I live in a condo with a balcony. There’s a sliding door, but no screen. We would like to get a screen door so we can get some air in here without letting the cat out. (Cat is new. Previous cat was not capable of jumping onto the balcony railing, and wasn’t interested anyway. New cat absolutely is and absolutely is.)
Our next door neighbours have a screen door, so I know it’s possible. In a quick google search, the installation videos didn’t look anything like our balcony door, so how do I make sure I get a door that works?
Ah yes - the crazy cats. When we got our lil dudes we got window screens made by these folks and the cost was pretty reasonable. It’s a local business, 2 very nice people who specialize in screens. We had a lot of weird accommodations to be made due to having old windows but the screens have been great and are now 10 years old and still truckin.
So if you decide to pass on making one these folks might be a good option to have one made.
Don’t want to discourage you from looking into doing it yourself/or hardware store if that is an option at all! It would be nice if a pre-made option existed!
I liked these 2 guys alot (they also are cat fans) because of our weird windows and the fact we needed to open/close them a lot and they don’t have any limiters… With the initial setup done I am now comfortable that everything is secure and have picked up some extra screen material to do any patching/replacement if needed.
They had a choice of screen also which was good - I think we went with regular screen (so we could still see out) and the cats could still climb it without ripping through it - so it was plenty tough. They come out and measure, then go make it, and come back and install.
I’ve done this on 2 different doors. One needed a roll away screen door as it was a regular door and not a sliding door.
Something like this for the regular door (but not this exact product)
The screen rolls up into a tube at one end
The other door was a sliding door that had a track/rail on it that allowed me to buy just the screen door frame complete with wheels.
Something like this (but not the exact product):
This was a PITA as it was flimsy and I had to add my own brace across the door as the track/rails weren’t the right distance apart top to bottom and the screen wanted to move at the bottom and not the top and therefore got bent out of shape.
I’ve used these same people on two separate homes and would use them again. Their products are great.
(edit ADDITION)
Not just their products, but the installer was amazing, he was clear about the advantages and disadvantages and was able to be insightful on door geometry, and even got me to not buy a product for one door because it wouldn’t have been good. I appreciate that honesty.
