Interlocks and warning beacons are part of the door safety chain; the guide to radiation shielding doors<\/a> details the access-control requirements.<\/p>\n Two standards do two different jobs, and mixing them up causes most of the confusion. EN 1634-1 is the furnace test: it puts a complete door or shutter assembly in front of a standard fire curve and records what happens. EN 13501-2 is the classification language: it converts the test result into a short code that fire strategies, building control, and insurers can all read the same way.<\/p>\n The code is a letter, or a pair of letters, followed by minutes. Each letter names a performance criterion:<\/p>\n An E120 shutter therefore holds back fire for 120 minutes but transmits heat. An EI60 shutter holds back fire for 60 minutes and limits heat transfer at the same time. Reading the letters before the minutes is the whole trick, because the letters tell you what the number is a number of<\/em>.<\/p>\n On fire rated roller shutters, a rating is not a property of steel thickness. It is a statement about one tested assembly: that exact curtain, those guides, that barrel, those fixings, in that wall, closing the way it closed in the furnace. Change any element and the classification no longer travels with the product. Suppliers of tested systems are blunt about this: a certificate for one design does not automatically cover every installation.<\/p>\n Most steel fire shutters on the market carry E classifications only. Integrity is what a rolling steel curtain is structurally good at. Insulation is harder, because metal conducts heat straight through the slats, so EI shutters need insulated or composite curtain construction and cost more to build.<\/p>\n The wall matters too. The European product standard defines standard supporting constructions such as masonry, aerated block, and plasterboard-faced steel stud partitions. The test evidence names which ones the shutter was actually built into.<\/p>\n The practical consequence for a buyer is simple. Ask for the classification and<\/em> the tested configuration it belongs to. A minute count quoted without size limits, wall types, and a control arrangement is a brochure claim, not a rating.<\/p>\n Fire doors and fire shutters sit under the same European product standard family for fire and smoke characteristics, but they answer different geometry. A hinged or sliding fire door carries an insulated leaf, so EI classes are routine for it. A rolling shutter coils into a box above the opening, trading insulation for span. Wide industrial openings that a fire door cannot economically cover are exactly where shutters earn their place.<\/p>\n Our own shutter range runs to 12,000 mm wide, territory where door-leaf construction is unrealistic. The trade comes in protection class and escape rules. Shutters typically serve compartmentation, not evacuation, and guidance is clear that openings people pass through regularly should have a separate fire exit or personnel door beside the shutter. For the mechanics of furnace testing in depth, see our piece on EN 1634 ratings<\/a>. Occupancy-specific ratings are worked through in our hotel fire door rating guide<\/a>.<\/p>\n On fire rated roller shutters the rating comes from the fire strategy, never from the budget or the catalogue. A fire compartment drawing, prepared under local code or by a fire consultant, states the required resistance time for each boundary. The shutter is then selected to meet or exceed that line.<\/p>\n As supplier-reported general guidance, the ladder usually looks like this:<\/p>\nHow EN 13501-2 Classifies Fire Shutters<\/h2>\n
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What an EI Rating Actually Guarantees<\/h2>\n
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Roller Shutters Versus Fire Doors<\/h2>\n
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Matching Ratings to Fire Compartments<\/h2>\n
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