Bray Allen
R&D Manager at DBCI

In the not-so-sexy world of door manufacturing, one might think that a wind test is the one opportunity to inject excitement: full-force wind, shredded metal, petrified onlookers.  In reality, a successful wind test should involve little drama.

DBCI, a manufacturer of quality sheet metal doors, has been conducting wind tests for nearly 25 years.   This past April, DBCI hired the services of Certified Testing Laboratories out of Orlando, Florida to manage third party tests of its new Curl-Lok door.

To begin, two DBCI employees mount a new DBCI door to a special vacuum chamber.  Then they spend the better part of a day prepping conditions for the test with the 5-person on-site staff.  The chamber is outfitted to run positive (exterior force) and negative (interior force) pressure tests to make sure the door complies with ASTM E330 and ANSI/DASMA 108 requirements.

The action itself lasts only a few minutes.  Pressure that correlates with estimated wind speed is applied beyond the required wind load and measured with an on-site engineer.  Often, wind loads on various door sizes can be extrapolated from one test. The tests also include using the same jams in actual metal buildings, a way to better gauge the real-world durability of the product, and an extra step DBCI performs on every new product or when codes change.

You can view the recent test of our Curl-Lok product in the video below.