4 Reasons Why Homeowners Choose Fiberglass Doors

Keep your home secure, weather-sealed, and stylish for years to come with a fiberglass entry door.

By Glenda Taylor | Updated Dec 15, 2017 4:58 PM

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4 Reasons Homeowners Choose Fiberglass Doors

Photo: jeld-wen.com

While a front door’s primary job is to provide security and protection from the elements, a great entry is one that balances function with form. A memorable entry makes a statement—and increasingly, that statement is being made in fiberglass. The material has long been appealing for its strength and durability, but now style is taking center stage. Door-shopping homeowners today enjoy ever-growing design options, thanks largely to JELD-WEN, a leading manufacturer of windows and doors that provides the widest range and selection of fiberglass doors on the market.

“Fiberglass has unique attributes that make it a great material for doors,” says Dan Jacobs, JELD-WEN’s Director of Product Line Management for Exterior Doors. Top among the selling points? Durability, energy efficiency, and sheer strength. “It’s a type of door that performs well in any climate and offers looks for every style, from traditional to modern. We’ve built, over the years, a great selection of fiberglass offerings, and we expect to continue to add to options and styles in the future.”

Today’s manufacturing technology combines both beauty and security, giving you the style you want and the peace of mind you demand. No matter your budget, odds are you’ll find a JELD-WEN fiberglass door that meets your high standards.

1. ROBUST DURABILITY
After investing time and money in selecting a suitable entry door, homeowners don’t want to deal with rusting, rotting, or warping only a few years later. Fortunately, fiberglass doors withstand the elements—including frigid temps, the harsh rays of the sun, and driving rain—without cracking or bowing. They aren’t susceptible to corrosion or insect infestation, either.

4 Reasons Homeowners Choose Fiberglass Doors

Photo: jeld-wen.com

To ensure that their fiberglass doors are strong and durable, JELD-WEN uses PolyMicro foam core technology, a process that permanently bonds the frame and the skin of the door together to create a sealed unit. This significantly increases the door’s structural integrity and prevents the damage that can occur when moisture penetrates a door’s surface.

An additional upside to a fiberglass door is its weight. Not as heavy as steel or solid wood, fiberglass’s light weight reduces tensile stress on door hinges and increases the likelihood that the door will continue to open and close without sticking or binding. While steel and solid wood are still fine choices for entry doors, fiberglass’s combination of durability and performance in a lightweight package make it an exceptional option.

2. ENERGY EFFICIENCY
Drafty, poorly insulated doors are a major source of energy loss in the home, where they lead to higher utility bills and lower levels of indoor comfort. But with high-efficiency fiberglass doors, you can say goodbye to this wasteful loss of heat—those manufactured by JELD-WEN have even earned the U.S. government’s ENERGY STAR® rating. These doors feature fully insulated cores designed to reduce thermal transfer between outdoors and in. Prehung entry doors sell as a single unit (already mounted within their frames), complete with top-notch weather-stripping, a leak-resistant sweep at the bottom of the door, and an adjustable threshold sill to help prevent drafts and moisture from entering your home. By replacing a drafty door with an ENERGY STAR®-rated door, you’ll be able to use less energy to keep your home at a comfortable temperature.

For added energy efficiency, homeowners can choose triple-pane or low-E (low-emissivity) glass, which allows optimal visibility while reducing unwanted heat transfer. Low-E glass also filters out harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays to protect rugs, draperies, and upholstery fabrics inside the home that might otherwise fade in the sunlight.

4 Reasons Homeowners Choose Fiberglass Doors

Photo: jeld-wen.com

3. REMARKABLE SECURITY
Quality door hardware plays a role in a secure door, but door design is equally, if not more, important. For starters, the solid construction of a fiberglass door goes a long way toward making it more secure than a wooden door. Here, too, JELD-WEN design improves upon the already strong material by installing a reinforced steel plate within the door frame along the latching side. The plate greatly reduces the possibility of forced entry through a closed and locked door, yet because the plate is hidden within the door frame, it doesn’t detract from the beauty of the door.

Another important safety feature located within JELD-WEN doors is a 12-inch solid wood lock block that comes double-bored for installing a deadbolt and handle set. Together, the steel plate and the lock block provide superior kick-in resistance. Prefer an extra deadbolt? You got it. On select door styles from JELD-WEN, the option of upper and lower deadbolt latches in addition to a center deadbolt takes security a step further.

4. A STYLE BONANZA
Your home’s entry says a lot about you and your sense of style. JELD-WEN understands this and offers a broad selection of fiberglass door designs that help you create a personal statement. Choose an authentic woodgrain texture or a multi-coat factory prefinishing option that promises the longest wear—or, if you prefer, you can paint or stain your door yourself! For natural light and an airier feeling, incorporate windows in the door itself or in the form of sidelights and transoms, with glass options ranging from clear to highly ornate. Then splurge on the perfect finishing touch: a wrought-iron grille, knocker, or even a speakeasy grille—a small, bar-covered opening at eye level, through which in the old days you would have whispered, “Joe sent me.

Homeowners can choose from JELD-WEN’s good, better, or best line of fiberglass entry doors and rest assured, whichever level they select, that they’re getting a quality door for their money. Many of the design and security options are available at all price points, while the highest-end line, the Aurora Collection, offers exclusive options. Read on to learn more about the three fiberglass collections and their many options.

• For affordability and style, it’s tough to beat JELD-WEN’s Statement™ Collection, featuring their prefinished line of Smooth-Pro™ exterior fiberglass doors in 11 designs and a variety of multi-coat finishes. Smooth-Pro™ doors are 6’8” to 8’ high and come in standard 32”, 34”, and 36” widths and as either prehung door systems or individual slab doors (without an attached frame). Customers can choose from contemporary, classic, or rustic colors, such as Denim, Stone, Saffron, Black Cherry, and Juniper. Like the Smooth-Pro™ line, JELD-WEN’s Design-Pro™ line of fiberglass doors comes prefinished and in standard sizes, but instead of featuring bold colors, the Design-Pro™ line mimics the look of real wood, with the choice of Mahogany, Oak, or Fir. If you want a different color or stain, the doors may be ordered and finished on the job site.

• JELD-WEN’s premium Architectural™ Collection offers even greater choice, including the ability to select a specific type of woodgrain texture as well as a choice of finish stain. The look of an entry door in the Architectural™ Collection brings you as close to the look of authentic woodgrain as you can get without installing a solid wood door. Woodgrain options include Cherry, Rustic Cherry, Oak, Maple, Mahogany, Fir, and Knotty Alder. Choose from a multitude of panel designs and various styles of glass, then complete the look with a pair of sidelights. With standard door widths and door heights up to 8’, the Architectural™ line of doors gives homeowners the ability to create a dramatic entry.

• Even the knots on the surface of the fiberglass doors in the Aurora® Collection feel authentic! JELD-WEN’s top line of fiberglass doors leaves nothing to be desired. It offers the look and feel of real wood, luxurious finishes, and a wealth of glass options that, in combination, constitute nothing short of a work of art. The Aurora line offers custom as well as standard door sizes and includes arch-top doors and double doors. In fact, JELD-WEN is the only manufacturer today with a 10-foot-high entry door. This premium line is also awash in customization options, including custom carvings, raised decorative moldings, custom door glass, sidelights, and transoms as well as grilles and accessories above and beyond those found in JELD-WEN’s Architectural™ line.

4 Reasons Homeowners Choose Fiberglass Doors

Photo: jeld-wen.com

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of JELD-WEN. The opinions and text are all mine.