EXTERNAL FIRE DOORS
External fire doors are certified door sets built to hold back fire and smoke for a set period of time while still working as a secure, weather resistant entrance or exit. Each one is a complete tested assembly of door leaf, frame, hardware and seals, rated to perform for a fixed duration such as 30 or 60 minutes.
At Aluminium Fire Systems we manufacture external fire doors in aluminium, EI classified for both integrity and insulation, so the door holds back flames and limits the heat passing through it. We supply these as bespoke door sets for commercial, residential and public buildings across the UK.
What Are External Fire Doors?
An external fire door is a door set that has been tested and certified to resist fire for a specific length of time. Unlike a standard external door, a fire door is not a single product. It is a complete assembly that includes the door leaf, the frame, the hardware such as hinges, latches and closers, and the seals. Every part has to work together. If one component fails, the integrity of the whole door set can be lost during a fire.
These doors do two jobs at once. They form part of a building’s passive fire protection system by stopping fire and smoke from spreading between areas, and they also have to perform as ordinary external doors. That means providing security, keeping out the weather and offering thermal insulation for everyday use. An external fire door sits on the boundary between inside and outside, so it has to be tough enough to face the elements while still meeting its fire rating.
You will sometimes see these doors referred to as exterior fire doors, fire rated external doors or fire and smoke doors. They all describe the same thing: an external opening that has been engineered and certified to contain a fire.
How External Fire Doors Are Rated
Fire doors are rated by how long they can hold back a fire. In the UK and across Europe you will commonly see ratings written as EI30 or EI60. That classification is made up of two separate performance measures.
Integrity, shown as the letter E, is the door’s ability to stop flames and hot gases passing through it. A door rated E60 will block the passage of fire for at least 60 minutes.
Insulation, shown as the letter I, is the door’s ability to limit how much heat transfers through to the other side. An EI60 door not only stops flames for 60 minutes, it also keeps the temperature on the unexposed face low enough to prevent nearby materials catching alight and to keep the escape route usable.
This is an important distinction. An older British rating you may still come across is FD, which is tested to BS 476-22 and measures integrity only. The EI classification, defined under BS EN 13501-2, tests both integrity and insulation, so it is a more demanding measure. Because an EI rated product satisfies both criteria rather than integrity alone, it meets and exceeds the performance required at the equivalent FD time period.
All Aluminium Fire Systems products are EI rated. This means the door manages the transfer of dangerous heat as well as flame, which is a critical safety feature on an escape route. Common ratings for external fire doors are EI30 and EI60. For projects that need extended evacuation times, such as high-rise residential towers or industrial facilities, we also manufacture solutions rated up to EI90 and EI120.
People often ask about FD30 external fire doors and FD30 external doors when specifying for projects. Where a specification calls for an FD30 or FD60 external door, our equivalent EI30 and EI60 aluminium door sets satisfy that requirement and add the insulation performance on top.
The Components Of An External Fire Door Set
A fire door is an engineered system, and for the rating to stand, every element has to be compatible and tested together. These are the parts that make up a certified external fire door set.
The door leaf is the main body of the door, built from fire resistant materials. The configuration, whether that is a single leaf, a double door or one that includes overpanels and side lights, has to be explicitly covered by the fire test evidence.
The door frame is just as important as the leaf and must carry an equivalent fire rating. It supports the door and houses the intumescent seals. A standard frame cannot be paired with a fire rated leaf.
The hardware, meaning the hinges, locks, latches and closers, all has to be fire rated and is often UKCA or CE marked. Standard hardware would fail quickly at high temperatures and cause the door to fail with it. A self-closing device is essential so the door acts as a barrier when it is needed. Where electromagnetic hold-open devices are used, they have to link to the fire alarm so the door releases and closes automatically.
The intumescent seals are central to performance. When they are exposed to heat they expand to many times their original size, sealing the gap between the door and the frame to block the path of the fire.
Smoke control is a separate matter to fire resistance. It is classified using the letters Sa or Sm rather than EI. If the building’s fire strategy requires smoke control, dedicated smoke seals, often combined with the intumescent strips, are fitted to restrict the flow of cold smoke before the heat triggers the intumescent material.
Why Aluminium For Your External Fire Doors
External fire doors can be made from several materials. Aluminium offers a combination of qualities that make it particularly well suited to external use.
Aluminium is naturally strong and stable, yet light. It resists corrosion, which matters a great deal for a door exposed to rain, wind and temperature swings all year round. It can also be formed into slim frames, which means larger glazed sections without compromising the fire rating. The result is an external fire door that is safe and secure but still lets natural light through and looks the part on a modern building.
The way our aluminium frames achieve fire resistance is worth explaining. To meet both the thermal and the fire performance standards, our profiles are engineered with specialist cooling inserts, such as GKF boards or ceramic cores, housed inside the profile chambers. These inserts absorb heat and protect the structural integrity of the aluminium, which lets us keep slim, attractive sightlines without giving up the EI rating.
Aluminium also gives you external aluminium fire doors that work as a single visual language across a whole project, matching the windows and partitions on the same building rather than standing out as a separate fire product.
The Aluprof MB-78EI System
We manufacture our external fire rated doors using the market-leading Aluprof MB-78EI system. This system is well respected across the industry for its versatility, letting us produce flush, thermally broken doors that give good weather resistance and thermal insulation for daily use.
Because the MB-78EI system is fully certified for both internal and external use, it delivers a consistent look across a project while providing proven fire resistance from EI30 up to EI90. As an approved Aluprof fire partner, we work closely with them so our products stay aligned with the latest technical developments and changes in legislation.
Configurations And Hardware Options
We configure each external fire door set to suit the compliance requirements of the specific project.
For configurations, we provide single and double door sets, with options for overpanels and side lights, all fully covered by our certification evidence. This is what allows us to supply double external fire doors for wider openings or a single fire door for a standard exit, while keeping the rating intact.
For hardware, we supply only listed and compatible items, including fire rated hinges, locks, closers and panic hardware for designated escape doors.
For sealing, every door comes fitted with the drop seals and intumescent strips needed to meet the specified integrity and insulation ratings, with smoke seals added where the fire strategy calls for them.
Where External Fire Doors Are Needed
While every project is different, we most often see the need for external fire doors in two situations.
The first is boundary protection, sometimes called the one-metre rule. If a building sits within one metre of a boundary line or a neighbouring property, Approved Document B of the Building Regulations generally requires the external wall, and any doors within it, to be fire rated so that fire cannot spread to the building next door. Clients come to us for this because our aluminium solutions allow glazed, attractive doors that still satisfy strict boundary fire requirements.
The second is protected escape routes. In many commercial and multi-occupancy residential projects the final exit door leads from a protected stairway out into a courtyard or external alleyway. If that external route is narrow, the door has to hold back radiant heat so the escape path stays safe to use. This is exactly where the insulation part of an EI rating earns its place.
This is also why external fire doors for flats are such a common requirement. Blocks of flats combine boundary conditions, shared escape routes and multi-occupancy duties, so the external doors frequently need to be fire rated.
We see a mix of new builds that specify these systems from the start, and retrofit projects where a fire risk assessment has flagged older, non-compliant doors that need upgrading to aluminium EI rated systems.
UK Regulations For External Fire Doors
In the UK the requirements for fire doors are set out in the Building Regulations, and the primary statutory guidance is Approved Document B (Fire Safety). It sets out where fire doors are needed, particularly in commercial and public buildings, in multi-occupancy residential buildings and as the connection between a house and an integral garage.
Every fire door set has to be tested and classified to recognised standards. We ensure full compliance by working to BS 476-22 alongside the European standards BS EN 1634-1 and BS EN 13501-2. The key point is that the whole door assembly has to be certified, not just the individual parts.
Inspection and maintenance duties also apply once a door is in place, and these depend on the building. The Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 brought in stricter duties from 23 January 2023. Under Regulation 10, responsible persons managing multi-occupied residential buildings in England over 11 metres in height must carry out quarterly checks of fire doors in the common parts, including self-closing devices, and annual checks of flat entrance doors on a best endeavour basis. These specific duties apply to multi-occupied residential buildings rather than to every building type, so the right schedule for any given project depends on its use and height.
Why Choose Aluminium Fire Systems For External Fire Doors
Fire-rated products are not a sideline for us. They are the only thing we do. Every member of the team, from quoting through to manufacturing, works specifically in fire-rated aluminium, which means the advice you get on an external fire door is informed by people who specialise in exactly this.
We are one of the UK’s leading manufacturers of fire rated products, and we manufacture in the UK. That gives us full control over quality and craftsmanship on every frame, and it lets us offer competitive pricing because you buy directly from the manufacturer. Our streamlined project management and production processes mean fast lead times and on-time nationwide delivery, so your project stays on schedule.
Most importantly, every order comes with a full compliance pack, giving you complete confidence that your external fire doors meet the latest standards and regulations. Our team stays fully up to date with current building regulations and safety standards, and as an approved Aluprof fire partner we are always aligned with the latest technical and legislative changes.
About Aluminium Fire Systems
Aluminium Fire Systems is a UK-based specialist manufacturer and supplier of fire-rated aluminium windows, doors and glass partitions. We work in partnership with architects, construction contractors, property developers, fabricators and installers across the UK, on both commercial and residential projects, delivering a compliant and stress-free solution to a building’s fire requirements.
Our specialism is fire-rated products and nothing else, and we manufacture every product here in the UK. As an approved Aluprof fire partner, we manufacture using market-leading certified systems and provide a full compliance pack with every order. You can read more about the team and our experience on our team page, and see the kind of work we deliver across our project case studies.
FAQs
External Fire Doors Frequently Asked Questions
What is an external fire door?
An external fire door is a certified door set fitted in an external opening that is designed to resist the spread of fire and smoke for a set period of time, while also working as a secure, weatherproof external door. It is a complete tested assembly of the leaf, frame, hardware and seals rather than a single product, and it is rated by how long it holds back fire, for example EI30 or EI60.
Do external fire doors have to open outwards?
Not always. The direction a fire door opens is governed by its role in the building’s escape strategy rather than by a blanket rule. Doors on escape routes are generally required to open in the direction of escape where they are likely to be used by a number of people during a fire, which usually means outwards towards the final exit. The specific requirement for any door is determined by the building’s fire strategy and the relevant guidance in Approved Document B, so this is something to confirm at the design stage.
What is the difference between a fire door and an exterior door?
A standard exterior door is built for security, weather resistance and insulation, but it is not tested to hold back fire. A fire door is engineered and certified to contain fire and smoke for a rated period of time, and every part of it, the leaf, frame, hardware and seals, is tested together as a set. An external fire door has to do both jobs at once: perform as an exterior door and meet its fire rating. That is why you cannot simply add fire resistance to an ordinary external door.
What is the difference between E and EI fire ratings?
An E rating refers to integrity only, which is the door’s ability to block flames and hot gases. An EI rating covers both integrity and insulation, so the door also limits the heat transferring through to the other side. That insulation performance is what protects escape routes and stops a fire igniting materials on the far side of the door. You can read more in our guide to E vs EI fire safety glass.
What are the rules for fire doors in the UK?
Fire door requirements in England are set out in the Building Regulations, with Approved Document B as the main statutory guidance covering where fire doors are needed. Door sets must be tested and classified to standards such as BS EN 1634-1 and BS EN 13501-2, and the whole assembly must be certified rather than just the components. Once installed, fire doors must be kept in efficient working order, and additional inspection duties under the Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022 apply to responsible persons managing taller multi-occupied residential buildings.
Can external fire doors be glazed?
Yes. Because aluminium can be formed into slim frames, our external fire doors can include glazed sections without affecting the fire rating, provided the glass and the configuration are covered by the fire test evidence. This lets you bring natural light into an entrance or escape route while keeping the door’s EI performance.
How long do external fire doors last?
There is no single answer because it depends on use, exposure and maintenance. An aluminium external fire door is highly resistant to corrosion and built for long-term external use, but its fire performance only stays valid if the door set is kept in good working order. Damaged seals, frames or closers can compromise the rating, so periodic checks are important. The right inspection schedule depends on the building type and its responsible person’s legal duties.
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Why Choose Aluminium Fire Systems for Internal Fire Doors
If you are weighing up external fire doors for a project, Aluminium Fire Systems can help you specify the right rating and configuration.