An exit device is the only piece of hardware in a building that is designed around the assumption that the person using it is panicking. Everything about it follows from that: it has to open with a push, anywhere along its length, with no knowledge of how it works and no free hand required.

Which is why the small faults matter more here than almost anywhere else in a building. A sticky latch on an office door is an annoyance. The same stickiness on an exit device is the difference between a door that opens under a crowd and one that does not.

What inspectors actually look at

Fire and building inspections in Ontario are not mysterious. The questions are consistent, and a facilities manager can walk the building and ask them without any specialist equipment.

Does it open with a single motion?

Push the bar. The door should open. Not push the bar and then turn something, not push the bar while lifting, not push the bar and then shoulder it. One motion, one action. Anything that adds a second step to getting out is the most commonly written-up fault there is.

Is anything added to the door that should not be?

This is the one that catches buildings out, and it is almost always well-intentioned. A slide bolt added because the door kept blowing open. A padlock and hasp after a theft. A chain “only used overnight.” A deadbolt fitted above the exit device. Each of these turns a compliant exit into a non-compliant one, and in several cases into a door that cannot be opened from the inside at all.

Does the door latch and close on its own?

On a rated opening the door has to actually close and latch under its own power, every time, from any open position. A closer that no longer pulls the door the final inch is a failure even though the door looks fine standing there.

Is the path on the other side clear?

Inspectors look past the door. Snow piled against an exit, a dumpster parked in the discharge path, or pallets stacked in a rear corridor are written up as readily as a broken latch.

Specific requirements vary by occupancy, by the rating of the opening, and by what the authority having jurisdiction determines for your building — the general principles above are consistent, but the clause that applies to a particular door is a question for the local inspector rather than an article.

Why exit devices fail

These are mechanical assemblies on the busiest doors in a building, so the failure modes are mostly wear rather than mystery.

The latch stops projecting fully

Dirt, dried lubricant and years of cycling leave the latch short of full extension. The door appears closed, but the latch is barely engaged in the strike. A push on the outside opens it. This is both a security failure and a fire-rating failure, and it is invisible unless somebody checks the latch throw.

The dogging mechanism is left engaged

Many devices can be “dogged” — the bar held depressed so the door pushes open freely during business hours. The problem is when it is left dogged overnight, or when a rated door has a dogging feature that should never have been specified in the first place. Fire-rated exit devices are not permitted to be dogged mechanically, because the door must latch in a fire.

Vertical rods go out of adjustment

On double doors, concealed or surface vertical rods latch into the head and the floor. Rods drift out of adjustment as the building settles and the door sags. Symptom: the door latches at the top but not the bottom, or one leaf has to be lifted to close.

The closer gives up before the latch engages

Closers have a separate latching action in the last few degrees of travel. When that valve goes out of adjustment or the closer loses fluid, the door drifts shut and stops a fraction short. Correcting this is ordinary door closer repair, and it resolves a surprising share of “the latch is broken” calls where the latch is fine.

The frame or strike has moved

Doors that get hit by carts, trolleys and delivery traffic move their frames over time. The latch and the strike stop lining up. Filing the strike is the usual field fix and the usual mistake — it buys a few months and enlarges the problem.

The alarm versus convenience problem

Almost every non-compliant exit started as a legitimate operational complaint. Staff propping a rear exit for deliveries. People using a fire exit as a shortcut and setting off alarms. Unauthorised entry through a door that will not stay shut.

These are real problems and there are compliant answers to all of them — alarmed exit devices that sound locally when the door is used, delayed egress where the occupancy permits it, electrified hardware tied into the fire alarm so that it releases on activation, and door position monitoring that reports a propped door without locking it.

What they have in common is that none of them prevents a person from getting out. The failure pattern is always the same: a staff-level solution is applied to a code-level problem, and nobody above that level finds out until an inspection.

A walkthrough worth doing quarterly

This takes about fifteen minutes in a small building and finds most of what an inspector will:

1. Push each exit device with one hand, from the middle and from the end of the bar. It should release both times.
2. Let each door close from fully open, from half open, and from a few inches open. It must latch every time.
3. Look at the latch itself as the door closes — is it throwing fully into the strike?
4. Check for added hardware: bolts, chains, padlocks, hasps, deadbolts.
5. On double doors, check both leaves latch independently.
6. Check the labels on rated doors are present and legible.
7. Walk outside each exit and check the discharge path is clear.
8. Check signage and emergency lighting over the exit.

Anything that fails these gets logged with a date. A documented list with repair dates is itself worth something during an inspection, because it demonstrates the building is being managed rather than reacted to.

Repair, adjust, or replace

Most exit device faults are adjustment and parts — latch assemblies, rods, strikes and closer valves are all serviceable items, and exit device repair is usually a matter of hours rather than a replacement project.

Replacement becomes the right answer when the device is obsolete and parts are no longer made, when it was never the correct grade for the traffic the door gets, when it is not rated and the opening requires a rated assembly, or when the door and frame have moved far enough that no amount of hardware adjustment will keep the latch aligned.

On a rated opening there is one additional rule worth stating plainly: the label on a fire exit door covers the assembly as it was tested, which means hardware substitutions are not a free choice. Fitting a non-rated device to a rated door voids the label, and an inspector who notices will treat the opening as unrated.

Frequently asked questions

Can we lock an emergency exit overnight when the building is empty?

Locking against entry from outside is normal and expected. Locking against exit from inside is the part that is not, and “the building is empty” is a judgement that depends on being right every single night. This is exactly the situation that alarmed and monitored hardware exists to solve.

Why does our rear exit set off the alarm when nobody has opened it?

Usually a door that is no longer latching fully and drifts open under wind pressure, or a door position contact that has shifted as the frame moved. Both are repairs, not alarm faults.

Is a push bar the same as a panic bar?

In everyday use the terms get used interchangeably. The distinction that matters is whether the device is listed as panic hardware, and whether it is fire-rated — a device can be one without being the other, and the opening dictates which is required.

How often should exit devices be serviced?

Testing is a routine building task and should be frequent. Mechanical servicing depends on traffic: a device on a busy retail exit works far harder than one on a rarely used stairwell door and will need attention sooner.

Our inspector flagged the closer, not the panic bar. Why?

Because a door that does not close and latch is not a functioning fire door regardless of the condition of the exit device. The closer is part of the assembly, not an accessory to it.

The short version

Push with one hand. Watch the latch throw. Look for anything added to the door that was not part of the original assembly. Those three checks catch the large majority of what gets written up, and all three are fixable before an inspector ever arrives.