Customer Reviews

Bug Off 36 by 80 Instant Screen, Fits Standard Single Front Doors and 6-Foot Sliding Glass Doors

5 star:		(141)
4 star:		(77)
3 star:		(30)
2 star:		(19)
1 star:		(17)

 

 

I have a fenced-in back yard and three years ago, bought one of these to hang in the back door because I didn't want to cut a hole in walls or doors to install a permanent dog door. My idea, of course, was to give the dogs the freedom to come and go as they please, and to ease my role as doorman. From about April to October, the storm door and house door are open whenever practical, and the set-up has worked just as I had hoped. I get very few insects inside, and after some hesitation at first, the dogs are totally comfortable with it. The screen panels hang from an adjustable spring rod, and the magnets both weight it and close it every effectively. This year, after over two years of use, the dogs tore it a little, and I bought another to have in reserve, simply because it's ingenious and effective. As for human use, when my hands are full, I use an elbow or whatever I'm carrying to press against the center, and it opens fine, and closes behind me.

Length:: 0:38 Mins

This is the Smart Screen, magnetic door. It is simple great. Lets the pets come and go while keeping the bugs out. Take a look at the simple to install door at my home.

We have a back door on which we can't use a traditional screen door. The hands-free door works great and was very easy to install! The dogs and the grandkids easily learned how to go in and out on their own. So now I can keep let the breeze in but keep the bugs out. One note of caution - the product uses magnets to re-close the screen. Our back door is metal so occasionally one of the magnets sticks to the door instead of to the other magnet so the screen doesn't close. A minor inconvenience.

After one full summer season we have the following comments:
We have a door that is located in a place that swing screen door will not work. The Hands-Free Screen Door fit our needs well. Our dog can go in and out on his own. It does a good job of keeping out bugs and closing behind who ever goes through. It's easy to put up and take down for storage in the winter. The material is heavy and strong enough to last for years. We clean it by hanging the door over our deck railing and washing with a hose.

Would I buy again: Yes.

We have a sliding screen door, but our dog has twice pushed out the screen by going berserk at the sight of a squirrel, and I was hoping for a solution that would let the dog in and out without having to keep replacing the screen. The Bug Off has proved to be a qualified success.

The opening I need to cover is a couple of inches shorter than this screen allows---in order to open and close readily, and keep flying insects out, it needs to be placed at exactly the right height for the bottom of the screen to swing smoothly right above the floor. If it's too long, it drags on the ground and doesn't work right. There's no mechanism in the way it's designed to adjust the length. Also, the "adjustable" tension bar proved to be adjustable only once, so that once I had expanded it to its maximum width, I found that it could not be reduced back in length again. It's stuck in the fully extended position.

Fortunately, with a little tinkering I was able to get the Bug Off to work. Since it was too long anyway, I dispensed with the bar at the top, and instead folded the top over by a few inches, pressing it with a warm iron to make a decent fold. I then added some additional velcro pieces across the top, putting the matching velcro pieces along the top of the door frame. The Bug Off uses velcro fasteners along the side, so now I have it mounted on the door with velcro along the top as well as the sides. Since I was able to fold the top over to get the overall length just right, it now fits the space perfectly, and I can put it up and take it down in just 20 or 30 seconds. It seems to me that the "velcro all around" method would work better for many applications than the bar that it comes with.

The screen itself works pretty well. It's a bit awkward to walk through it, but manageable, and you have to let it fall back in place just right or the magnetic closures in the middle won't come together properly. That's easy enough for an adult to do, but kids and pets can't be counted on to do it right every time. But even if they don't, it still closes together decently so as not to allow much room for flies and mosquitos to go through.

All in all, it's OK, if you have just the right space for it. It's less expensive than re-screening a screen door!

The Bug Off Instant Door is a clever item, and the idea is carried out well. This is a fairly simple invention -- a hanging screen "curtain" designed to be set in an open doorway to keep bugs out. And it does just that, beautifully. You install it by running the expandable black curtain-rod type hanger through loops at the top of the curtain and adjusting it to fit the top of your door frame. Next you peel and stick a couple of Velcro tabs on each bottom corner to hold the lower edges flush with the door frame. And you're done.

I had to fiddle with the location of the velcro tabs a bit to keep the edges nice and flush, but overall this is a 5-10 minute installation. Once in place, the Bug Off works great. It has a nicely weighted nylon canvas strip at the bottom, and a set of covered magnets on the inner edges to help the curtain lock back shut after someone (or, in our case, some dog) passes through. We put ours on the screen porch to let the dogs run to and fro without letting bugs in of a summer's night. Took them a few tries to get the hang of it (they're small, and I think they worried the weighted edges would swing back and clip them, but that doesn't happen).

Since installation, we've been able to leave the screen door "open" with about 99% fewer bugs. Moreover, this is just a well-put together piece. It's actually attractive and feels like it will last for years. The way the magnets and bottom weights are invisibly tucked away maintains a neat look that appears like it could have come with the porch. I absolutely recommend this product to anyone wanting the door open but the bugs out.

Good quality and it works well. I have three of these things and they certainly work. I wouldn't use them in an area where there are lots of bugs swarming around (like when I lived in Austin, Texas). However, here in Arizona, they keep out the bugs.

We got this screen so we could leave our back door open and not let the bugs in. It works great and is easy to get through and the magnets really help keep the pieces together. It's very wind resistant. We've had some 30+ mph winds recently and there was no problem with the screen falling down. It hasn't yet. I would definitely invest in it again.

We made the mistake of selecting outward opening French doors for a kitchen renovation - thus no screens.

There were few choices. The bug-off screen was the least costly and invasive.

It went up easily with the telescoping rod and height adjustment pockets.
Sealing the edges is another story. We expected velcro or magnets or something on the sides, but no. You want that, you have to go to Radio Shack for magnets.

The screen itself is robust and well made.
Heavy polymer web with nicely finished oversewn edges.
The overlap of the magnet closed center effectively closes the screen.
In and out traffic is ok, but reminds me of a tent flap.

However the heaviness of the screen adds both stiffness and opacity.
The bug-away is probably 2-3x darker, more opaque, than a normal window/door screen. It's obtrusively dark and interferes with the light, vision and "bringing the outdoors in" function of the big glass French doors in the first place.

Rather than leaving the screen up for the summer, my wife took it down and said we would only use it if we had a party or some function on the kitchen deck.

So there you have it, works, well-made, easy to install - but darker than other screens and needs additional side tie-down points for a good seal.

The only reason I did give this four stars, is because the rod supplied with the screen. After reading the reviews on this product, I looked in the hardware store for similar product. I was told at two different hardware stores I visited that they are no longer available and are on online item only. So back to the internet I went. I ordered this because I liked the idea of a no hands screen. For that it works great. With one small dog, two kids using the back yard a lot this is the fix we where looking for. Since our door opens to the outside, a traditional screen door opening into the kitchen area just would not work. Plus the dogs hands are just wrong for opening doors. We wanted to be able to have the door open for a cross breeze in the kitchen, keep out insects and let the dog come and go as he pleased. I ordered this fully expecting the rod that comes with it not to work, And it did not! The rest of the product does just like it says. If you clean the painted surface around the door first the Velcro tabs stick just fine.
However the spring tension curtain rod that comes with the screen is total junk. I never got the screen up with it. Following the instructions " adjust the rod 1 inch wider than the door opening, compress and place in the opening" AHAHAHA!! It is so cheap it could not even do this!! I went to the hardware store and got a basic spring tension rod and the screen works fine.We have been using this for a month now and it is just what we wanted, So for that I gave it four stars.