Mayhew We are Distributors for Upstate in The New york and NJ area but do not deal with single units. Dykes is your best bet. It is a Lumber yard with brances in NJ and NY. Main office in Weehawken they handle many door manufacturers in addition to Upstate. Upstate is south of Buffalo in 3' of snow currently but luckily for them not far enough north or West to have gotten hit as hard as other counties. Fontrick the owner is Brother of the owner of Upsate. Select and Creekside The owner of Creekside was head of production at Select they all make similar products with similar designs but of the 4 Fontick and Upstate run the best operation and have better quality control and service support.

You could probably sneak a 1/32" deep line in without too much trouble. I'd use a laminate trimmer with a straight bit and a straightedge.

The answer to your question depends on your climate and whether the door will have some protection from the elements e.g., a porch or (gasp) a storm door. In our coastal Virginia climate, wood doors don't perform well, but they perform better if protected by a porch. You will need to periodically re-paint or re-stain either a FG or wood door. If you're considering a composite door, I suggest you check out Plastpro doors--In my opinion they are better engineered than Therma Tru doors and in our market they cost a little less, too.

We ordered our fiberglass door through ThermaTru. I can't speak to the quality of it yet as we have about 2 weeks to go before it arrives. I live in Texas and we've had a solid wood door for the past 11 years. It's under a covered porch and it's held up fairly well. It does swell during the summer humid months and it sticks. We opted for a fiberglass door this time around because I wanted a painted door, not stained. I've had stained the past 11 years and wanted something different so I figured why pay an upgrade for beautiful stain grade wood if I was just going to paint it.? Hopefully we like it!