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Door & window standards in Europe


Connys

Question

Below I try to explain how we work in Finland and Sweden and probably in several other european countries. This is an important issue for architecture firms when looking for cadprograms over here!

The door width should be entered in the same way as for the window. That means width and height overall should be entered, not the opening width as it is now for the doors in VW. Both doors and windows should have the shim gap included in the overall measure. That means the overall width should be the same as the structural opening in the wall. I would also like see the actual width for the door and window frame (not the opening width) in the data report.

For exampel a door D9x21 which is standard 900x2100 mm door with 10 mm shim gap gets the following values:

Total width overall: 910x2110 mm (=the structural hole in the wall)

Frame width: 890x2090 mm (=the door part to be inserted in the wall)

The same goes for windows and windowdoors.

I would also like to notice about that the 3d opening symbol and name is drawn in a mirrored way in Scandinavia compared to the one used by VW. According to the European standard EN 12519 "Windows and pedestrian doors - Terminology", the symbol for the direction of rotation is opened up on the side where the leaf hangs. Also the naming for right and left hanged door is different in europe standards. I would also like to see VW print the data for the direction of rotation in reports, right or left hanged, so this work would be automated. I try to illustrate this with the simple figures below:

||............||

..x...........|

...x..........|

.....x........|

.......x......|

...........x..|

right hanged door (top)

|..........x|

|........x..|

|......x....|

|....x......|

|..x........|

|x..........|

|..x........|

|....x......|

|......x....|

|........x..|

|..........x|

right hanged door (front)

I?m new to VW, so please correct me if I missed something.

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12 answers to this question

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Automatically drawn, dimensioned and annotated door and window schedules would take a lot of the angst out of door and window scheduling (I hope the CEO's comment on automatic door and window schedules in his Novedge interview is a hint that this is coming). However the door and window tools need to take account of the different way of representing hinged doors and lights used in different parts of the world.

In Australia we also use the convention shown by Connys above. It seems more logical to do it the way we do - the two vertices are on the hinged side and the single vertice is on the latch side (where the single vertice is).

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The fault lies not with VW that the US standard for sizes, set by manufacturers, is so screwy.

For those who don't know, a door in the US is measured by leaf size, a window usually by frame size. This drives us crazy when alternative window manufacturers use frames of different thicknesses, not to mention the difficulty of getting openings to align at the top.

Perhaps there could be a preference choice whereby the dimensions of a door or window could be set to the opening size (that would include shim space), or to leaf/sash size. That would make everyone happy, I think. To enhance the preference, there could be alternate data fields where if one is selected, the other is grayed but still displayed.

The beauty of it would be that once the window is set by sash size, the opening size would be automatically calculated; and vice-versa.

I do have to admit that I just don't understand why it makes more sense to reverse the hinge notation, but I've probably just internalized the US convention after years of brainwashing.

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Pete we use the same protocol here in Australia:

- Doors are defined by the door leaf size and the frame is extra over.

- Windows on the other hand are defined by the overall frame size.

Where we differ is in the way we indicate how the door or hinged window sash is indicated in elevation views. We do it the opposite way round to you - from Connys post we do it the same as the Europeans. The UK does it your way.

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Defining doors by leaf dimension drove me crazy in Australia...

The logic and reasoning behind Swedish & Finnish standards is that when the (modular, by 100mm) widths and heights of doors and windows is the one used in design, a door or window by any manufacturer can be used in the same opening. Architects are not expected (usually not even wanted) to be involved in the choice of suppliers, except in quite special projects. The same applies to cupboards and cabinets.

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I have got this answer from the tech support via a VW reseller in Sweden:

To change the 3D door swing from US standards (where the 3D arrow ?points? to the hinge) to the EU standards (where the 3D arrow ?points? to the strike), do this:

Choose the command VectorScript Plugin Editor in the Tools:Scripts submenu

Scroll to the Door entry in the list and click the ?Parameters? button

Scroll down the parameters list until you get to ?HingePref?, number 200

Change HingePref from zero to 1.

Now your 3D doors will have the EU standard swing in 3D.

We?ll work on the opening choice metric for a future version. (By RAnderson 12 mar 2007 )

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The Swedes and Fins have definitely got it down with regard to these standards.

I do have to admit that I just don't understand why it makes more sense to reverse the hinge notation, but I've probably just internalized the US convention after years of brainwashing.

Because the two vertices represent the hinges while the one vertice represents the latch.

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To change the 3D door swing from US standards (where the 3D arrow ?points? to the hinge) to the EU standards (where the 3D arrow ?points? to the strike), do this:

Uh-huh. So, each and everyone in the 40% of users are expected to do this, for the convenience of 25% of users.

Hang on - what convenience, which users? For the convenience of a handful of programmers at NNA!

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Gideon_scott

Well I have tried it and got it working in the standard VW startupfile. However, when trying in any existing drawing it would not work for me. One way to get around this is by copying the door that was created in the new clen startup file to the desired drawing. After that I had to use the eyedropper tool to copy the settings to the door tool (cross the pick up sets defaults). After that, if HingePref is set to 1, it seems to work on new doors created with the doors tool. I think we got the same problem for windows and their hinge direction marker...

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I have tried the same trick for the window script, and it works the same way, but the HingePref should be changed to "0" for european standards. I think this should be possible to easily choose in the preferences dialogue window.

However I have still not managed to find a solution for the shim gap to be include in the total width/height overall. And to have the frame width/height = total w/h overall minus shim gap.

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The logic and reasoning behind Swedish & Finnish standards is that when the (modular, by 100mm) widths and heights of doors and windows is the one used in design, a door or window by any manufacturer can be used in the same opening.

Presumably there aren't many bricks used in Scandinavia?

We need a 100mm module metric bricks instead of the short-sighted imperial-to-metric 112.5mm modules.

By the way, what opening sizes are used for double doors in Finland, etc?

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Funny story this :

During a remodel of an upscale resort, the InteriorDesecrator's spec called for expensive Italian marble tile cut to fit by the supplier based on our metric planset. However, the bean-counting Resort Manager decided to save some money by using US tile instead.

He also refused to acknowledge the need for revised metric>imperial drawings although the interiors were built for the metric tile. Eventually, the cut-to-fit US tiles arrived on site and utter chaos resulted when the local installers tried to fit the imperial tiles to the metric spaces ; )

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