Are Retractable Screens Hurricane Rated?

No, an ordinary retractable insect or solar screen is not hurricane rated, zip track or not, and it should be raised before a storm. A separate product class, the fabric hurricane screen, is: it rolls down like a patio screen but uses heavy PVC or polymesh fabric in anchored aluminum tracks, and it carries a Florida product approval or a Miami-Dade Notice of Acceptance (NOA) after large missile impact and cyclic pressure testing. The approval, not the word "hurricane" in a brochure, is what makes it storm protection, and it only covers the opening sizes, pressures and mounts printed in the approval drawings.

Two products that look the same when they are up

Both are a head box, a rolled fabric and two side tracks, which is why the confusion exists. Installers sell "storm screens" and "zip screens" from the same showroom, and a dual-use hurricane screen does double as a shade and privacy screen on calm days. But the two are engineered for loads that differ by an order of magnitude.

A zip insect or solar screen is a light mesh with a zipper or bead welded to its edges, sized so it stays in its tracks in moderate wind. Our zip track wind resistance guide covers the ratings: EN 13561 class 3, the top class most suppliers quote, is a 110 Pa test pressure, about 30 mph (48 km/h). The wind classes table gives the full conversion. That is a deployment limit, and above it the screen comes up. Nothing about the zip edge changes that, and the site's position is unchanged: zip screens are not hurricane protection.

A fabric hurricane screen is built and tested as a protective system for an opening. In the Fenetex drawing for Florida approval FL8637, the fabric is one of three tested types (polymesh, PVC laminate or PVC mesh), a 6 mm double-flap keder is welded along the track sides and weight bar with a weld at least 20 mm wide, and the tracks are 6063-T6 or 6005A-T6 aluminum profiles fastened into concrete, block, wood or steel at maximum spacings between 2 and 6 in (50 and 150 mm) set by an anchor schedule. Edge retention is the same idea as a zip screen, at a different scale; the edge types themselves are compared in zip track, keder and zipper edges.

Mesh openness explains some of the gap: an insect screen lets most of the air through, while a hurricane fabric is far less open and takes far more of the load. See screen mesh openness factor, and solar screens vs insect screens for the everyday mesh choice.

Approved hurricane screens compared, from the approval documents

Every figure below was read from the approval documents themselves, not from brochures: the Fenetex FL8637 product evaluation report and FL8637 installation drawing (13 sheets), and the Miami-Dade NOAs for Alutech Storm Tex, 20-0410.05 and 25-0728.02. Pressures are allowable design pressures, positive and negative.

The Storm Tex catalog listing gives maximum dimensions of 24 ft wide by 20 ft high (288 by 240 in), manual or motorized operation, and NOA 20-0410.05. The approval drawings confirm the 288 in width, but only at 35 psf, and the listing's NOA is the one that has passed its printed expiration date. That is the pattern to expect: brochures quote the largest size and the best pressure as if they came together, and they do not.

How to verify an approval number yourself

1. Get the number in writing. Ask for the Florida approval number (FL plus digits) or the Miami-Dade NOA number (two digits, a hyphen, four digits, a point and two digits). The Fenetex drawing requires a permanent label on each screen showing the Florida approval number, the missile level, wind zone and test standards; the Storm Tex NOA requires a label reading "Miami-Dade County Product Control Approved".
2. Look it up at the source. Florida numbers are in the state's product approval search, where the evaluation report and installation drawing are attached. NOAs are in the Miami-Dade product control search, and each NOA is a PDF whose first page states the approval and expiration dates.
3. Check the dates and code edition. The Fenetex evaluation is to the Florida Building Code eighth edition (2023) and says re-evaluation is required when the code or ASCE standard changes. An NOA past its expiration date is not valid, by its own wording.
4. Find your opening in the table. Look up your width in the design pressure schedule and compare it with the site design pressure, which the Fenetex drawing says is determined by others for the specific job per ASCE 7-22. Your number must be equal to or below the table value.
5. Check glass separation. The fabric bellies when hit. Fenetex requires 32 in (813 mm) minimum from fabric to glass in the HVHZ and Wind Zone 4. The current Storm Tex table requires 29.75 in (756 mm) at 288 in wide and 35 psf, and that is required in HVHZ areas, with the local authority deciding elsewhere.
6. Check the mount and substrate. The anchor schedule lists the substrates and fasteners allowed. Conditions not listed need site-specific design by a registered engineer.

Whether a permit is needed and who reviews it is a local question; our permits and building codes guide covers how to ask.

What the approval does not cover

Places outside Florida. The Fenetex drawing states the evaluation is valid for use in Florida only, and use elsewhere requires review and certification by a local design professional. A Miami-Dade NOA is accepted for use in Miami-Dade County and other areas where the authority having jurisdiction allows it. Outside Florida, ask your building department what it accepts before you buy.

Your specific site. Both documents call themselves generic, non-site-specific evaluations. The approval says the screen resists the tabulated pressures when installed exactly as drawn into a host structure that can carry the loads; the Fenetex report adds that any alteration to the drawing invalidates it. Whether your wall, beam or post can carry those reactions is for the permit holder and, where conditions differ, a licensed engineer.

Sizes beyond the table. There is no extrapolation. A 26 ft opening on a product whose table stops at 288 in needs a mullion or another product.

The motor and the roll-up. Fenetex: "operability of roll-up mechanism and hood assembly are not part of this approval." Storm Tex: the roll-down mechanism is not part of the approval and must be certified by an independent testing agency. So the approval does not tell you the screen will come down when you need it. A motorized screen needs power at the moment you deploy, and storms take power out, so ask what the manual override is, and lower the screens while the weather is still calm, as you would close shutters.

Substitutions. The approval covers the tested fabric and components. Swapping in a lighter shade fabric, or another brand's track, leaves you with an unapproved screen even if it looks identical.

Is a dual-use shade and storm screen worth it?

It suits openings that already want a large screen: a lanai or porch face, a pool area, a wide glass wall. On a porch or lanai, a dual-use screen gives shade and privacy most days and storm protection to the openings behind it when lowered It is mounted and anchored very differently from a motorized patio screen of the same size, so treat it as storm protection that also shades, not the other way round. The glass separation rule also means it sits far out from the glass, often at the outer face of a porch, rather than tight over a window.

It is a poor fit where insect screening is the main goal, because the fabric is far less open than insect mesh. The Fenetex drawing allows a secondary non-hurricane screen track attached to the hurricane track, with its anchors not counted in the anchor calculations.

Frequently asked questions