How Should We Specify Access Control For These Metal Double Doors?

Is there a dividing metal mullion between these doors, or is it a full width opening when both doors are opened?

Are there exit devices?

Are there door closers?

You can always try electrified exit bars.

More questions: Are they exterior? Fire rated doors (typically, exterior doors are not rated, but there are exceptions)? Are  BOTH doors required as means of egress? Is there an exit sign above the door? Does the door also serve as a means of egress from another space? 

Now if these doors are subject to heavy use, I would strongly recommend an FRP (Fiberglass Reinforced Polyester). Steel doors are the poor man's choice, but FRP doors will last almost forever. 

Shear locks have their place, but that place is limited. Answer all the questions in these posts and we can have more info.

Shear locks have their place, but that place is limited. 

I am in violent agreement with Jim.  Shear maglocks have limited applications and the doors they secure require constant adjustment and great closers in order to successfully secure doors.

With no Mullion, I think electrified exit devices with latch retracting vertical rods is the best overall general option.

UPDATE:

• No mullion
• Door Closers
• Door Hardware to be determined
• NON-Fire Rated
• Egress - Both Doors

I think one of the other posts somewhere in the vast IPVM archives noted correctly that vertical rod exit devices are created by the devil. I agree. such devices along with their support items (power supply, power transfer device, etc) can push the door cost close to $8K and create constant headaches for the integrator et al.  Like the shear lock, such devices have their place, but me thinks more info is needed.... 

Brian may be close to the correct answer. A couple of more questions: What is the type of occupancy? Does the door serve an occupancy of 50 or more persons? Is the door an exterior opening?

• the door does not face an exterior opening
• occupants are warehouse staff moving pallets
• occupancy is less than 50 at all time

• the door does not face an exterior opening

Not sure what you mean here.   How often is this door being used for moving stuff in/out....in reality? When is the door supposed to be locked?

Sheer locks, drop bolts...lots of possible locking methods. 

"about to order new double hollow metal doors"...usually new doors can be equipped by the door contract hardware supplier with internal vertical bars...perhaps a flush drop bolt?  Look here for an example. http://www.dortronics.com/products.php?cat_id=7

Another alternative is to manually lock the door, and use access control to just disarm alarm contacts, perhaps with a local sounder.

If you are worried about maglocks hanging down you could always us a Z-bracket with the securitron maglocks. Depending on which way the doors will open the maglocks may have to be on the unsecure side. Depending on how secure this door must be this solution could work. I have done this in the past when the door in question was internal and not high security. Basically the maglock will mount to the face of the door frame and with the z-bracket the armature plate would mount to the door with a bracket and would extend above the door to be able to connect to the maglock properly. The other issue you may have is the durability of the doors themselves.

Shannon and UM#2 thanks for the ideas.  Here is some more info.

• Door Usage: 200-300 openings per day
• One Door can manually unlocked (stationary leaf until used)
• Door Height - 8 FEET

Does ELR make sense? premature failure of a power transfer hinge?

Client would like a magnetic hold for moving equipment through these doors.  I assumed a access control timer would release the doors.

The Z Bracketed Mag Locks seem to be making more sense...

Any additional thoughts are appreciated.

Can't swear this would pass every AHJ's muster, but saw this in use at an airport, and thought it was creative, and a great deal cheaper than those electronic lock retractions.

Standard mag locks with a dual sense crash bar that was dual wired to both NO and NC switches in the bar.  The NO was wired to the REX input on the AC panel, and the NC was hard wired to one leg of the lock power.

So in normal operation, the user would push on the crash bar and the NO relay would account for the request to exit, and simultaneously kill the power to the lock, requiring no "dual movements" such as pressing an exit button and then turning a handle, as well as always ensuring lock power could be de-energized in an emergency.

Here's the installation instructions pdf.  Wiring is shown on page 8

https://www.securitron.com/Other/Securitron/_OWNA2.0/Documents/Installation_Instructions/Exit_Devices/DSB_IO_500-22700%20F.pdf

If this door is in the means of egress path, the use of magnetic locks puts a number of items requirements into play: including fire alarm release and a very specific method(s) for releasing the door. That being said, I am moving closer to the mag lock solution (Per Shannon above) but I am not quite there yet. The z-bracket places the locking device on the threat side of the door but that may be OK in some cases.  The door being 8' would also generate a significant load on the top of the door (and the bracket.... and it cries out for an FRP door which will absorb this load. I used these doors in horse clinics as a means to control entry to surgery and other procedure areas in a vet clinic (horses) with good success.  

I would bet that you can use standard surface mag locks on this 8' door without incident. Standard mounts will give you less problems, resulting in a most trouble free door and be trouble free door. But I would only use mag locks if the door is not exposed to the exterior (for security reasons- not for durability reasons). Securatron in my view has the best mag locks on the market for this purpose and they are warranted for life no matter the reason for the problem (including breaking off from a fork lift). Their  newest exit bar is made specifically for the release of mag lock doors in the path of egress. But can you live with such bars that are sitting on the door at precisely the hit area? 

You mentioned a magnetic lock for holding the door open. You would actually need a magnetic door holder. Connect an output from the access control system that engages the holder for some set period of time after a valid card read. In this way, if someone wants to prop the door open and forgets it, the door will automatically release and lock. You can also incorporate the holder in a closer

Call a Door Hardware Specialist who knows what they are doing so you do it right the first time.  For those who suggest not using vertical rods or other type of mechanical hardware is shows your lack of expertise the space.  You don't call the lawn mower repair guy to work on the scissor lift, no his area of expertise right?

For what you describe it would make sense to install crash bars using top vertical rods with Automatic Door Openers for when freight is moved though, yes its a more expensive solution up front but provides free egress and will perform with less service issues in the long run from damage to the door from pallets etc.

Maglocks are a LAST RESORT and convenient for uneducated folks trying to do door hardware to any application, they are Fail Safe and can be easily defeated to gain access.  If you do access control work and are not a door guy you should farm it out or go get schooled on door hardware.

Thank you for everyone's input.  I will be recommending crash bars and vertical rods.  The auto door openers would be great too.

There is an alternative option if you are not overly concerned with how the solution LOOKS. The function of it would work very well if installed correctly, but the look would not be something I would consider suitable for a "customer-facing" area. If this is entirely a back-of-house area where only employees would see it, then I would absolutely do this over alternative choices.

Shortest explanation is to utilize one door that is fixed, either via manual or automatic flush bolts, and create a small bracket where a strike could be mounted on the fixed door for a rim exit device to latch into. Then, simply electrify the rim exit for access control purposes.

If you used automatic flush bolts, you could also tie a door operator to it to allow the door with the rim exit device to open automatically when the operator is activated, followed shortly by the "fixed" door once the other door has opened enough to release the flush bolts.

The main thing to consider is that if you don't have an automatic operator on a door with automatic flush bolts, you must have a coordinator to hold the moving door open while the fixed door closes first.

I would choose this all day every day over vertical rods. Furthermore, the amount you would save over a two-vertical rod solution would come pretty close to paying for an automatic operator to be installed as well.

The last thing I would mention is that if you use automatic flush bolts, top-notch installation is a must. They are an absolutely fantastic solution that you'll never have issues with if they are installed correctly. If installed incorrectly, they'll give you problems forever.

Good luck.

This is also a good solution. You may want to consider equipping the inactive leaf with an automatic flush-bolt on the bottom and a manual flush-bolt on the top (most folks will throw the top, but not the bottom). An astragal is also suggested to help hold the door ridged. But all this stuff brings a door coordinator into play;  and as UI 5 notes, flush bolts must be meticulously installed by folks who know what they are doing. And don't forget the timing issue: the doors must essentially be unlocked BEFORE the operator is energized to avoid binding. 

Please report back on what you did and how it worked for you.