Loft Ladder, Loft ladders, Attic Stairs

Safe and convenient access to your attic or ceiling space with a Gorter scissor stair attic ladder

Gorter has for many years been the leading supplier of attic ladders, scissor attic stairs and other access ladders throughout Europe and their entire range is now available throughout Australia, New Zealand and the Middle East.

The Gorter range of scissor stairs is perhaps the most convenient, durable and cost effective access system for access to both industrial and domestic attics and ceiling spaces.

Catering for most ceiling heights, Gorter attic ladders/scissor stairs are made from durable aluminium, and are housed in a high strength wooden casing with a hinged ceiling panel which can be finished to match the existing ceiling. The attic ladder is counterbalanced and its light-weight construction makes operation practically effortless.

Gorter attic ladders are load tested up to 450kg and thus suitable for practically any domestic or industrial application. Gorter attic stairs are suitable for suspended ceilings and can be supplied with a patented plenum system which spans the gap between the ceiling and roof whilst maintaining the gradient of the original attic ladder. Operation of the attic ladder requires less than 3kg of force and the adjustable anti skid steps and telescopic handrails ensure it is a safe and convenient access solution.

All Gorter scissor stair attic ladders are safety approved by Aboma Keboma (licensed assessor) in accordance with International standards EN 1050, EN-ISO 14122-3.

Standard features include:
-Hook and eye
-Stair guide control system
-Telescopic Handrail (can be mounted left or right)
-High strength adjustable anti-skid aluminium steps
-Counter balanced (less than 3kg-force required for operation)
-Safety Approval Report (EN-ISO 14122-3) available
-Padlock hasp to lock attic ladder into place

Optional Features include:
-Fire rating (60 minutes fire rated – type EI-60 – opening size: 700mm x 1200mm)
-Extension for floor to ceiling heights greater than 3000mm (not available for type:small)
-Plenum extension for suspended ceilings without changing gradient of steps (Max ceiling to roof           height: 1200mm)
-Dual handrails (Standard on type:XL)
-Electrical operation

Gorter Attic ladders can be conveniently combined with a Gorter roof hatch to provide a complete access solution.

With other options often costing many thousands of dollars in manufacture and installation, Gorter attic ladder scissor stairs are a convenient and cost effective alternative, guaranteed to be the cheapest in Australia For product comparable in quality and features

Ladder Attic

What am I talking about? Just a quick post today to address some of the questions that were sent to us recently about loft ladders and there was a particular good one addressed “ladder attic”. I asked the sender of the email to send it through as a post so that we can all see it and have a laugh as I cannot paste it in my post without permission…

Mostly asked questions in the last month were about sourcing and installation of loft ladders so I’ll have to speed up with my post on the complete installation process and I’ll address some of the questions in this post that we had regarding sourcing a  good quality loft ladder.

We have a lot of email saying that folks go to a hardware store and find no attic ladder or they spoke to staff and they say it is available and can order it in. The ladder will be there in a few weeks time and the price tag is rather unattractive.

Well the price as with anything else will represent the quality in most of the cases and you should be concerned about the quality of your loft ladder. You might be able to compromise on the finish in case it will be in the garage or something but you need a good quality product for safety and longevity. You wouldn’t want to replace your ladder in a year or two.

Particularly if the ladder will be used frequently. One of the biggest disadvantage of the cheaper loft ladders is that they may not be suitable for frequent usage. They are OK if you use them a few times a month.

We also got some of our readers saying they are having challenges sourcing the loft ladder online as well. At the time I write this post I have not come across a good quality loft ladder e-commerce site so hopefully it is not that far away…

The info on the products on current sites is minimal and the navigation on the sites is not cool. As loft ladders become popular in Australia, they will be more sites available offering good service I reckon.

This page is to make sure all of our readers know that the products we are referring to or offering information about on this site are loft ladders and we do not call them attic ladders. The reason behind this post is to make sure  that our readers are aware that  “Attic Ladder” is a registered trademark for  an organisation (that we are not associated with any way what so ever).

We would like to point out that we respect this fact and to demonstrate this further we don’t mention the phrases of Attic Ladder or Attic Ladders in our site and ask our readers to respect this trademark when posting comments and please use loft ladder instead of attic ladders.  This website is not associated or affiliated with the organisation that owns the trademark in any shape or form.

Furthermore, the content of this website is not authorised or approved by any other company or third party organisation.

And lastly all information on this website is for information only and not advice. It is not authorised, licensed or approved by any other organisations.

I hope above is a clear explanation and makes it apparent to everyone that we are not calling the the attic access ladders attic ladders, we are calling them loft ladders.

If you just arrived to our site and have no idea what the above disclaimer is about, then I feel obligated to address you as well.

If you don’t know what the loft ladders are, please read on and I’ll give you a quick introduction.

First of all loft ladders are used to access the attic area of properties and they are  foldaway ladders attached to the top of a hatch door that can be opened down and the ladder unfolded when it needed and closed away when not in use.

Here is a picture of a loft ladder:

Above picture demonstrates how a loft ladder looks like in opened position ready to use and access the attic.

The below picture is the same loft ladder folded up:

These loft ladders are the easiest way to access your attic area for storage or for converting your attic into a living area. The things to look out for when purchasing a loft ladder is the length to make sure you are getting the length that suits your floor to ceiling height. I am talking about the purchasing criteria in another post so I will not go into too much details here however, I’ll mention one more important one that is the roof structure of your property. You’ll have to have a look up in your attic to see what is the structure of your roof is and that will mainly determine the loft ladder type and hatch door with that your structure can accommodate.

As loft ladders and converting lofts into storage areas getting more and more popular, we have an increasing number of inquires on how difficult it is to install a loft ladder.

Just a few years this project was mainly for skilled DIY-ers or tradesman. Nowadays more and more blokes are figuring it out that it is not that difficult of a project and they give it a go.

Making a hole in the ceiling scares some people away but if you purchase a quality loft ladder and follow the assembly instructions properly you will be fine as it is well within a DIY project.

The most important thing here is that you should never cut or remove roof members in modern truss roof (the ones with a “W” shaped webs) without professional advice as it can quite easily affect the structure of the roof. So when you considering a spot for your loft ladder keep that in mind.

It is also quite easy to screw-down 17mm plywood sheets for flooring and that will give sufficient support for your weight as well as for lightweight storage.

In later posts I will give a run down on a complete installation.