Union Industries welcome new addition to its High Speed Door Family!

Union Industries has expanded its range of industrial fast acting doors with the development of a lightweight internal door for ambient & chilled environments - the Picadoor.

Union Industries has expanded its range of industrial fast acting doors with the development of a lightweight internal door for ambient & chilled environments - the Picadoor.

Although Union is continually upgrading its existing range of robust internal and external doors by incorporating the latest technological advances, this is the first brand new door launched by Union since its Eiger freezer door over a decade ago.

The introduction of the Picadoor High Speed Door comes after consultation with several existing customers who required a lighter, smaller internal door for use by pedestrians, conveyors, pallet trucks, and trolleys. Therefore the Picadoor has been specifically designed for these types of high use conveyor applications and pedestrian openings, with supermarkets for store-to-shop floor doorways and also machine guarding applications in mind.

Over the last 18 months numerous development models and configurations have been tested at Union's Leeds facility. This is to ensure that the door satisfies the requirement of customers in the most effective and efficient way possible.

To help oversee the development of this new door, Union tapped into the engineering knowledge of Mark Throp, Union's newly appointed Engineering Manager. It was suggested by Mark, after carrying out research, that the best way to create a suitable door was to utilise high grade aluminium rather than the heavyweight steel as used in the other rapid action doors in Union's range.

Union Industries designs each of its doors individually to suit its client's needs. The Picadoor is no different, with various configurations to suit the customer's requirements, including several different colour options for the aluminium frame and door blades.

The new Picadoor has a maximum opening size of 2.0m wide x 2.5m high, making it ideal for the majority of internal applications it has been designed for. It also has a variable fast opening speed due to the inclusion of an inverter inside the control panel. The open speed is pre-set at approximately 1.5m per second, with automatic close after an appropriate dwell time which can be set up to suit the individual application requirements.

The door features a 'pencil beam' photocell as standard for safety along with a lightweight bottom beam safety edge, and also has a manual override opening facility ensuring optimum safety for pedestrian users. As would be expected, various safety additions are also available for the Picadoor as optional extras. Additionally, Picadoors are CE compliant with the new harmonised European Standard (BS EN 13241?1:2003 + A1:2011).

Unlike other doors in Union's range, the Picadoor comes with the offer to train customers' own engineers or their preferred local contractors on how to install the door, thus allowing engineers to become 'Union Approved Installers' for Picadoor High Speed Doors. This enables future purchases to be provided on a 'supply only' basis, making the purchase & installation of further Picadoors more time and cost effective. A pre-requisite of the training is that Union must have proof that the customers' technicians are adequately qualified as electrical and mechanical engineers to ensure that the Picadoors are installed correctly, safely, and to the highest possible standards.

Alan Hirst, Sales Director of Union Industries said: "The Picadoor has now filled a gap in the market for a lightweight rapid roll door that is perfect for pedestrians and light vehicles, which we identified our customers were in clear need of.

"Although the door is not made from heavyweight steel, this doesn't take anything away from its durability and effectiveness. The Picadoor's unique design and manufacture from high quality materials ensures its durability & effectiveness in the right applications. But the main selling point of this new door is that it's a 'Union Industries door'!

"Our doors remain at the forefront of the industry through quality of design, materials & components used, and also the manufacturing processes we utilise, all of which have given our doors excellent life spans. On top of that, our innovations remain at the cutting edge of the market and mean the 'through-life-costs' of our doors are far less than other alternatives that are available. However, we identified the need for a new type of door, and as was the case with our Eiger Freezer Door, we have innovated and expanded our product range to meet a wider customer base."

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