be manual: push-up on a spring-balanced barrel, or a hand chain if it is tall. The spring is tensioned to the weight of the door so the curtain stays where you leave it. Above that you want a motor: a single-phase tube motor inside the barrel for shops and garages, worked from a key switch or fob, and a three-phase motor with a manual override chain for a power cut on warehouse doors. A powered shutter is a machine in law. If it runs on a single button press it gets a safety edge on the bottom rail or photocells across the opening; hold-to-run control is only acceptable where you can see the whole door from the switch. It is set up to BS EN 12453 and comes with a declaration of conformity.

Fire shutters

A fire shutter closes an opening in a fire-resisting wall, usually between a kitchen and a restaurant, a servery and a hall, or a workshop and the offices. It looks like a security shutter but it is a tested product: the curtain, guides and box are certified as one assembly, to BS 476 or BS EN 1634, for 60, 120 or 240 minutes, and it closes on a signal from the fire alarm, dropping under gravity on a controlled descent so it still works in a power cut. Where Approved Document B asks for a fire-resisting shutter, the fire strategy or building control will say what rating you need. We fit that certified assembly to the maker's specification, with the fixings into the wall done properly so the certificate means something. We do not guess at fire ratings.

Replacement roller shutters and emergency repairs

A shutter that has been rammed or jemmied is an emergency for the business, because the premises are open to the street until it is made secure. The phones are answered around the clock, so call as soon as it happens and send a photo. We will tell you straight whether it can be made safe with a straightened guide or a new bottom rail, or whether it needs a replacement roller shutter, and the written estimate comes within the working day. For a replacement we measure the opening, check the guides and the box, and reuse what is sound: a like-for-like curtain on existing guides is quicker and cheaper than a full new shutter, and we will say which you need. If a landlord or an insurer is involved we put what we find in writing.

Finish, planning and what affects the price

The laths come galvanised as standard, which is fine on a warehouse or in a yard; the goalpost frames we make are hot-dip galvanised. On a shop front or a house you will want it powder coated, curtain, guides and box in one RAL colour, done at the plant before it comes to site. An external shutter on a shop front usually needs planning permission, so ask the council early; we supply the drawings. Price is driven by the size of the opening, the curtain type, motor against manual, colour, and whether a goalpost frame is needed. Plain galvanised is quickest; powder coating and fire certification add time, and you get a plain lead time with the quote. The site survey is free and the quotation is fixed unless the design changes.

Straight answers on roller shutters