Diamond Grille vs Intruda vs SupaScreen: choosing security mesh

Most weeks someone rings or walks into our showroom and asks for Crimsafe. Fair enough. It’s the brand most Australians know, the same way people say Esky when they mean any cooler. What they’re really asking for is woven stainless steel security mesh, which is a product category rather than a single company. We don’t sell Crimsafe, but we make and supply screens from the same family of products, and we’re happy to explain the differences straight up.

We’ve been manufacturing aluminium windows, doors and screens at 5-9 Hogan Street in Ballina since 1971, and our security doors and windows range covers three mesh options: Diamond Grille, Intruda and SupaScreen. They all do the same basic job, keeping intruders and insects out while letting air in. Where they differ is strength, appearance and price. Here’s how we’d explain them across the counter.

The three options, plainly

Diamond Grille

Diamond Grille is the one you already recognise: a pressed aluminium grille in a diamond pattern, fitted over standard insect mesh inside an aluminium frame. It’s a visible deterrent. Anyone standing at your door can see there’s a barrier, and that alone turns away plenty of opportunists. Because the grille is aluminium rather than woven stainless steel, it’s the budget-friendly option of the three, and it’s popular for back doors, laundry doors, rentals and whole-house jobs where the numbers matter. The trade-off is that you see the grille from inside too. Some people don’t mind at all. Others do, especially on a front entry or a living room slider with a view worth keeping.

Intruda

Intruda is a woven stainless steel mesh held in an aluminium frame. There’s no grille pattern, just a fine dark mesh that your eye stops noticing after a while, so the view through it stays clear. The mesh itself is both the security barrier and the insect screen, and it’s far harder to cut or force than a standard flyscreen. Intruda sits in the middle of our range on price: proper stainless mesh security without stretching to the top shelf.

SupaScreen

SupaScreen is the top of our range and the closest match to what people picture when they say Crimsafe: high tensile stainless steel mesh in a strong frame, with a fixing system that grips the mesh right around the perimeter. It’s also the product line we turn to when a job needs BAL-rated screens for bushfire-prone blocks. If you want the strongest option we supply, or your block demands ember protection, this is the one.

Airflow and insects in a Northern Rivers summer

Anyone who’s spent February in Ballina or Lismore knows the drill: it’s hot, it’s humid, and a closed-up house is miserable. The cheapest cooling you’ll ever get is a breeze through an open door, and a security screen is what lets you leave that door open. All three of our mesh options keep mosquitoes, midges and everything else outside while the air moves through.

The stainless mesh products have a bonus here. With no grille in front of the opening, you keep close to a full view and the screen fades into the background, so the house feels open even when every door is locked. Plenty of our customers screen the whole back of the house for exactly this reason: doors open from October to April, ceiling fans on, air conditioner resting.

Ember protection on bushfire-prone blocks

Parts of the Northern Rivers carry bushfire attack level (BAL) ratings, and if you’re building or renovating on one of those blocks, your windows, doors and screens need to suit the rating. Embers are the sneaky part of a bushfire. They can travel well ahead of the fire front and work their way into gaps around openings, which is why ember screening matters even on blocks that may never see direct flame. We supply BAL-rated stainless mesh screens for these situations. Tell us the rating on your report, or bring the paperwork in, and we’ll work out what your openings need.

Keeping pets in without the barred-window look

Security mesh quietly solves a second problem: pets. A determined dog will go straight through a flyscreen, and cats treat them as climbing frames. Stainless mesh shrugs both off, so you can leave doors and windows open without the escape act.

And unlike old-style window bars, mesh doesn’t make the place look fortified. From the street, an Intruda or SupaScreen door reads as an ordinary screen door. Frames are powder coated in colours including Pearl White, Stone Beige, Apo Grey, Dune and Black, so the screens match your existing joinery instead of shouting over it.

Made to fit your existing openings

You don’t need new joinery to add security mesh. We measure the openings you already have and make screens to suit in our Ballina factory, covering hinged and sliding doors as well as window screens right through the house. Because we manufacture on site, odd sizes and older openings aren’t a drama.

We also stock spare parts (rollers, tracks, seals and handles) and do repairs in-house, so a screen we supply now can be serviced years down the track. We offer professional installation for residential and commercial properties, with supply-only options also available for homeowners and builders. We serve Ballina, Byron Bay, Lennox Head, Alstonville, Bangalow, Lismore and the wider Northern Rivers. If you’re near the beach, our piece on coastal aluminium windows is worth a read too, because salt air should shape your choice of frames and finishes.

Choosing by budget or by need

Here’s the honest version. If money is tight, or the job is a rental, a shed or a secondary door, Diamond Grille does the job and does it visibly. If you care about the view and want genuine stainless mesh strength, Intruda is the sensible middle pick and the one we quote most often for family homes. If you want the strongest screen we supply, have a BAL rating to meet, or you’re screening a front entry you’ll look at every day, go SupaScreen.

On cost, the main factors are the size and number of openings, doors versus windows, the locks you choose and the finish. Stainless mesh costs more than grille, and as a rough market guide a woven mesh door can run to several times the price of a grille door, so across a whole house the difference adds up. Mixing options is common and completely sensible: mesh on the front entry and living areas, grille on the laundry and the shed.

If you’re still tossing up, come and look at all three side by side in our showroom at 5-9 Hogan Street, Ballina. The factory opens at 6am weekdays and there’s always someone around who actually builds these screens. Or call (02) 6686 3160 and we’ll organise a free, no-obligation quote. Get in touch and we’ll help you land on the right mesh for your place, not just the dearest one.