What we install · Sliding Glass Doors
The River View Is Also the Largest Hole in the Wall
Sliders here are large, they face water, and they have usually been sitting in salt air for decades. All three of those change what has to be checked before anything is ordered.
Tell us the address and whether the house is occupied year round. On this coast the second answer changes the recommendation more than the first.
2004
Two landfalls, three weeks apart, on the same stretch of coast
Empty
Glass protects a house when nobody is there to close a shutter
Our crews
We measure, we schedule, and our own people install
Licensed
A licensed Florida general contractor
Corrosion in the parts nobody looks at
On a house facing the Indian River Lagoon or the ocean, the visible frame is rarely the problem. The problem is the anchoring, the fasteners and the substrate behind the frame, which have been in salt air continuously since the house was built. A slider replacement priced from the outside assumes that what it is being fastened to is sound. On this coast that assumption fails often enough that we treat it as a question rather than a default.
What a lagoon-facing or ocean-facing slider needs looked at
- The state of the fixings currently holding the frame into the building.
- Whether the material receiving those fixings has gone soft or gritty.
- How the water has been draining, and where it has been going instead.
- Whether a previous repair reused an anchoring route it should not have.
- Whether the header above is original or was altered after 2004.
Why salt matters more on this stretch
A barrier island house has ocean on one side and lagoon on the other. There is very little distance in either direction and very little between the building and the water, so salt-laden air is a constant rather than an occasional condition.
The practical consequence is on fixings and on the substrate that receives them. A frame can look perfectly serviceable while what holds it into the building has quietly degraded, which is exactly the part a homeowner cannot inspect and a quick estimate does not look at.
How we handle it
- 01Open up at a jamb before quoting anything on a water-facing elevation.
- 02Specify fixings for continuous salt exposure, not for an inland opening.
- 03Rebuild the drainage path rather than sealing over the old one.
- 04Leave the track true across the full span so the panels roll properly.
Wide sliders are where we most often slow a job down here, and it is usually corrosion rather than span that does it. Finding a jamb that will not hold the specified anchoring is a manageable problem in week one and an expensive one when the units are already on a truck from the factory.
Said plainly
Where we stop
A slider is only as good as what holds it in, so we will not hang one on an anchoring route we do not trust. On island properties that sometimes means remedial work has to happen before any glass is ordered, and we would rather tell you that at survey than after a deposit.
FAQ
Common questions
- How would I know if my jambs have gone?
- From the outside, you would not, and neither would anybody quoting from photographs. It is found by opening up at survey, which is why we do that on water-facing work rather than pricing from a walk-around.
- My slider still rolls fine. Is that a good sign?
- It tells you about the track, not about the anchoring. Those are different parts of the assembly and they fail on different timescales. A smooth-running door on a corroded fixing route is a common thing to find here.
- Is the whole thing coming out, or just the panels?
- That depends entirely on what the survey finds behind the frame. If the anchoring and substrate are sound there may be a retrofit route; if they are not, the frame is the reason the job exists rather than a part we are keeping.
Treasure Coast specifics
The 2004 Rebuild
Frances and Jeanne came ashore at almost the same point on this coast three weeks apart in September 2004. The rebuilding that followed happened at speed, during a shortage, and it left a distinctive housing stock behind.
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A House Nobody Is In
Approved shutters meet the requirement and cost less. They also need somebody at the house to deploy them. On a coast where a large share of properties are empty through hurricane season, that single fact decides most of these jobs.
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Island & Lagoon
The barrier islands here are narrow, with ocean on one side and the Indian River Lagoon on the other. There is very little distance from water in any direction, and that shows up in the fixings long before it shows up in the frames.
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Three Counties, Three Rules
The Treasure Coast is one market to a buyer and three jurisdictions to a permit. Martin, St. Lucie and Indian River each run their own building department, and several municipalities inside them run their own on top of that.
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How We Work Here
We are based in Fort Lauderdale and the Treasure Coast is a real drive from us. We work it in scheduled blocks, and that has consequences worth stating before you call rather than after.
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More what we install
Impact Windows
The core product, and on this coast the argument for it is different from the one made further south. Here the deciding factor is usually not cost or code — it is whether anyone will be at the house when a storm is named.
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Impact Entry Doors
An approved entry door is an assembly — slab, frame, hinges, lock, threshold and glazing approved together. On a seasonal property it is also the one opening that gets used all year by somebody who does not live there.
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Impact Garage Doors
A double garage door is usually the largest single opening in the envelope. On a seasonal property it is also the one that sits shut and untouched in salt air for months, which ages it differently from one in daily use.
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Next step
Find out what is actually wrong with it.
An inspection, photographs of what we found, and a written scope. If the honest answer is that it can wait another season, that is the answer you will get.