Door Bottoms vs. Toe Clearance

[Paul Sweet]

A thread in the 4Specs forum got me thinking (not a good idea with codes or standards). I wonder why ADASAD 404.2.10 requires door surfaces within 10 inches (255 mm) of the floor to be smooth, yet ADASAD 306.2 requires toe spaces to be only 9" high.

 

[Frank]

The door surfaces used to be 12 inches, not sure about the reson for the difference.

 

[khsmith55]

My understanding for the 10" smooth surface requirement is related to the footrests on a wheelchair. Sometimes users will use the footrests to help in opening the door and the smoothness requirement is to prevent the sideways displacement or snagging of the footrest. On a side note, when using panel doors I always make the sure the bottom rail size is always specified or denoted on the door schedule.

 

[mark handler]

.... the footrests to help in opening the door and the smoothness requirement is to prevent the sideways displacement or snagging of the footrest..

Correct. ..

 

[Paul Sweet]

But if the smooth surface at the bottom of a door needs to be 10" high because a footrest can be 10" high, then the footrest will be too high to fit into the 9" toe space under a lavatory or counter.

 

[JBI]

Maybe (and I'm just guessing here) the extra inch is to compenasate for the threshold allowance of 3/4 inch?

 

[Francis Vineyard]

JBI got it.

A trick with smaller wheels is to "pop caster" before coming to the threshold to keep momentum over the threshold.

Maybe Msradell can give us an opinion!

 

[Msradell]

JBI got it.A trick with smaller wheels is to "pop caster" before coming to the threshold to keep momentum over the threshold.

Maybe Msradell can give us an opinion!

Actually, I'm in a power chair which makes things very much different. My foot rests are normally only about 1" but I can easily raise them if required. My chair is front-wheel-drive and I only have small tippers in front of the drive wheels and those are about 2" off the ground under normal circumstances. Because of this flexibility the issues of the thread really don't apply in my case. That being said I definitely feel that the explanation presented above is probably the best anyone can come up with, if you have to balance the front of your chair over the threshold it obviously could be higher than 9". Another thing to consider with the 9" clearance in that it uses feet are on top of the foot rest so in reality if the foot rest is any higher than about 7" the user feet will hit the bottom of a 9" toe space.