Are Iron Doors Energy Efficient?

It doesn’t matter where you live, you want anything new installed in your home to be energy efficient. If you install a new iron front door, you don’t want it leaking precious hot or cold air. Unfortunately, the second law of thermodynamics says that hot things will get cold and iron is an excellent conductor of heat. This means it can not only bring heat from the exterior in, but it can conduct heat from the interior outside as well.

This seems like kind of a major flaw. An iron entry door is a fairly big entryway, and this means it could funnel a lot of heat in or out. However, no one would want a door that does that and quite a few homes are using iron doors now. To combat the superior conductivity of iron, the doors are made using thermal breaks. A thermal break is a form of insulation in which creates a barrier between conductive material to prevent energy loss. This means that your iron doors typically aren’t solid iron, but rather two pieces separated by a piece of insulation inside to prevent heat loss or gain. The same is done with the glass on an iron door. Furthermore, most iron door glass is often coated with a finish that helps reflect the sun to make it even more energy efficient.

Thermal breaking is an excellent way to create an energy efficient home. It is not just used in iron doors, but many new energy efficient windows use this as well to keep your home the temperature you want it. If you are interested in learning more about iron doors now that you know you won’t hemorrhage your hot or cold air, contact us today to see what options we can offer to make your home have the perfect entryway.