Doors & Windows

Talk to Kevin & Cindy on Water Island, they may be able to help you out. Sorry I don't know their last names.. But everyone knows them.

Thanks! I have been pinging my neighbors but haven't gotten 'round to everyone. Maybe need to talk it up @ Pirate's Ridge on Friday nite happy hour!
Meanwhile, I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions / experiences / likes / dislikes/ "if I had it to do over I would do - this - instead". One of my considerations in replacement of sliders is that I want to maintain private access to the porch from each bedroom as well as not do anything that restricts the view or airflow. Thus, the floor to ceiling double-hung windows & the "standard" size door on the "end" for access. This level of the home is wood construction so we have some flexibility to redesign the openings.

I'm interested in choices people have made in consideration of the harsh environment, airflow, ease of use (opening/closing), avoid restricted view. AND, interested in folks who chose to procure locally or if they shipped from State-side and why they made the decision they did (i.e., cheaper, better selection, etc.). AND, recommendations on reliable quality installer. (I prefer NOT to spend my Winter in the USVI 'testing the marital relationship' with my husband & I installing doors & windows!)

FL Barrier Island,

I too expect to replace our sliders this year (6 sets of them with two stationary and two sliding doors in each set) and am interested in getting rid of the floor tracks and replacing the old tile floor with new tile. I suspect I will have to stick with sliders for the purposes of airflow, view and the space so many swinging doors would require. Also, our home is all masonry so working within the existing spaces would be more cost effective. I've been trying to find sliders with a top only mechanism or a recessed floor channel but have not yet had any luck. Also, I hope to get fiberglass door frames and screen door frames this time. I hope folks who have recently tackled a project of this sort respond to the thread with some ideas.

Hmmmm.....2 stationary & 2 sliding doors. We thought about "atrium" doors but shelved that because of a few reasons:
No way to put screens on them.
Open out - One good wind and the glass breaks as door crashes
Open in - we have just enough room for one inward opening door
Airflow - we thought we would get more airflow with windows. even sliding doors...only 1/2 the "opening" on one side or the other...is restricting airflow. Our thinking with the windows, we could have airflow horizontally (versus vertically and with double hung we could have the vertical airflow on the top or the bottom).

Fiberglass! Yes. Good point! And, what about double pane (is that what you call it?) and/or getting UV or other properties?

We always have our sliders open so I don't see any reason to spring for special glass. If you have AC and keep the doors closed and have expensive furnishings you can purchase glass that filters UV and protects your furnishings from fading as quickly as they would without the special glass. Each of our sliding door units is ten feet wide with two stationary sides of glass and two sliding center glass doors with screens. The only real drawback to sliding doors, from my perspective, is that eventually they fail to operate smoothly on their track and even tinkering with their adjustments fails to substantially improve their motion. I'd really like to try sliders with a top only track but so far all I've found are custom manufacturers, which are cost prohibitive.

I recently had an 8' two-panel slider replaced in a room I was remodeling. I chose to replace the slider instead of getting french doors because of the no screen issue,limited space for the door to swing, and the potential for the wind to catch the door and slam it open or closed. Prior to replacement I had taken down the door to find out way it was so hard to operate and found that one of the rollers has rusted into something that resembled a rock and the other roller was well on its way to the same state. The problems that led to this were that the track was below the tile level, so that when water got into the track it had nowhere to drain, the doors were seldom operated, and the rollers were not stainless steel. When I had the new door installed I had the new track raised above the tile level and used stainless steel rollers. The door was a much higher quality door than the original and has a heavy duty screen door frame that works great. Total cost was about $1500.00 installed but there are less expensive options available also. I have other sliding glass doors (not particularly high quality either) in the house that were replaced after Marilyn in 1995 by the previous owner that still slide with 1 finger. I attribute this primarily to the tracks being able to drain well so the rollers do not sit in water for extended periods. Back in the states I had a home on the NC Outer Banks that also had sliding glass doors facing the ocean. I had the same problem with the rollers rusting up on those, which would freeze up from rust when not operated frequently. I took those down once or twice a year and worked on them with WD-40, which kept them functional. Those also had insulated glass in which the seals failed on several panels, which caused them to fog up. I had the glass replaced in the frames for about $125 per pane about 5 years ago and it took the guy doing the job all of 30 minutes per panel. Replacing the rollers is pretty easy also if they are not too rusted up. Anyway, the point of this post is that in my experience, the main problem with sliders is that the rollers will freeze up due to rust, particularly if the tracks can not drain properly, making them difficult to operate. There are stainless steel rollers and nylon rollers on the market that can alleviate these problems and they are fairly inexpensive to replace.

Thanks to everyone who responded with comments/ideas. One remaining subject I'd like to query: Anyone have any recommendations on STT place of business to purchase doors/windows with this same place of business doing the installation? Or, recommendations (if we purchase & ship the doors/windows from Puerto Rico or state-side), who is a reliable installer?