If you want a wall of glass that stacks to one side or rolls away into the wall, IWC is one of the aluminum lines we build them from. IWC is International Window, and it prints two catalogs. Keltic is the architectural book, and that is where the multi-slide and pocket doors live. Ambassador is the other one, and it carries the retrofit frame.
Every big slider gets harder to push eventually, and it is almost never the door. It is the track. Grit blows in here and never leaves, and season by season it grinds a track down, so the part that wears is the part you want to ask about.
IWC extrudes the Keltic track as one piece of aluminum. That single piece carries up to four tracks, and more tracks attach to it when you want more panels. Fewer joints across a long opening. The one-piece extrusion is flush mount only, so a recessed track gets built a different way, and the track itself comes out the same width either way.
Running inside that extrusion is a separate stainless steel track. IWC's own line is that all stainless steel tracks are removable and replaceable. So a worn track is a part, not a door. Stainless track caps and stainless fasteners throughout. That matters more here than it sounds, because blown sand gets into everything eventually, and a fastener that has rusted into the extrusion is what turns a small job into a long one.
The Roll-Xtreme roller runs on precision stainless steel ball bearings. IWC lists it among the Keltic door advantages and names it standard on the pocket door. It is not standard everywhere. On the Keltic View the standard is a smaller stainless roller and Roll-Xtreme becomes the upgrade, while on the sliding glass doors it is standard on two of the three series and optional on the third. Ask which roller is written into the quote you are holding.
These are the same multi-slide system set up two ways, and the trade runs in both directions. The lock stile is the vertical piece of frame at the handle where two panels meet, and on a long opening it is the piece sitting right in the middle of your view. One setup gives you less of it. The other gives you the heavier roller as standard, plus the only panel sizes IWC prints anywhere.
Less frame in the view
IWC's own description is the same door with more of the view. You get a narrower lock stile, and a flush pull in place of a recessed handle. The trade is the roller, because the heavy one is an upgrade here instead of the standard, and no panel sizes are published for this door at all, so we settle yours with the factory before anything gets drawn.
The standard multi-slide
The heavier roller on stainless steel ball bearings sits in the Keltic door advantages and in the pocket door key features. This is also the one spread in the whole book where panel sizes are printed at all. You will find them in the table below. No lock stile figure is printed for this door.
Everything below comes out of one of two IWC books. Keltic covers the architectural aluminum, so that is the big sliding openings, the block frames and the stainless tracks that lift out. Ambassador covers the windows and the retrofit frame. A finish list, a roller or a sill from one book tells you nothing about the other, which is why we have kept the two of them in separate rows down the page.
Keltic, the architectural book
Keltic 7800 and View 7801 · Architectural aluminum
Three series · LC25 · LC35 · CW40
Keltic 7080 · Thermally broken aluminum
Ambassador, and the retrofit frame
Ambassador 8200 · Isobar ThermoTech
Ambassador 8880 and 8881
Two of these are ours, and two are rules California wrote for you.
Five steps, in the order they run.
These four settle how a door feels once it is in your wall. IWC's own figure sits at the bottom of each card, and the fuller list of printed figures is further down the page.
Bigger panels mean fewer uprights in the middle of your view. IWC prints panel sizes in one spread of the Keltic book and for both Ambassador multi-slides. The rest we settle with the factory first.
The sill is the piece you step over on the way out to the patio. On the pocket door and the View it sits down into the floor, so there is barely a step. On the ordinary Keltic slider you pick the height. A taller one sheds water better.
Two panes, sealed together with a dual seal around the edge. On the Keltic doors those panes are tempered. Tempered is the safety glass that breaks into blunt pieces instead of sharp ones, which is what you want in a door grandchildren run through.
Every frame has a depth. Your wall has to be at least that deep, or it gets built out on site. We check this first on a house that already stands.
Every figure here is printed in IWC's own brochures, and where one is not printed the row says so.
| What you're choosing | Which door | IWC's printed figure |
|---|---|---|
| Panel width and height | Keltic 7800 pocket door | 3 to 6 ft wide, up to 12 ft tall |
| Panel width and height | Ambassador 8880 | Up to 4 ft by 9 ft |
| Panel width and height | Ambassador 8881 | Up to 5 ft by 10 ft |
| Panel width and height | Keltic View 7801 | Not printed |
| Frame in the middle of the view | Keltic View 7801 | 2 3/4 in lock stile |
| The step at the threshold | Keltic sliding glass door | 1 5/8 in, 2 in or 3 in sill |
| The step at the threshold | Keltic pocket door and View | 1 in or 1 1/2 in, recessed |
| How deep your wall must be | Keltic sliding glass door | 4 1/2 in or 5 7/8 in frame |
| How deep your wall must be | Ambassador 8200 windows | 2 3/4 in frame |
| Which roller you get | Keltic doors | 3 in Roll-Xtreme, or 1 7/8 in on the View |
| Energy numbers | Both books | Not printed |
Exact numbers move with the configuration, so we confirm yours with the factory before anything goes on a drawing.
We warranty our installations for a year and stand behind our work. Typically manufacturers would offer a limited lifetime warranty or 10 year warranty on their products (you would need to refer to each manufacturer for their respective warranties). The Keltic book prints no warranty at all, and the Ambassador window pages print the words lifetime warranty with no terms beside them, so ask us for IWC's current document and read it before you count on it. After twelve months we still come out, and there is a charge for the visit.
California's contractor board tells homeowners to get three bids before they sign, and that is sound advice, so get two more alongside ours. Compare the glass, the frame material, and whether each door is block frame or retrofit. Then ask all three who pulls the permit and whether the labor guarantee is written into the contract. If ours is the one you sign, our office files the manufacturer claim for you, and you call the same number you called to buy the door.
Tap any photo to open it full size, and use the arrows to move through the set.
These come up more than anything else, and here they are the way we say them in the showroom.
No. IWC prints that claim on its hinged door and on the Ambassador window series, and not on the sliding or the multi-slide doors. Neither book prints a U-factor, which is the number describing how fast heat moves through a window. The LC25, LC35 and CW40 markings grade weather and structural performance instead of energy.
So if a thermally broken aluminum window is what you are after, the Ambassador window series is the one to look at. Our valley sits in California Climate Zone 15, which puts a hard limit on how much sun heat your glass may let in, so talk to us about Title 24 before you specify a wall of glass and not after. Aluminum is the case where Title 24 usually wants a consultant to model your whole envelope. We arrange that consultant and manage the process, though we do not do the modeling ourselves.
On the Keltic door series IWC stocks four: bronze anodized, clear anodized, Kynar white and Kynar Mojave beige. Other finishes are available by request. IWC ties those four to keeping lead times short but prints no timings anywhere, so ask us about a special finish and we will get the current answer from the factory instead of guessing it for you. Do that early if a committee that meets once a month has to see your color.
Two things sit outside the four. The Keltic hinged door runs its own standard list, clear anodized and bronze anodized, with others available. Ambassador works on a dual color system altogether. You name the outside finish and the inside finish separately, so a dark frame on the street side need not mean a dark frame against your white walls.
On a run of windows, or a single slider going back into openings that already exist, most homes are finished in one to two days. Your house is closed up again each evening before we leave.
A block frame multi-slide is a different job, because the wall has to be opened and rebuilt around the door. That runs longer, and stucco patching and texture add days of their own. We put the day count in your quote so you can plan around it.
Probably not. On a Keltic the stainless steel track your rollers run on is a serviceable part. IWC states that all of its stainless steel tracks are removable and replaceable, so a chewed-up track is something we change and not a reason to buy a door.
You can slow the wear yourself. Vacuum the channel out a few times a year, especially after a wind event. Keep the sill drainage clear so water leaves the way it was built to. If your door is still heavy after that, call us and we will come and look at the rollers.
Yes. One patio slider, or one hinged door, is a normal call, and we book it the same way we book a whole house.
What we will not do is drop a Keltic multi-slide into an opening that has to stay exactly as it is. That door needs the wall built around it. We also do not install garage doors at all. If your job is a like-for-like swap in the openings you already have, say so on the phone and we will point you at the products that do that.
Four pages pick up where this one stops, and each answers a different part of your job.
Family owned in Palm Desert since 1986, license 906636, and our own crews go out on every job from Palm Springs through Indio. We pull more window and door permits than any other company in the Coachella Valley. Come by 75-100 Saint Charles Place, Monday to Friday, 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM. Bring your opening sizes if you have them, and we will tell you which of these suits your house.
