How To Use A Fireplace With Glass Doors

A cozy burn down on a cold nighttime is a delight. But it loses its charm when yous must look for it to fire out earlier heading to bed. A wood fire left untended isn't safe. Dissimilar a gas fireplace, which can be switched off, the merely way to leave a wood fire is to close information technology off with drinking glass doors.

Can You lot Add Drinking glass Doors to a Fireplace?

A lot of new fireplaces come with drinking glass doors. Simply if y'all want to add this safety characteristic to an existing fireplace, retrofitting them isn't hard. The doors come in standard sizes that fit in any flat firebox opening.

Nosotros asked Justin Calemmo, of Five Sons Chimney Service in Brookfield, Connecticut, to show how to retrofit new doors on an onetime fireplace. Our 1848 fireplace has a surround that'due south undersized, so the glass doors brand it safer by blocking the fire from the too close wood floor and mantel.

Fireplace Glass Door Installation in 8 Steps

Installing a fireplace door is simply a matter of fitting the door unit into the firebox opening and attaching it to the masonry. The process is fairly simple when you're dealing with a squared-off brick firebox. If you have a firebox fabricated of rough-textured material, such every bit fieldstone, yous won't be able to use a standard door considering information technology can't overlap the opening's edge.

If you're dealing with an older fireplace, yous'll want to be watchful when drilling into the brick, in case information technology's brittle.

Step 1

Attach lintel clamps to door

Stand the door on its bottom edge and either lean it against your leg as y'all work or accept a helper hold it for you.

With a Phillips-head screwdriver, remove the four screws located on the dorsum of the door where the floor brackets (lesser) and lintel clamps (top) volition go. Set these aside; you will need them later to attach the brackets and clamps.

Get together the 2 lintel clamps and attach them to the door at the summit.

Step 2

Adjust the clamps

Person screwing on clamps on glass fireplace doors.

As you tighten the screws that hold the lintel clamps to the upper, rear frame of the doors, note that the screws fit into a slot milled in the clamps. This slot allows y'all to adjust the clamps up or down to precisely align them with the underside of the lintel that runs across the top of the firebox opening.

Next, screw the ii 50-shaped floor brackets in place at the lesser of the door.

Step iii

Marking for spiral holes

Person adding markers around fireplace doors.

Carefully fit the door into the firebox opening, making certain non to scratch the cease. Marshal the unit snugly into the opening.

Hang a droplight inside the firebox to light your work.

Holding the unit in identify, reach inside to marker where the bottom brackets encounter the flooring of the firebox. Use a thick marking, such every bit a Sharpie, and marker through the grooves in the brackets.

Step 4

Drill holes for lead anchors

Advisedly remove the door from the firebox and gear up it aside.

Using a drill/driver fitted with a 5/sixteen-inch masonry bit, drill a 2-inch-deep hole at each of the 2 subclass marks.

Step 5

Insert lead anchors for screws

Apply a wet/dry vacuum to selection up the dust left from drilling the holes. Be sure to vacuum out the dust in the holes, too.

Using a hammer, gently tap a lead anchor into each pigsty until it's flush with the surface of the surrounding brick.

Step 6

Insulate door

Person adding insulation onto fireplace doors.

Put on a pair of gloves and unroll the fiberglass insulation that comes with the door. Tear off pieces to fit into the channels at the 2 sides and the top of the unit.

Stuff the insulation into all 3 channels. Don't worry most keeping the fiberglass fluffy, as you would with wall insulation—it's mainly there to seal the door and go on smoke from seeping out, and to protect whatever terminate on the door frame from the heat.

Stride 7

Screw door to firebox floor

Person screwing fireplace doors to complete installation.

Carefully slide the door into the firebox opening. Check that no insulation is sticking out around the edge of the frame.

Brand sure the door is flush to the face of the firebox. Achieve inside and twist sheet-metal screws through the bottom brackets and into the atomic number 82 anchors.

Using a socket wrench, tighten the screws to secure the unit to the brick.

Be careful not to tighten the screws too much or y'all may loosen the ballast in the brick or break off the caput of the spiral.

Footstep 8

Clamp door to lintel

Person clamping fireplace doors too the metal lintel bar.

The clamps that hold the door to the metal lintel bar at the top of the firebox are adjustable. Make certain the clamp is positioned and then it can bridge the depth of the lintel.

Finger-tighten the thumbscrew to clamp the hardware onto the lintel. When yous tin can't turn the thumbscrew anymore, use a pair of pliers to give it another quarter-plough.