TEMPUS - Temporary Fire Doors
Innovation overview and development
An overview of the sustainable innovation
This is a truly innovation that creates ZERO site wastage when comes to timber temporary doors while make people’s life safe and the door stay compliant per whole project and then can be transported to another project. There is not such a product on the market.
There are no doors like TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door on the UK market!
Next generation fire protection. Constructed from heavy-duty steel with a mineral wool core, Tempus is designed to withstand the rigours of a construction site whilst maintaining fire compliance throughout. This is a real game changer as no maintenance required.
How the innovation was developed, including effective collaboration, knowledge transfer and partnership along the project team
The innovation has been developed in collaboration with Morgan Sindall. Details of the project below:
Project name Bricket Road Project | Morgan Sindall
Project location Bricket Road, St Albans
Project timescales or phase Start date: Q2 2021 End date: Q3 2022
Project contract value 39k
Type of work (e.g. new build, refurb) New build commercial
Construction product (e.g. school, housing, road) New build commercial
When we talk about doors that will “stand the test of time” we back it up with evidence! Every component on TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door has been rigorously tested. To put this into perspective a single TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door on the Bricket Road project has done 66k cycles in one year and it is still compliant!
The use of new technologies, processes products or techniques or novel uses of existing ones
The frame is surface mounted on the wall, so it doesn’t matter if the structural opening varies in size and TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door comes in standard sizes anyway.
This keeps the cost and lead times down.
One query was if we could create a solution for working with screed because temporary fire doors are usually installed before the screed is laid, so was there a way to be able to lift the door? And yes, there is! The 120mm fixing slots in the frame enable the door to be lifted without removing all the fixings. Simple.
It’s unlatched so there is no need to operate a latch if you have your hands full already! The Sera fire locking plates lock the door when they come into contact with fire which activates between 100-200 degrees! It is still possible for the Fire Brigade to force entry if required.
It has a very high quality closer that can be adjusted to hold open for a few seconds, so it doesn’t slam immediately, and the hinges have been tested to 2.5 million cycles, so they are incredibly hardwearing!
The lock is cylinder operated and integrated into it so a floor or stair core can be locked off over a weekend or a holiday period, whilst being easily unlocked from the inside with a thumb turn.
It comes with transport bolts with packers between the door and the frame, which hold the door frame in the right position to allow it to be fixed before they are removed.
How does the innovation provide a more environmentally friendly approach for the industry
Previously temporary fire doors were timber frames and door, and because they are only temporary, the contractor will look to do them as cheaply as possible as they only get thrown away at the end of a project. This means that the way they are constructed on-site suffers. A temporary fire door gets very heavy usage with a lot of daily traffic. When they’re on site it’s common for them to get used and abused – quite literally – as people often carry stuff through and use all sorts of different objects to open the door. Even in the right conditions the door will still get trashed and disintegrated. However, it’s not always the people who are at fault. The climatic conditions within the site don’t help the situation, that’s for sure! The doors obviously go into the site before the building is fully watertight so there’s usually a lot of moisture around. The timber intakes in this moisture and expands meaning the door doesn’t close properly.
The consequences of these problems
The door then must be cut down to be able to fit, only to dry out again and shrink leaving gaps, which unfortunately you can’t do anything about.
“They might add a bit of lipping onto the side by screwing it or cutting the door down slightly which immediately makes it non-compliant before it’s even installed because it’s not how the door was tested originally; that’s if it was even tested in the first place…”
The door can also delaminate, and the face can start coming away from the door itself, which again renders it non fire rated. TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door
“A recent project we were working on, had to have the door revisited 3 times and finally replaced, which places huge extra costs.”
To underline the high usage, we installed a counter on a TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door recently and in just over a year it had done 68,000 cycles!
It’s hardly surprising that a cheap option will disintegrate. The fixings don’t hold very well and the hinges or closer may start coming off, especially if the door face has an intake of moisture as well for the closer. And if nothing is done about it you end up with an opening where the door is swollen and/or jammed which creates no fire barrier and an unsafe fire escape route.
The solution
TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door was developed on the back of this problem that for years had been swept under the carpet. It needed to be something that was robust enough to last the length of the project and then be reused for the next one. TEMPUS – Temporary Fire Door is exactly that. It’s a steel door in a steel frame with an insulated core that is not affected by moisture intake and can be unscrewed, removed, and reused again and again saving time and money – not to mention sustainability!
How does the innovation provide an improvement in social value
This is a truly innovation that creates ZERO site wastage when comes to timber temporary doors while make people’s life safe and the door stay compliant per whole project and then can be transported to another project. There is not such a product on the market.