Survey the Opening Before You Order the Lock

Electronic door hardware is chosen at the door, not from a panel schedule. One access control system can call for an electric strike at one opening, an electrified mortise lock at the next and nothing at all at a third, because the door, frame, latch and egress requirement decide what is possible. Ordering ahead of that survey is how a project ends up with hardware that will not fit.

What gets recorded at every opening

• Door material, thickness and handing; frame material, and whether the cavity will accept a strike at all.
• Existing lockset type, whether cylindrical, mortise, rim exit device or aluminum storefront deadlatch, and its manufacturer.
• Fire rating and label, if any, plus the egress behavior the door has to preserve.
• Closer and hinge condition, and measured preload from stack pressure or a frame out of alignment.
• Cable path, available power, and whether a power transfer hinge or door loop can be installed.
• Accessibility requirements, including opening force and any automatic operator already present.

Fail-safe or fail-secure is a life-safety answer, not a preference

Fail-safe hardware unlocks when power is lost. Fail-secure stays locked and relies on the mechanical exit path from the inside. Which one belongs at a given door depends on how people leave the space, what the fire alarm is expected to do, and what the authority having jurisdiction wants to see. Settle it before ordering, because it changes the part number rather than a setting.

Magnetic locks come with conditions

A magnetic lock has no latch. It holds only while it is powered, and it must release for egress in every foreseeable condition. That normally means redundant release, a request-to-exit sensor plus a clearly marked release device, and a drop on fire alarm. It also means a maglock is not the answer on a fire-rated opening that has to latch positively. Treating a maglock as a shortcut around a door problem usually surfaces at inspection.

Power is where the budget quietly breaks

Locking hardware draws more current than most schedules assume, and motorized latch retraction on an exit device pulls a large inrush at the instant it fires. Voltage drop over a long run turns a nominally correct supply into an intermittent one, and intermittent locking is the hardest fault to chase. Calculate load and drop per opening, size the supply and battery around how long doors must behave during an outage, and leave the enclosure enough room to be serviced.

Georgia conditions at the opening

Humidity moves doors. Wood doors swell seasonally, hollow metal frames sweat, and a strike gap that was correct in February can bind in August. Leave adjustment range in the hardware and expect a seasonal check on exterior openings.

Coastal exposure around Savannah adds salt at hinges, strikes and exposed fasteners, which argues for finishes and materials chosen for the environment rather than for the price line. Inland, afternoon thunderstorms take power while buildings are still occupied, so the outage behavior of every controlled door deserves to be a documented decision instead of a discovery.

Wind and stack pressure at tall Atlanta entrances create preload that keeps a latch from seating cleanly. No reader or panel setting fixes that. It is solved with closer adjustment, sweep replacement and alignment work before anything is electrified.

Retrofit and new construction run on different clocks

On a new fit-out, hardware selection has to land with the door and frame submittals, ahead of rough-in, or the frame arrives without the prep and the fix becomes a field modification nobody budgeted. On a retrofit the sequence inverts: survey what is installed, decide what is reusable, and stage the work so no occupied opening sits unsecured overnight.

Start with what you already have

KSEDCO supplies, installs, services and supports electronic door hardware for commercial buildings across Georgia, working from your drawings or starting with a survey of what is on site. Photographs of the door, frame and existing lockset often answer more than a specification does. Call (888) 360-0035 or use the contact page. Manufacturer detail is on the ASSA ABLOY door hardware page.