Replacing double glazed units in door vs new door

[CluelessAboutBiology]

We have an uPVC external door that has a double glazed panel top and bottom with a horizontal bar across the middle.

Does anyone have any experience of replacing the glazed panels? Would it work out more expensive to replace both glazed panels than to buy a new door?

Haven’t replaced in a door but we’ve replaced some panels in our bay windows as they were getting condensation in them. A lot cheaper than new windows and frames and they’ve been great

@SnoodsI’m thinking of doing this for a couple of windows as I’ve heard the “replace the pane not the frame” jingles, just wondered whether it would be worth doing for the door.

I bet if you get a quote, replacing the glass and not the full door would be less than half the price. If the door is fine I’d be tempted to just replace the glass if that’s all that’s needed.

Thank you @Snoodsthat's just what I wanted to know so I don’t get talked into buying a door when I don’t need to! I was thinking of replacing the top pane first, then at a later date do the bottom pane, but I didn’t want to get to the stage of replacing the bottom one only to find out I’d have been better off replacing the whole door.

Loads cheaper to replace panels. I wouldn’t use a big company though.. where I am there are a couple of small independent tradesmen who do this,
the sort you’d find on your local fb page.

Very easy to change double glazed panels, I’ve done it myself a few times. Much cheaper than replacing the whole door.

However it also depends on the condition and age of the door. In the early days of double glazing they used to use external beading (rather than internal) to hold the panels in. This is a security risk because it’s extremely easy for someone to break in by removing the panels from the outside. If you have one of these doors I’d replacing the whole thing.

Thanks for pointing that out, @doris86 It’s quite an old door so I will have a look at it to see if can see external beading.