mfree
May 5th, 2005, 10:00 AM
I've posted about this before, though it was a while ago. I have a tactical problem with my house.... a glass front door. Bummer for smash-in home invasions. Also a bummer as for a long time I had nothing to cover it with and you could see in the house, but at night, couldn't really see out to see who was at the door.
I hemmed and hawed... how do I fix this, make it safer, without replacing the door ($$$!!!).
Answer: Cheap plastic hanging blinds. Why?
1. It conceals the house effectively from the door's view
2. Doesn't take the overall look of the glass door away from the outside
3. If someone decides to take a running leap through the door, they'll get tangled up in the blinds. When I installed them, I used double reinforcements on the top bar, installed the lower bar retainers as tightly as I could, and I keep the length strings tightened up so the blinds don't sway when I open the door. If someone hits them, arms-legs-head will end up through the spaces in the slats before the thing gets enough pressure to come crashing down. This buys me valuable time and makes valuable noise.
4. I can raise a slat and peek through the door without presenting my entire profile to whoever's outside.
Simple and cheap, the kind of solution I like :) This adds on to the other "safety" item, the wind chimes hung above the door about 2' inside the house (open the door, even slowly, and you hit the chimes).
Now, to address all the old windows that won't close far enough to latch (even though they're all at least 8' off the ground) by replacing them, and getting some solar lights to line the driveway, and I'm golden.
I hemmed and hawed... how do I fix this, make it safer, without replacing the door ($$$!!!).
Answer: Cheap plastic hanging blinds. Why?
1. It conceals the house effectively from the door's view
2. Doesn't take the overall look of the glass door away from the outside
3. If someone decides to take a running leap through the door, they'll get tangled up in the blinds. When I installed them, I used double reinforcements on the top bar, installed the lower bar retainers as tightly as I could, and I keep the length strings tightened up so the blinds don't sway when I open the door. If someone hits them, arms-legs-head will end up through the spaces in the slats before the thing gets enough pressure to come crashing down. This buys me valuable time and makes valuable noise.
4. I can raise a slat and peek through the door without presenting my entire profile to whoever's outside.
Simple and cheap, the kind of solution I like :) This adds on to the other "safety" item, the wind chimes hung above the door about 2' inside the house (open the door, even slowly, and you hit the chimes).
Now, to address all the old windows that won't close far enough to latch (even though they're all at least 8' off the ground) by replacing them, and getting some solar lights to line the driveway, and I'm golden.