Re: Door hardware with electric strike

["Robert L Bass" <RobertLBass@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Doug Meredith" wrote:
>
> I'm building a new house and plan to have electric strikes on two
> doors.  I'm having trouble getting my head around how the door
> hardware should work.
>
> For egress I don't want to have to unlock the door to get out, nor
> do I want to have to engage the strike, so this presumably means a
> knob (or lever) that will turn on the inside even when locked.

That is correct.  Electric strikes have a "keeper" that holds the
latch in place.  When current is appled, a solenoid releases the
keeper and it swings away, releasing the door.  The keeper then snaps
back ready to receive the latch when the door closes or (in styles
intended for deadbolt locks) remains open until the door closes.
When the extended deadbolt engages the keeper it clicks shut again,
locking the door.

> I'm not really sure what to do about a dead bolt either.  I don't
> want to have the situation where the dead bolt is locked and now I
> can't get in the house (using an RFID card or punching a code in an
> external keypad).  I'm considering forgoing the dead bolt entirely
> on the theory that with an alarm system a dead bolt doesn't really
> add a great deal of security.

Typically, the key-in-knob or combo knob and deadbolt can be released
from the exterior with a key in the event of a power outage or system
failure.  From the inside a turn of the latch of knob opens the door.

> Just to put this in perspective, the family's normal way of
> entering the house will be by driving a vehicle into the attached
> garage.  The man doors won't see a huge amount of use.  Guests will
> be let in this way when we are home.  Extended family and our
> cleaning lady will have RFID cards and will come in this way.  I
> would be willing to accept (and might prefer) a solution that
> doesn't have a way to mechanically leave the doors unlocked.

In addition to electrik strikes, there are numerous makes of electric
door locks which will open with a code, proximity card or even a
finger print.  Many of our customers use coded locks with batteries
in them.  Battery life typically runs several years with "average"
use.  I sell a fair number of electric strikes though most are used
with telephone access controls or fulol-blown access control systems.

> I'd really appreciate any insight from the folks here.  Thanks.

There has been some discussion in this newsgroup of hacking RFID
access control systems.  While that is a possibility, the likelihood
of it affecting any given private residence is close to nil.  If it
is a concern though, consider using a code or code-plus-card system.

--

Regards,
Robert L Bass

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