Winter is coming (okay, maybe not just yet, but in another month or so). But even though the temperature hasn’t dipped past sweater weather, there’s never been a better time to start preparing your automatic doors for the harsh conditions. Here’s a quick list with five easy steps you can take as the weather starts changing to make sure your doors are set up for success all winter long.
Check for Gaps
Keeping a nice seal around your doors is important all year long, but especially when the weather starts to cool down. Weatherstripping can deteriorate or shift out of alignment as the season wears on, which can let the heated air from inside the building escape while also letting in the cold winter air. This can not only make things uncomfortable for your building’s clientele, but can also make for an expensive energy bill.
Gaps around your doors can also let unwanted visitors in during the colder months—rodents and pests looking for warmer places to hunker down can find even the smallest gaps between seals and sweeps to enter, so be sure to keep an eye out for any developing gaps around your doors this winter.
Keep Your Tracks Clear
Your door tracks keep the whole operation running smoothly—when things are clear, your doors effortlessly glide open and closed. But when your tracks collect debris, it can lead to door jams and frustrations. During the wintertime, cities put salt on the roads, parking lots, and sidewalks to prevent ice buildup, which can make its way to your doors and into your tracks. Besides physically getting in the way of your doors opening and closing, salt can also lead to rust and the deterioration of your tracks over time.
If that weren’t enough, ice can wreak havoc on your automatic door system, too. When water or snow gets into tracks and freezes, doors can stick open or closed and tracks expand or warp in the process. And this isn’t even taking into consideration all the dirt and debris left over from the fall—from dead leaves to twigs to pieces of trash—that can make their way into your tracks via the winter wind. So make sure to keep your doors in their prime by checking and clearing out your tracks every day.
Make Sure Your Locks Are Working
It’s a classic tale—the holiday party has just wrapped up and the last stragglers have finally left, but when you go to lock the building’s doors for the long holiday weekend, you discover that the locks aren’t working. It’s easy not to think about the locks on your automatic doors, especially if you only shut down your building around the winter holidays, but try getting into the habit of checking your locks once a week to make sure everything’s working. That way, you won’t get stuck with a security problem when everyone’s off the clock.
Double-Check Sensors & Batteries
Did you know that colder weather can deplete your batteries (by up to 60%!)? This means all your battery-operated sensors, like handwaves or push plates, are at risk of shutting down during the winter—and you know things like that always happen on the coldest day of the year to the person juggling six coffees and a year’s worth of file folders. Be sure to check, recharge, or replace all your batteries before winter arrives and then regularly check them as the cold weather drags on. Another pro tip: if your sensors have a back-up and that back-up is battery-operated, you’ll want to check it, too.
In addition to the cold spelling problems for your sensors, snow and ice can do the same. If a motion sensor gets covered by snow or ice, it can be harder for them to properly sense the person who wants to get into the building—which again, will inevitably be that same person juggling all the coffees and all the files. So make sure to clear off any build-up that accumulates on your sensors, especially after a snowy day.
Sign Up for Our ProActive Maintenance Plan
Of course, even doing all you can ahead of the cold weather may not prevent all potential problems, so it’s good to have professionals you can trust if your automatic doors act up. Our ProActive Maintenance Program is a perfect way to give you peace of mind—our techs (all certified by the American Association of Automatic Door Manufacturers) will come give your automatic doors a thorough check and tune-up, calibrate all your sensors, perform a safety inspection, and get everything in tip-top shape. Then, we’ll come back again after the winter has thawed to check and fix anything that might have gotten jostled or damaged in the frigid weather. Learn more about our ProActive Maintenance Plan here.
Winter is coming, but your automatic doors will be prepared for the worst if you follow these simple steps. And if you have any other questions or concerns about the upcoming cold weather and how your doors might be affected, don’t hesitate to give us a call!