Business · exit hardware
Out in one push. In only with a key.
Exit hardware is the one part of a building where security and life safety pull in opposite directions, and the law has already decided which one wins.
When you are required to have it
The requirement sits in the building code's egress chapter, at section 1010.2.9 in the current numbering. A swinging door on an egress route cannot carry a latch or a lock unless it is panic hardware or fire exit hardware in the cases the section lists. Two of those cases cover most ordinary businesses:
- Rooms or spaces with an occupant load of 50 or more in a Group A (assembly) or Group E (educational) occupancy.
- Swinging doors serving a Group H (high hazard) occupancy, with no occupant load threshold at all.
The same section also reaches large refrigeration machinery rooms, transformer vaults, battery and energy storage rooms, and doors near large electrical equipment.
Your occupancy group and occupant load are determined by the building department and the fire marshal, not by us and not by a web page. What we will do is fit and adjust hardware that meets the standard and then let them sign it off.
Building code egress requirements, section 1010.2.9, read from a code publisher rather than the State's own printing. Your authority having jurisdiction has the final word on occupancy group and occupant load.
Panic hardware and fire exit hardware are not the same thing
Panic hardware releases the latch under pressure on the bar. It is about getting a crowd out of a room without anybody having to think.
Fire exit hardware does the same thing but is listed for use on a fire-rated door assembly, which means it has no mechanical dogging. Dogging is the feature that holds the latch retracted so a door stays push-open all day. On a fire door that is forbidden, because the door has to latch to hold a fire.
This is the mistake we find most often on inspection: ordinary panic hardware fitted to a rated door, usually because somebody wanted the dogging. It fails, and it fails for a reason that matters at three in the morning.
The fish-wire problem, and what two local codes say about it
A pair of doors with panic hardware and a gap between them can be opened from outside with a wire hooked through and pulled against the bar. It takes seconds and leaves no damage, which is why it keeps happening to the same premises.
Two of the cities we work in wrote the fix into their own codes. San Mateo's Building Security Code, at section 23.54.090, requires a door with panic hardware trippable by fish wire to carry a steel astragal at least 0.125 inch thick and 2 inches wide, extending at least 1 inch past the door edge and at least 6 inches above and below the latch. South San Francisco's chapter 15.48.070 requires astragals in comparable cases and at the meeting edge of double doors.
If your premises is in neither city, the astragal is still the right answer. It is a strip of steel and it closes the only gap the technique relies on.
San Mateo Municipal Code §23.54.090; SSFMC §15.48.070.
What we do
- Supply and fit rim, mortise, surface vertical rod and concealed vertical rod devices.
- Repair and adjust what you already have. A bar that needs a shove or a door that does not latch is usually alignment rather than a new device.
- Fit outside trim so staff can get in with a key or a code while the exit stays free.
- Add astragals, strikes and door closers where they are missing.
- Remove the things somebody added. A chain, a padlock or a secondary bolt on an exit door is the single most dangerous thing we find in commercial premises, and it is the first thing a fire inspector looks for.
If you have padlocked an exit because of break-ins, tell us. There is a legal way to secure that door and we would rather fit it than read about the other outcome.
Words you will hear
Questions
Our bar sticks and staff have to hit it twice.
Usually alignment or a worn latch rather than a dead device. Worth a service call before you buy anything.
Can we lock the back door at night from outside?
Yes, with the right outside trim or a keyed cylinder dogging arrangement, depending on whether the door is rated. What you cannot do is put a padlock or a chain on it.
We failed a fire inspection on exit hardware.
Send us the inspector's note. It usually lists the item, and nine times out of ten it is dogging on a rated door, a missing astragal or a device that no longer latches.
Do we need panic hardware at all?
That depends on your occupancy group and occupant load, which the building department and fire marshal determine. We will fit what they require, and we will not guess on their behalf.
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