Roll-Down Hurricane ShuttersWilmington, NC

Wilmington, New Hanover County

What roll-downs cost in Wilmington, and the openings that earn them

Roll-down hurricane shutters in Wilmington are $52/sq ft installed for the manual crank version. A pulldown pole instead of a crank adds $400 per opening. An electric motor adds $700 per opening. The rate covers the curtain, the head box, the side tracks, stainless anchors, the New Hanover County permit and a per-opening design pressure calculation.

The honest position is that most Wilmington houses should not be covered entirely in roll-downs. Accordions at $38/sq ft carry the identical ASTM E1886/E1996 rating, and on a ground-floor window you can reach, the extra money buys convenience rather than protection. What we quote here is usually a mix: roll-downs on the four or five openings that earn them, something cheaper on the rest.

The openings that earn them are upstairs. Wilmington has a great many two-story houses with bedroom glass twenty feet up and no comfortable way to reach it. Somebody has to get to those windows with a storm coming, usually the owner, usually alone, usually on a ladder in wind that is already rising. A roll-down is the only rated system that covers second-story glass from inside the room.

The second case is width. Landfall, Porters Neck and the houses backing onto the Intracoastal were designed around their water-facing glass, and an accordion covering that span meets in the middle of it. A roll-down comes down as one curtain, so the opening you paid for is still one opening when the shutters are up.

Then there is the house nobody is standing in. A motorized roll-down closes from a switch, a remote or a phone, which is the whole argument for the $700. We do not fit battery backup and we will tell you why if you ask: the units are temperamental and tend to be flat on the day they are needed. Every motorized system we install has a manual override crank instead, which is mechanical and works with the power out.

The question people ask last and should ask first is the wiring. A motorized opening needs power at the head box, and on an older Wilmington house that run is sometimes straightforward and sometimes awkward, depending entirely on what is above the window. We look at it during the measure and quote the electrical as part of the number, because a motor price that leaves it out is not a price.