With its new Engineered Door a stand-out feature of its product offering, Aluplast reflects on the benefits for its fabricator customers.

With composite doors dominating the entrance door market for the best part of two decades, many fabricators who purchase complete door sets from a third party potentially limit their ability to add value, designs or colour options within their sales portfolio.

As economic uncertainty and global political turbulence continues to erode margins, the Engineered Door was unveiled last year by Aluplast alongside its launch partner, Regalead, partially in response to these challenges, with a view to “bring additional choice and value back to the fabricator”.

Compatible with Aluplast’s Ideal 70 and Ideal 4000 profiles, the systems supplier’s Aludec and Woodec foils are central to the concept, perfectly replicating genuine timber and aluminium doors for a level of quality and authenticity previously unseen in PVC-U doors.

“Improved aesthetics and performance have made the Engineered Door a viable alternative, or worthy challenger, to the composite door,” says Aluplast’s Ian Cocken.

“Our next generation foils are central to its appeal because they don’t just look like the genuine article; they feel like it too. It’s a tangible authenticity that really takes this product to the next level.”

A key design feature in the Engineered Door range is a selection of ‘bolection mouldings’ fixed to the edge of the panel and partly onto the profile, which, when combined with Aluplast’s Woodec foil create a finish so close to real timber, that it has to be seen to be believed, according to Ian.

In turn, Aluplast’s Aludec foil emulates a premium aluminium look that can even replicate textured powder coatings in a low maintenance PVC-U product, with anthracite grey and jet black among its seven finish options.

When applied to products such as the Smart-Slide neo, Aluplast’s next-generation sliding door, access is provided to a higher-end market, usually reserved for more expensive aluminium products.

With Passive House standards of thermal performance, heights of up to 2.5m and spans of up to 6m achievable with just two panels, Smart-Slide neo opens up even more opportunities for PVC-U fabricators and installers.

What do fabricator’s think?

Challenging the perception that PVC doors are only suited to functional spaces, Nat Weaver, Co-owner at Aluplast fabricator, Ashfen, argues that the Engineered Door is a viable – or even superior – entrance alternative to the composite.

“When you’ve got a customer who’s fixed on having a composite door, there are sometimes size limitations that mean that’s not possible, or it’s going to be a bit of a struggle having one,” says Nat.

“As we would manufacture this in house, you get a lot more wiggle room with the height and width, unlike a composite, where you’re very much restricted by what the slab company can offer you.

“The Engineered Door is an absolutely brilliant – possibly better – alternative to a composite in some cases because, besides the size parameters, it can give you a lot more options in terms of design.

“It’s got the mechanically jointed mid rails and transoms and you can create some absolutely beautiful period designs.”

With PVC doors able to match with window foils for a cohesive look that’s not possible to achieve with composites, Ashfen is free to cater to truly unique customer requests, as Nat describes.

“We’ve got a job in Derbyshire, at the minute, where the customer knew that she wanted something brilliantly bonkers,” says Nat. “From the outset, she wanted an Aludec deck foil on the outside of her windows and a Woodec foil on the inside.

“We were able to offer front doors, back doors, side doors, all matching foils so that they go with the windows, which we wouldn’t be able to do with a composite. It’s a straightforward thing that makes a really nice selling point.”