Thanks WindowsonWashington.

Can you recommend a good brand. I see that Provia and HMI doors come highly recommended for fiberglass doors but I could not find a dealer for HMI in California and the dealer for provia is about 2 hours away.

Any others you would recomend.
For the wood doors whom do you recommend.

For solid wood, we have a Rogue Valley mahogany door. It is lovely and well-built.

Thanks Chibimimi. Looks like we have a few dealers for Rogue valley doors so will look at them.

Decent door, I would look at the Simpson first. In fiberglass if not Povia pr HMI the lowest I would go is ThermaTru but from a real lumberyard/building supply not Lowes any other box store for doors or really millwork but that is just my opinion.

If you are in the SF Bay Area and are planning to have glass in your door, you might consider getting a quote from Wooden Window in Oakland at least for comparison.

Thanks millworkman. Simpson is one of the companies we are considering if we go with Wood door. I looked at the ThermaTru fiberglass doors at a window and door store and lumber store but we are still not sure on fiber glass.

Oaktown,
We are in the SF bay area ( peninsula). Will look into wooden window.

We did a fiberglass door by Mastergrain, but it was site stained by a company called Doorway. The trim around the transom is mahogany. I love it. It looks like wood to me, but insulates like fiberglass (cause it is).

Here is picture taken a while back before siding was finished.

Carol

Thanks Carol. Your door does look very nice and like wood. I have not found many fiberglass companies recommended so far in our area. Have only found ThermaTru and Jeld-wen and plas-pro. Not sure if is it i because of climate here many people use wood doors or I am not looking the right places.

The thermatru doors are supposed to be decent but the doors I saw so far don't feel like wood to me. I will search more.

We did not have many options in our area either. Good luck in your search. Unfortunately our door guy is a few miles away (we are in Canada)!

The therma Tru doors we looked at did not look as much like wood as the one we got. I would try another brand.

Carol

If your looking at Therma Tru look at the Classic Craft line in Mahogany as that is pretty dam close to a wood look. Jeldwen is mediocre and Plastpro is quite a bit lower than that in my opinion.

Listen to MWM...he has forgotten more about doors and manufacturers that they rest of know presently.

akshars,

I forgot to mention that in addition to the transom framing in real mahogany, we also have the door casing and exterior and interior trim in mahogany. When looking at fiberglass doors in the showrooms, the fiberglass trims and casings really gave them away as being non wood. With our combo it fools the eye better as all is wood except the actual door. Our combo door was far cheaper than if we had done solid wood too.

Because we had a separate door company stain the door, they were able to match the wood trim with fiberglass doors better.

Best of luck.

Carol

millworkman, I will look at the classic craft line. The Jeldwen Aurora line of fiberglass does look better in terms of the wood look so far. it is also much more expensive than thermatru which would be ok with, if we felt all the other features of the door were good. I see you mention that the Jeld-wen wood door is decent. How would you compare that to Simpson door?

Carol, Thanks for the info on the casings/trim being real wood. I will see if this is something that will work for us.

Simpson is in my opinion the best "off the shelf wood door" available. Jeldwen is a pretty good door it was better when Morgan owned them but they were dumbed down a little in my opinion when they were purchased by Jeldwen. As far as the Aurora F/G door this if I am not mistaken is the IWP doors which were at the time before Jeldwen purchased them shaky at best in my honest opinion and I have seen no evidence in any of the products Jeldwen produces that they are higher quality than under the prior manufacturers.

Thanks milworkman. I really appreciate you sharing the information so we can make an informed decision. You are right the Jeld-wen aurora doors are the IWP doors previously.

I second MWM's sufgestion of Therma Tru! we bought our because the house faces west & though we have a 9 ft deep porch overhang.

We didn't want any issue with the door rotting or warping & chose a Therma Tru Classic-Craft American fiberglass door which looks & feels exactly like wood (includes graining) without all the complications!

I am in Northern California as well and we ordered ours online from Borano.

Haven't received it yet, but it will arrive next month! We ended up needing something custom snd had a difficult time with the local prices.

Thanks Laura. I was hoping you would chime in. The prices in Northern California are definitely higher then most parts of the country.
Can I ask how long it the wait time is for Borano to make custom door?

If you go the custom wood route make certain if your using Mahogany (and that would certainly be my choice) make certain you end up with a Genuine Mahogany and not a "spanish" cedar (for lack of a better term and the "true" names escape me at the moment). If they do not make it out from the appropriate species you will end up no better off than using pine in my opinion.

If I can add a question to the mix, I am wondering which series of Simpson doors are the exterior wood type that are "best off the shelf"? I'm looking for a craftsman style.

I love our mahogany door.

Simpson doors in general, pick the style you like the exterior doors are all good.

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This post was edited by millworkman on Tue, Aug 27, 13 at 12:19