Patio Door

I am not sure if this is the right forum but if I was looking at getting a Patio door, standard size from a big chain store is any one better than the other?

What material are you looking at?

Vinyl white on white door.

there are a few quality vinyl patio door brands out there. however, they are not sold in any of the big box stores. brands i recommend are okna, gorell, polaris, sunrise, and soft lite. all of them are very well designed and energy efficient. i can almost guarantee that any vinyl patio door purchased at a big box or local supply store will warp and leak air in a few years, which means you will need to pay someone to rip it out and then pay for a new patio door as well, essentially paying for the job twice. quality vinyl brands will not lead to that.

Pay close attention to the sill on a patio slider. It's one of the major differences between the lower priced box store/builder grade types of sliders. You don't want a vinyl sill that is more like a pocket. The next step up would be an aluminum sill. The correct sill in this day and age would be fiberglass. Most of the better sliders out there all have them.

Sunrise makes on the finest sliders out there, but it's not the cheapest. Plygem and Paridigm make a similar looking door although I've not seen one in recent years. Vista makes a decent budget slider that works very nice. Then there is always Andersen which can be pretty good as far a sliders goes.

I agree with the above posters, there is nothing off the shelf of a box store worth buying. You may find higher end Anderson, Pella, and Weathershield products depending on your location, but only in their top wood lines. At that point, you'll pay more than just purchasing a quality vinyl product from a builders supply house. If you want to diy, that would be my recommendation.

Where does simonton fit into the mix for patio doors?

My experience is limited, but if their door is in the same class as their windows, it is smack-in- the- middle.