Points to consider when replacing existing hangar doors:

  • Is the existing door configuration suited to the anticipated size of aircraft?
  • Does the insulation value need to be improved?
  • Are the doors difficult to open?
  • Has the ground track degraded or subsided?
  • Is the structure no longer sound?

Choosing the correct replacement door:

Choosing your door, especially for larger hangars (30m opening or more), usually ends up as a choice between Bottom Rolling Slab Sliding Doors and Vertical Lift Fabric Doors. When used in the correct situation they are both economically and spatially viable.

There are pros and cons for these two choices:

Bottom Rolling Slab Sliding Fabric Lifting
Range of colour options Range of colour options
A range of cladding materials and profiles
The ground needs to be prepared for the track and drainage The ground needs to be prepared for mullion pits (if applicable) and drainage
Personnel and Vehicle doors without thresholds can be accommodated given the correct door leaf configuration Personnel and Vehicle doors can be accommodated in a solid lower panel, but this will increase the bunching depth
Cladding panels can achieve a range of insulation ā€˜Uā€™ values from 0.45 W/m2K to 0.15 W/m2K with reasonable rates of air leakage due to the brush seals placed around individual leaves Not well insulated. However, they have been used in very cold climates and they do achieve a better air seal than a bottom rolling door
Door leaves are ground bearing so only apply wind load into the existing structure Doors are suspended and impose the dead load of the door as well as wind loads into the existing structure
Doors require no additional headroom Doors require headroom for the swing up mullions and bunching of the fabric
100% opening of the building width can only be achieved with the use of outriggers No outriggers needed to achieve a 100% clear opening of the building width
Fuselage docks can be accommodated

For some real-life examples see our case studies section, or contact our experienced sales
team to talk about technical details, budgets and time frames.