Power Operated Garage Doors and UK Law

In practice, all you are left to do after a Garage Door Workshop Ltd automatic garage door or gate installation is to press the button, and our intelligent entry drive units will work out what you want it to do and do it, without fuss, year after year.

Modern, top-quality equipment – Hormann’s SupraMatic E, for instance – is mechanically self-adjusting and electronically self-calibrating – for practical purposes maintenance-free, and is backed by a 5 year onsite parts and labour guarantee.

Garage Door Workshop Ltd provides garage doors across St Albans 01727 855606, Hockliffe 01525 211811 and Prestwood 01494 866624 — call us Today or complete our contact form today.

However, recent tragic accidents have brought to everyone’s attention the potential crushing and entrapment hazards of remotely controlled, power-operated machinery in the home. The industry’s trade bodies and the Health and Safety Executive have assessed three main areas of risk:

• Supply of equipment with lack of design emphasis on safety, and inadequate ability to detect and rapidly respond to obstruction on contact
• Sub-standard and/or incomplete installation
• Lack of information and product familiarity amongst end-users

From our Trade Body journal: “DHF member DN highlighted a case where a child was crushed by a garage door, and in the ensuing lawsuit the manufacturer of the door, the company that installed the door and the owner of the property where the accident happened were all held jointly legally responsible.”

Safety is everyone’s business.

As required by UK Law, all combined door and automation installations that are undertaken by the Garage Door Workshop Ltd will be assessed and demonstrated to you onsite to show compliance with the function and safety requirements of the EU/UK MACHINERY DIRECTIVE.

Providing all is OK you will be issued with the correct ‘Declaration of Conformity’. This is now routinely requested by house purchasers’ solicitors, similar in purpose to an electrical wiring safety certificate – i.e. a legal, binding declaration of ‘safety in use’, by the person or company who put it in. You will also receive a unique identifying serial number and the ‘CE’ mark permanently affixed to the door panel.

This system has been designed to create an ‘audit trail’ of responsibility, identifying:

• The individual engineer who placed the machinery into service.
• The company that supplied the equipment.
• The company that manufactured the equipment and allows investigating authorities/HSE to establish, in the event of injury, how and why things went wrong and who was involved.

TO ACHIEVE LEGAL COMPLIANCE A POWERED GARAGE DOOR INSTALLATION MUST INCLUDE:

• Detailed formal handover: commissioning engineer explains and demonstrates the door’s power operation functions, safety systems, check routines, emergency/manual override, and maintenance requirements.
• Issue folder to end-user containing all manufacturer documentation, including:
  • Owner’s manual / operating instructions for door system
  • Certificate of Incorporation / Type testing for door system
  • Owner’s manual / operating instructions for powered operator system
  • Certificate of Incorporation / Type testing for operator system
• Issue end-user with the Declaration of Conformity(original to user, copy kept for 10 years).
• Affix permanent ‘CE’ label showing installation company details, engineer name, installation date, and unique serial number.

Garage door closing edge crushing hazard.

A standard double-width GRP door panel weighs approx. 115 kg (14 stone) and powered units producing 1000N force are common — demonstrating the significant forces involved if not safely controlled.

Under the EU/UK Machinery Directive, powered drive equipment must use effective force-sensing technology to detect obstruction and limit impact/duration to safe values as defined in BS 12453:2001 and BS 12445:2001.

Force safety criteria:

• Initial dynamic impact ≤ 400N
• Dynamic load reduced to ≤ 150N after 0.75 seconds
• Final static load ≤ 25N after 5 seconds

Example test result: Initial dynamic load measured at 176N (well below limits). Dynamic force reduced to ≤150N in 74ms. Final static load = zero — thanks to good design, vertical operation, rigid panel, soft leading edge, and fast electronic force monitoring.

The Hormann/Cedar Door installation tested had been in daily use for 7 years without maintenance, demonstrating long-term durability and safety.

However, later tests at our showrooms found one older installation producing an unsafe 672N impact force — quickly fixed — showing there is no room for complacency.