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Choosing the Right Garage Door
Choosing the Right Garage Door
As far as we are concerned at The Garage Door Centre to make sure you choose the right garage door the easiest thing to do is to pick up the phone and call us. We have 34 years experience with every possible type of garage door available, we supply and install over 6,000 doors a year of all shapes, sizes, designs, materials and mechanisms, manual and electric.
We can give you the best impartial advice based on your requirements and/or constraints in the garage. We are a family owned company and only recommend the very best type of doors for the application and can discuss simple or complex specifications on standard or totally bespoke garage doors.
However, if you want some light reading then read on……
The choice in garage door mechanisms hasn’t really changed that much in over 30 years but the quality of the materials and mechanisms have. Safety has become far more important bearing in mind most garage doors are quite a size and weight and of course so many more doors are electrically operated now so the safety features are very important. The availability of so many more colours and special finishes is also far greater as well as clever access control devices to provide the most convenient and secure control of electric garage door systems.
Insulation
Insulation has become a far greater factor with a greater awareness of the need to reduce energy consumption and with a big rise in insulated garage doors there has also been a greater emphasis on weather sealing to help make certain garage door types closer in performance to a front door.
Certain garage doors lend themselves to being insulated in their design and mechanism and panel design – Look at sectional doors, roller doors and side hinged doors primarily with a good choice now of matching pedestrian side doors, also insulated.
Security
Home and Garage security has always been a big issue with customers but the need for ‘real’ security has driven many doors to be tested, retested and certified with a ‘secure by design’ accreditation.
Some garage doors are quite simply more secure in their basic design than others anyway, but security is still one of the top features for almost ALL garage doors we supply and install.
Convenience
Most garage where a vehicle is stored inside will have an electric garage door these days for convenience and security but for so many garages where there is never going to be a vehicle inside then the garage door perhaps needs more convenience geared towards the pedestrian? There are many garage doors now available with a ‘wicket’ or ‘pedestrian’ door set into the main garage door panel providing easy access on foot without having to open the main door.
Design
It is now possible to almost completely design your own garage door in certain materials and mechanisms. In reality this is usually a sectional door with designer elements on the panels, windows, emblems and special colours, etc.
We can also supply timber sectional doors with ANY design in the panels taken from an image or drawing which is computer generated and then cut into the timber panelling.
We have steel chassis up and over doors which can have almost any type of infill material enable matching materials to be used to co ordinate facades.We offer glass garage doors, special materials on sectional doors such as bronze, leather, copper and so on…
Timber side hinged doors in any design within the parameters of the timber sections used.
The list could go on but the point is that advances in materials and mechanism have allowed for the flexibility of design to go much further than 30 years ago.
Matching Doors
There is a huge demand for co ordinating a garage door with either a front door, window colours and other architectural elements in a home.
We can offer a massive range of matching front entrance and side doors with garage doors either in door design or colour match.
An exact match in design can be tricky as one door is far larger than the other but we can guarantee a colour match in many doors because they are from the same manufacturer.
The Main Garage Door Types
Up and Over
A one piece door panel which opens and closes either using a canopy or retractable perating mechanism which either has no tracks or horizontal tracks into the garage, usually on larger or heavier doors or where a remote control electric operator is used.
The Up and Over is the main garage door most people are used to seeing in the UK but fats changing to either sectional or roller doors.
Roller Garage Doors
A door which rolls up and down either manually or more common electrically with aluminium double walled slats of varying dimensions. Cheap doors have small slats which are not very strong and the better roller doors have bigger slats which are far stronger and more secure and stable.
There is a steel roller door which has a continuous steel curtain still available for a good, basic door.
Sectional Garage Door
A relatively new type of garage door in the UK but the main door type in most of Europe and definitely in America. Usually made up of 4 panels split horizontally which rise vertically then curve in towards the garage and slide along tracks horizontally until fully open. These doors provide great levels of insulation and security as standard and have huge size options.
Side Hinged Garage Doors
Still a very popular garage door type and rightly so. Easy to operate and these days available in timber, steel, aluminium and GRP versions. A great demand seems to be for insulated side hinged doors to provide comfort, security and durability in the panel. We offer many variations for side hinged doors and matching pedestrian doors alongside these.
Round the Corner Doors
As it says in the description a door which slides along horizontally and then curves to go around the corner of the garage and along the wall internally. Like side hinged doors this is an old concept in doors but nowadays you can have timber, steel, aluminium and insulated versions of this door type and it makes great sense on older properties for the design and style and also for very large openings or where there is little or no headroom available.
Trackless Sectional Doors
The only new type of garage door design in many years is the Securlap trackless sectional door. It is primarily 2 very strong timber door panels which sit one on top of the other in the opening and the operation is the 2 panels lifting vertically using a counterbalance mechanism. When open the 2 panels sit on top of each other above the opening but the whole door operates WITHOUT any internal tracking mechanism which is popular in many garages.
These are quite unique and always worth a look at against other door types.
Summary
The vast selection of garage doors available in the UK market means there is usually something to suit all styles of property and budgets, starting from around £500 and ranging up to £10,000 plus for the supply and installation of a high quality timber remote-controlled system. High quality modern materials and operating mechanisms can easily mean a lifespan of 20 -30 years BUT this really does depend on choosing a well established manufacturer who truly produces a door with high quality components and materials.
There are unfortunately many fakes and low quality garage doors pushed around on the UK market, especially in roller doors and side hinged doors.
BEWARE!!
