I finished installing this stave core construction door yesterday.
I had never built an exterior door with lites before. Custom sized sealed units were going to run over $500 plus shipping. And I remember Jack Forsberg's comments about them being a failed technology, so I decided to use two pieces of glass sort of like my Pella windows. The outside pane sits against a foam seal:
The pieces of light colored wood you see around the inside of the frame are spacers which are the exact thickness of the two panes of glass plus the spacer between them. After the first piece of glass is laid on top of the weather stripping, the glass spacers are laid in and pin nailed to the outer spacers.
Then the second piece of glass is laid in place. Finally, the retainer pieces are cut and fit into the dado left around the inside of the frame. They look like this.
After fitting into place I pin nailed them to the frame.
This gives a nice, clean look to go with the rest of the door.
For the curious the door is white oak on the outside and white ash on the inside. I filled the grain in the white ash and colored it with dye toners to match the aged pine trim which I reused around the door. The outside is finished with GF's Exterior 450. We'll see how the finish and the door hold up behind the storm door.
John