A lot of business owners – especially those who move straight into a fully functional shop – don’t give a lot of thought to their shutters. The truth is that shutters can last for a long time, especially if they’re properly looked after, but they won’t last forever.
At a certain point, they will likely need to be fully replaced. Doing this proactively, rather than waiting until you’re locked out of your store due to a jammed mechanism, is a much better idea in most cases. From visible corrosion to strange noises, here are some signs you need a full replacement.
Corrosion
A bit of surface rust on a bottom rail is cosmetic; deep, structurally damaging corrosion isn’t. If you can push a screwdriver through laths near the ground, the steel has thinned and lost integrity, and you’ll likely need to get the whole thing replaced by a provider like LBS Group ASAP.
Look at end locks and welds for hairline cracks and warped laths that refuse to sit straight after impact – these are all classic signs of corrosion and structural fatigue. Once the curtain is actively deforming, its security function will likely also be highly compromised.
Repeated faults
One callout can just be a case of bad luck; an ongoing string of them is a pattern that you want to try to break. Motors constantly failing, chains stretching, springs losing tension, and frequent resets on the controller are all signs that the drive train is at the end of its life.
If the parts that you need are no longer made, or only available on long lead times, you’ll spend more keeping an old shutter limping along than you would just replacing the whole thing. As a very general rule of thumb, when recent repair spend approaches a third of a new unit – and downtime is rising – it’s time to budget for replacement.
Slower, noisier, rougher operation
Shutters often clearly show their age in their behaviour. Watch for uneven speeds, grinding over certain points, juddering on the way down, or the curtain racking to one side and distorting itself. Daylight at the sill or along the guides could mean that the bottom seal has flattened, or that the guides are out of line.
A sagging headbox or barrel that starts to deform under load can start to chew through laths and bearings; no amount of lubrication will fix a distorted drum, and you’ll only be buying yourself a bit more time by adding heaps of grease.
Quite aside from the financial side of a false economy, constantly having to arrange for repair teams to come to your shop is just not worth the added stress.
If you find that shutter maintenance has an unbalanced impact on how much energy you’re able to put into the more important aspects of running your business, then it’s likely time to invest in a new set. They’re not super cheap, but it’s an important investment that will soon pay for itself.