Exterior Door in Shop

[Terry Brogan]

I'm getting ready to put an exterior door in the back of the shop, which sits on a block foundation and has old-fashioned cedar Channel Siding on the outside walls. I'm good with framing in the door and flashing and sheathing the exterior. Question is about the sill. The door is a prehung steel door set in frame with brick-molding already attached to the outside and an attached threshold, which has a rubber or plastic-rubber pad on the bottom. Standard stuff. Since the walkway on the outside back wall is considerably lower, I have to cut down into the block, put in some lath, and pour in some concrete to get the threshold level with the floor of the shop inside. Then I'll build up a couple steps outside.

Options for the sill:
1. Put down peel-and-stick membrane on the concrete, set the door in, flash the outside, done.
2. Put a treated wood sill plate down, set door on that. Door threshold is now 1 1/2" higher than floor on inside.
3. Mold a little step in the concrete I pour to have the same effect as #2, meaning a place for the wooden sill but still flush to floor on the inside.
4. Put in a drainage sill like jamsill or damsill, set the door on that.

What do people usually do?

[phil harold]

1&2 ?

I like the door a little higher off the floor in the shop

[Bob Lloyd]

4. For 2: normally the threshold would sit on the concrete, why have have it raised to step over it? In 3, what do you gain nothing by putting the sill in the concrete? For 1, I am not sure the peel and stick would stick very well to the concrete. Also, unless you bring it up on the inside to make a pan, you still have the potential for leakage but on a concrete shop floor it probably would not matter. Overall the pan does a better job

[David G Baker]

I put down one whole tube of 100% silicon between the concrete and the sill.
In one of my out buildings there is an 8 inch step-down to the concrete slab out side of the door and 6 inches from the floor to the sill on the inside. It works well for me unless I want to use a hand truck.
The reason for the door height is the volume of water that runs past the doorway during heavy rain storms or during snow melt.