Fire regs and building control

[Coughingchildren5]

Hello mumsnetters, I am hoping someone will have some insight on a building regs, fire regs question.

I am doing some work on a three storey house. We have replace two rotten wood beams in the house with steel beams according to a structural engineers spec. One is ground floor and one is on the top floor.
I have done this under a building notice.
We are using the opportunity to move the doorway on the top floor over so that we can use the landing space more effectively.
The wall under the beam is being reconstructed with stud work.

That's the picture.

So the building control guy has turned up and said he won't sign off the steel work unless we install fire doors throughout, chucking our period doors, and install a wired in fire alarm system.

As there is no loft extension, no extension etc can he really hold me to ransom over this?

I already have smoke detectors on every floor.
Any similar experiences?

It's for your safety ... I know it seems a pain but it's because it's a 3 storey building... to give you a chance to safely leave the building in the event of a fire.

You've changed the configuration of the attic by the sounds of it, so yes you will have to comply with current building regs. We have had to replace all our period doors with fire doors.

We had to install fire doors throughout our renovation because the middle bedroom had skylights so therefore no means of escape in a fire. Added £60 to each door and we had 7 that had to be fire doors.

Got them from a website in Sheffield called Doroworld. They were excellent and reasonable price compared to other places.

Hang on MrAutumn is saying it isn't Doorworld, it's Doordeals.

And try Ironmongerydirect for your handles. The ones I got eventually were £25 whereas Laura Ashley wanted £60 for exactly the same ones!

Thanks for the fab tips on where to get things from, I'll be looking at this now.

I haven't changed the configuration of anything, it was open plan door ways, it is now going to have proper doors. It's not an attic, it's a proper floor.

I have just replaced rotten stuff with steel.. the replacement wall is constructed to modern standards rather than out fof 200 hundred year old dust and rubble and wormy wood.

Struggling to understand why the building officer can ask me to upgrade parts of the building.

We had to do the same when we renovated our 3 storey holiday house. As far as I remember it was because the renovations were classed as new build changes and therefore had to conform with the latest regulations.

In our situation the previous doors were rubbish and we had to replace all doors throughout with lovely oak veneered fire doors and hidden self closers. Think we got the doors from Howdens.