If you’re shopping for external composite doors in the UK, learning about U-values will help you make an informed purchase. If you’ve no idea what U-values are or why you should care about them, there’s no need to worry. Once you’ve finished reading today’s concise guide, you’ll have all the relevant information to hand. Read on to discover the answers to frequently asked questions such as “What is the typical U-value of a composite door?” and “How important are U-values?”.
A composite door’s U-value is a measure of the thermal transmission properties of the materials that comprise the door. In other words, the U-value tells you how easy it is for heat to pass through the door (or other household fixture to which the U-value refers). As U-values represent the amount of heat or energy (in Watts) that makes its way through a door, window or other fixture, lower U-values are always better. In our case, the lower the U-value, the less heat can escape via transmission through the door.
A composite door is composed of layers of materials, usually including uPVC, timber, insulating foam and a laminated skin to seal and protect the outer surfaces of the door. Compared to doors manufactured from uPVC or timber, composite doors offer several key advantages:
If you want to cut domestic energy usage to save money and reduce your household carbon footprint, composite doors are almost certainly your best choice. Good-quality composite doors usually outperform comparable uPVC and timber doors.
At the time of writing, all replacement composite doors fitted to existing dwellings in England & Wales must have a U-value of 1.4 W/m2 K or lower. Composite doors fitted to new homes must have a U-value of 1.6 W/m2.K or lower.
As far as typical values are concerned, the majority of quality composite doors have a U-value of between 1.1 W/m2.K and 1.3 W/m2.K. High-performance composite doors may boast U-values significantly lower than this and could help you reduce your winter heating costs even further.
So what’s a good U-value for an external composite door? Well, anything under 1.4 W/m2 K should be fine for all residential applications.
The main factors that influence the U-value of a composite door are:
The better the design, materials and build quality, the more thermally efficient you can expect a new composite door to be.
To summarise, the most important benefits composite doors offer include:
If energy efficiency is your main concern, we recommend focusing on composite doors with the lowest quoted U-values. These will be the models that offer the very best performance in terms of thermal efficiency and will therefore help reduce your utility bills the most.
To ensure the perfect fit and finish, buy from Rock Solid Doors, the country’s leading supplier of stylish composite doors for residential and commercial properties. We invite you to browse our range and please feel free to contact us if you need any help.
