Quick Guide to Selecting the Right Pet Patio Door

There are quite a few pet patio doors, and this quick guide helps you to choose the right one for you and your pet.

There are three choices to be made.

Step 1: Determine the Right Height for Your Patio Door

The standard size pet patio door has been specifically manufactured for Australian conditions. The diagram above shows this measurement and it is 1980mm - 2102mm in height (the spring loaded top section provides this height variation).

Measure your door from the bottom of the inside track to the top of the top track (essentially this is the height of your sliding door plus 10-20mm).

If this measurement is between 1980mm and 2102 mm, the standard Pet Patio Door is the right one for you. This solution fits 9 out of 10 of every door sold, so check to make sure that your measurement is really outside this range!

If your measurement is slightly higher than this, in the range 2102 mm to 2380 mm, then you purchase the standard Pet Patio Door from a retailer and order a small extension piece directly from Pig in Mud - click here for the extensions page.

If you have an unusually high door frame (greater in height than 2380 mm) or an unusually short door frame (less than 2038 mm) then we have special order doors for these heights (as these are specially made they cost around $150 extra):

   Tall Door Option for heights between 2380mm and 2450mm (see special height sections for dogs and for cats); and

    Short Door Option for heights between 1900mm and 1970mm (see special height sections for dogs and for cats).

If your door frame  height is taller than the 2450 mm then you should purchase the Tall door from our retailers, and then order an extension piece directly from us - click here to go to the extensions page.  

Click here for metric conversions  

In summary:

Now you have the right height door panel done! The next step is to determine the right size pet door flap for your pet ....... 

Step 2 and 3: Measure the Height of Your Dog at the Shoulder and its Width

For Cats it is easy - there are just two sizes.

          For most cat breeds, select the Standard Cat Patio Door.

          If you have a quite large cat, select the Large Cat Patio Door.

For Dogs, there are quite a few variations. The easy way is to go straight the Breeds Guide, select your breed and follow the advice there.

For a quick selection, the majority of our sales  are in the following two categories (so please check if you are really outside of these categories):

Medium Pet Patio Doors - suited to a lot of the popular breeds, such as Maltese / Shi Tzu crosses, Cavalier Spaniels, Miniature Poodles, Jack Russels; and
 
Extra Large Pet Patio Doors - suited to the popular larger breeds, such as Staffies and Bull Terriers.

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Outside of these popular sellers, we suggest that you measure the shoulder height of the dog and the width across the shoulders. 

Shoulder Height is the height from the ground to the area on the back of the dog's neck directly above its front legs. 

Width is hard to measure with a tape measure, so we suggest that you open your sliding door just wide enough to allow your dog to pass, and measure this width.

If you have a puppy then measuring your dog will not help you! We recommend you go to the Breeds Section and select the breed closest to your dog. 

Once you have these two measurements you can select the right door from the table below:

Some Restrictions on Stock

Due to the large range of options, there are some restrictions on the stock that we carry.

1.  Tall and Short Door Options are only available in the Mill Silver Finish and not in White or Brown powder coat

2.  The Tall Dog, Low Rise and Very Tall Dog options are not available in Short Door and Tall Door formats annd are only available in Mill Silver Finish and not in White or Brown powder coat. For these doors a custom extension must be supplied. Please contact us directly on 1300 78 38 39 to discuss if you have the requirement for a Tall Dog or Very Tall Dog option and also require either a short door height or a tall door height. 

3.  At present, none of these special stock items are available in New Zealand due to restrictions on freight