School me on Garage Doors

[mikester]

I have a garage. It has two doors. They are ugly and manually operated. They are not secure enough and I don't like them.

I want nice insulated doors to keep mainly sound out so I can work in my garage in peace. I want automatic doors, preferably sliding and not slab. I have slab doors now, they have pretty significant gaps between the doors and the frames. I'd prefer the gap be minimal to none (insulated). I would also prefer it to be secure when closed. I may consider an alarm or some kind. I use the area as a workshop and occasionally as an office work space when I need to be away from the noise inside the house. The only access into the space is through the garage doors since the area is more of a basement type setup with garage doors on the side to get in.

Normally, I wouldn't really think twice about this and I'd just look for good references (which I will do of course) but I have a pretty low ceiling in the garage. It's probably under 7". I suspect that this will make it a challenge to put the railings in for sliding doors. I also suspect that an automated opener might not have enough room to operate without interfering.

I don't usually park in my garage, it's just not really that big but I do intend to park in it when I buy that car I've been dreaming about, whatever that is (Maybe a boxster or a cayman or a Carrera 4S or a Scion FRS).

THANKS!

[Noah930]

We replaced the garage door in our house when we bought it three years ago. We went with a steel sectional one. Looks like several horizontal panels that articulate up onto a track just below the ceiling inside the garage. You can go for those inexpensive $750 deals you hear about on the radio, or up to $2K for the nicer ones. We went for the insulated door, but honestly SoCal is not the same as living in a true winter climate where I suspect it would make a real difference.

I wanted to free up ceiling space so I opted for one of those side-mounted garage door openers. It's mounted literally in a corner ceiling of the garage, next to the garage door. My mistake was having it installed by a company (Garage Doors 4 Less) not so familiar with it. So they could never get it to work reliably. After about 3 service calls (cable kept jumping off the spool) back to them after installation, we asked a garage door repairman working on the house next door to come take a look. He immediately knew about the problem and returned the next week to install a fix for about $80. It hasn't been a problem since. This was the company: Home The garage door opener also has a little automatic lock on it, so when it shuts there's a little deadbolt that activates across the garage door's tracks preventing someone from lifting open the door from the outside.

One other thing was installing a little keypad outside of the garage. While we have a door between the garage and house, it's great to be able to walk in from the driveway and open the door without a remote opener (i.e. if you're not in a car because you're just taking a walk or going for a bike ride). That might have been a $75 option, or something nominal like that. Very convenient.

[RWebb]

you can have about any look you want...

[Evans, Marv]

I don't know a thing about garage doors, except what little I learned when I bought & got mine installed. I have a 16 ft. wide by 8 ft. high & and 8 ft. x 8 ft. next to it. The cost at the time was around $2,800 installed 3+ years ago. My wife wanted wood doors, but I nixed that because of th maintenance & lack of insulation. When I talked to the guy who did ours, I told him I wanted steel, insulated, with a fake wood grain & medium dark wood color. He said it was no problem & the insulation rating would be R17. I've been very happy with them.

[look 171]

All the garage door we install are insulated for sound and not for the climate. When I put in the ones in my own home, I made sure of that. Have you open a non insulated thin gauge steel door? They rattle and shake as they open. The insulation will minimize that. If you want quiet, get a Marantec. They are slower to open and close, but I can't hear it close if I am sitting right next to the garage inside my living room. They are super quiet and worth every penny.

forgot to tell you that Marantec is the opener.

[rnln]

Get insulated garage doors and Lift master opener, the one that mounts on the wall right at the door's torsion bar. You'll be happy.

[onewhippedpuppy]

Just did mine a couple weeks ago. Insulated aluminum doors (no need to paint the exterior), raised panel exterior style, nice row of windows at the top. For my new 3rd car addition I went with high lift doors that raise right up by the ceiling to maximize vertical space for my future lift. The insulated door panels fit together with a tongue and groove design to minimize air leakage, they have an oversized gasket at the bottom where it meets the floor, and a gasket around the exterior perimeter of the door. The garage is significantly more pleasant, and holds heat much better when I use my propane heater. GET WINDOWS! I didn't have them before and it's been a huge improvement, having some natural light in that tomb is really nice.

[Z-man]

Keep in mind this: given that the garage doors are the only entry into your work area, if you have automatic garage doors, and you loose power, you will not be able to enter your area unless you devise a way of bypassing the automatic opener. Typically, you can bypass the electric mechanism by pulling on a rope tied to the release mechanism on top of the door. However, this rope is inside the garage!

I friend of mine had this issue, and came up with an interesting solution: he drilled a hole through the door and installed some type of deadbolt which was connected to the rope. In the case of a power outtage, he woud unlock the deadbolt and pull on the string to release the door.

Another suggestion: the corkscrew propelled doors require far less maintenance than the chain propelled ones, and they are a bit quieter as well.

Hope this helps,
-Z-man.

[mikester]

Yeah Z, I'm concerned about that as well. I'm actually open to getting something with a battery backup if need be.

[onewhippedpuppy]

That's not an issue so long as you have a conventional keyed entry door. Any properly installed garage door should easily open by hand if the power goes out. It's an inconvenience, but a minor one.

Are the garage doors no kidding the only way in?

[mikester]

Originally Posted by onewhippedpuppy

That's not an issue so long as you have a conventional keyed entry door. Any properly installed garage door should easily open by hand if the power goes out. It's an inconvenience, but a minor one.

Are the garage doors no kidding the only way in?

Yeah, I'll take pictures in a few and post them. The house is on a hill and the garage was placed under the house cut into the hill.

I would have done it differently...

[mikester]

Here we go. The doorways are about 81" tall and the ceiling inside is about 82".

It's short, I'm under 6ft though so it isn't terrible for me.

[onewhippedpuppy]

That makes more sense. In which case you would be hosed if the opener quit working for any reason. I would do battery backups on both sides, that way if one opener died you could still have a backup. Here's what I am planning to use on my new 3rd stall intended for a lift, it would eliminate the opener taking up your limited ceiling space.

Residential Jackshaft Garage Door Opener, Model 3800, from Chamberlain LiftMaster

Again, spring for windows. My garage previously had zero natural light, the difference is amazing.

[mikester]

What makes more sense? The manual release not being accessible in power outage situation? It's a risk, I can't be the only one on the planet with this problem though. There has to be a better solution.

[Z-man]

Originally Posted by mikester

What makes more sense? The manual release not being accessible in power outage situation? It's a risk, I can't be the only one on the planet with this problem though. There has to be a better solution.

They do have keyed manual releases as part of garage door solutions - kinda like what I described before. I think that is your best bet -- if you have a power outage, you may be able to open your garage door via the battery backup, but how many times? What if you want to close it and the battery is dead?

-Z

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by Z-man

They do have keyed manual releases as part of garage door solutions - kinda like what I described before. I think that is your best bet -- if you have a power outage, you may be able to open your garage door via the battery backup, but how many times? What if you want to close it and the battery is dead?

-Z

Park your car outside?

[sailchef]

+1 on windows.

Single car grage. Had new door istalled a few years ago and the windows are like day and night.

Aluminum sectional door 9X7, insulted and air tight with new seals all around, new tracks, new screw type lift spring. $850 installed by local Amish.

I used the exisiting opener. Geni screw type, 15 years old and still real quiet.

The old one had all kinds of gaps that let in wind and weather. It stays toasty in there now without all the draft.

The floor is a doubled up heavy Harbor Frieght canvas tarp over plastic sheeting. It keeps the moisture from comming up thru the cement floor. I have a couple 3X5 peices of 16 gauge sheet metal laying under the front and back of car to facilitate rolling the jack around.

[RWebb]

clear windows let people look in and see your 911 - get obscured glass

[scottmandue]

I'm in the market for a new garage door and a opener, two car garage with tall ceiling.

Want good solid reliable door/opener but nothing fancy and would rather not take out a second mortgage to pay for it.

I'm is So Cal (south Los Angeles) if anyone knows a good contractor PM or email me please.

Thanks

[tharbert]

I'm not so sure a there's room for anything but the single panel doors you have. The standard garage doors run either 7' or 8' tall and need another 8-10" of space above the door to move up and out of the way.

Other than the single panel doors you have, I don't think there are many inexpensive alternatives.