Garage doors: types and characteristics

What ensures the safety of the car stored in the garage? Of course the entrance doors and gates, which can be placed next to each other, but more often, as in the photo above, are combined into a single whole.

In this article we will discuss the design options for garage doors, and the requirements of the existing standard for them. After reviewing the material presented by us, you will learn how to choose the right doors for the garage with your own hands, and understand what their advantages and disadvantages are.

What are garage doors

Despite the fact that wood and plastic can participate in the process of manufacturing garage doors, metal was and remains the basic material. Separate regulations for the production of the gate is not for garages.

They are made according to the standard 31174, in which requirements are formulated for all types of metal gates - including garage doors.

Classification

The first sign by which large doors to the garage are classified is the direction and methods of opening them. For clarity, we present you a brief annotation in the form of a table, accompanied by pictures.

Gate opening method	Distinctive features
	If you want to install doors in the garage with your own hands - a swing option is what you need. In any case, there is no complex automation, which requires the participation of a specialist to install. The design of swinging cloths most often shield.
	A distinctive feature of the gate with a sliding canvas, is the presence in the system of the supporting element - the support beam, which accounts for the main load. There are several modifications of sliding gates: monorail, cantilever, suspended.
	The main advantage of the sectional type of gate is their maneuverability, although they also have many other positive qualities, which we will tell about. This design of the gate is ideal for a small garage area in which there is no place to turn around.
	Gate with a lifting and rotary cloth, it is possible to consider one of the most reliable options for garage. Unlike sectional doors, here the sash is one-piece, and, moving along the guides, it turns, smoothly moving from a vertical position to a horizontal one.
	Rolletny gates have a lot of advantages: they do not require additional space, open easily, do not limit the visibility when leaving the garage. As a rule, they are installed on garages attached to a residential house or located in the basement. In the garages facing the street, they are not placed, because of the durability of the shutters are significantly losing to all other options. In addition, rolling shutters practically do not retain heat.

Differ garage doors and on such grounds as the version of execution, which may coincide with the method of opening. Like any doors, they can be frame, panel, panel, have glazing elements, ventilation grilles, or profile inserts, as well as be insulated (see Warming garage doors: what to do) or cold. But sectional and rolling gates stand out in the classification list, as they have completely individual mechanisms in their action.

Almost all automatic doors for the garage, at the same time perform the functions of the gate and the front door. Although in some of them, as in the swing models, there is a wicket. There are still folding gates that open like an accordion, but they are installed mostly not in private garages, but in production boxes.

Features garage doors

Video in this article on the topic: "Garage doors with your own hands" - will help you to better understand the structures and mechanisms for opening the gate. We hope that you will gather a lot of useful information from the proposed video. And in this chapter we will cover in a little more detail the design and other features of each of the options presented in the table.

What you need to know about swing gates

Since humanity first invented the swinging doors and gates, they can be safely categorized as classical. Swinging canvases you can not only install with your own hands, but even make if you wish. Of course, the price of an improvised gate will be much lower, and in cases where savings are the main goal, this is a good way out.

So:

• In any case, to find information on how to assemble panel board canvases from wood, to weld the gates from sheet steel, how to insulate the doors in the garage or to decorate them, is not difficult. Only all of this is quite laborious, and it will turn out, as it should, not everyone. But in the sale you can always find an inexpensive model in the budget price range.
• Most likely, these will be two swing open doors on the supporting frame, without any comfortable additions there. Wickets at such gates may not be, which is not very convenient in the case when the garage owner needs not only to take or place a car in it, but, say, to spend a whole day there, doing repairs.

• Some comrades manage to cut the front door in a metal casement gate on their own. At the same time, it is necessary to reinforce the perimeter of the gate with metal plates, weld the hinges, install a seal around the perimeter, mount the handle and locks for garage doors. And although the presence of a ready-made gate in a garage door automatically increases their cost by a third, independently cutting it out in a dull canvas can hardly be considered such a good idea.
• When buying a cheap model, you will also have to think about how to insulate the garage doors yourself, since there will be no factory heat insulation filling, there will be no such doors in the canvases. When you ennoble the sash from the inside by covering them, for example, with plastic or clapboard, and laying foam polystyrene or mineral wool under the veneer, thanks to the cost of purchasing these materials, the total cost of the construction will increase considerably.

• So in the end, it will not be entirely clear what the savings you were initially striving for expressed. It is much easier to purchase gates with insulated swinging doors, which are made of sandwich panels. This multi-layered material with a honeycomb filling retains heat wonderfully. It allows you to reduce the cost of heating the garage in the winter - that's where you need to look for savings!

The most expensive cost forged gates, the cost of which depends on the design, and in general, the high cost of handmade. At the same time, it cannot be said that they are more reliable than, for example, the version of sheet steel, which does not have any decorative delights. Most often, forged decor simply shows the level of security of the owner of the garage.

Sectional gates

The main advantage of sectional canvas is the fact that it is almost impossible to crack. Such gates are always insulated and do not require space either outside or inside the garage.

Thus, installing a sectional type gate, the owner “kills two birds with one stone”: saves heat and usable space in the garage.

• In their production, as well as in some swing models, use sandwich panels. Only here they are not enclosed in a rigid frame, but divided into several parts, fastened together by loops. Thus, it turns out easily transforming flexible canvas, driven by the torsion system.

• It consists of: guide profiles with polyamide rollers, limiting the movement of the blade; shafts; cables, as well as drums, on which they are wound. The sectional doors move almost silently: the doors move smoothly, settling in the sub-ceiling space.

Note! We will immediately say that in such a system there is no danger of a cable breaking - in which case, the web movement is blocked by ratchet couplings. This precaution can not be called superfluous, since the weight of the door leaf can reach three hundred kilograms.

• Such a system is balanced by a spring mechanism, which at the same time reduces the weight load. Therefore, the door leaf is very easy to lift even by hand, for which you need to pull a special handle. In some models, the opening of the gate is due to the cylinder mechanism.
• The gate sectional design can be set in motion and automatically - for this they connect an electric drive. Virtually all models controlled in this way can work in the same way in manual mode.

• Switching modes is performed using a special key, which helps a lot when, for example, the web is blocked by a power outage. Accordingly, at the sectional gate there should be not only electronic, but also a mechanical lock.

A rather complicated mechanism of action does not in any way prevent the gate from equipping the gate, except that not every width of the web allows it. Here is the same situation as with a swing gate: if the canvas is equipped with an entrance door, then it will cost thirty to forty percent more.

The price, of course, is influenced by the option of decorative facial decoration - it can be a mosaic, and a beautiful relief, and lighting.

Retractable garage doors

Gates with sliding canvas are divided into several groups. In all cases, when a certain force is acting on the flap, it rolls aside, opening the opening. Only here the principle of setting the canvas in motion, they are somewhat different.

• For example, the mass of rail gates, the flap of which moves on rollers, falls on a guide beam rigidly fixed along the lower perimeter of the opening. Such gates have no restrictions in the size of the opening, materials for the manufacture of the fabric, and, accordingly, their weight.

• Their mass is evenly distributed on the beam, which allows you to install the gate, which is also called sliding, even in a curved or short opening. Only for this purpose it is necessary that the canvas, similarly to the sectional variant, consists of several movably connected elements. The only difference is that when moving, they do not rise up, but move sideways.
• There are models of sliding gates and with hanging canvas. Here, too, there are videos, only they are not located at the bottom, but, like the curtains, are on top. Accordingly, the guide beam is mounted on the upper horizontal of the aperture. Most often, the rollers are rigidly fastened to the canvas, but some manufacturers also offer such options, where the door leaf moves along the rollers, which are integral with the guide profile.

• But if in the monorail version there are practically no restrictions on the weight of the canvas and the dimensions of the aperture, then in the gate with a hinged casement, the height of the aperture and the carrying capacity of the beam installed in it plays a decisive role. But, this design allows you to install multiple doors, rolling in different directions.

Retractable gates can operate either in manual mode or be connected to automation - the latter, by the way, is not at all necessary. And I must say that with a strong wind, when the swing doors can be quite difficult to open, the sliding canvas does not cause such problems.

Lifting leaves for gates

The door is opened with a tilting sash, due to its smooth transition from a vertical plane to a horizontal position. Here, as in the sectional models, the canvas rises under the ceiling, and this movement is carried out by means of levers and springs, and the frame is also made of steel pipes with a rectangular cross section.

Note! The advantage of this type of door is the absence of hinged joints, which are different for rolling and sectional doors. Therefore, they are easier to manage, more reliable and economical to operate. The canvas itself can be made of absolutely any material: galvanized sheet steel, profiled sheet, sandwich panels, wood, high-strength plastic.

So:

• For durable and trouble-free operation, lifting-swivel blades are equipped with additional elements. For example, a limiter is installed at the bottom of the sash — a bar that prevents the hard part of the gate from quickly deteriorating. Edging rubber seal, which retains its elasticity for a long time, prevents moisture from entering the garage room.

• If necessary, decorative plates can be purchased for the door set, which compensate for the gaps between the door contour and the perimeter of the opening. They, by the way, can also play the role of decorating elements. You can order the gate of a specific configuration.
• For example, it may include polyurethane panels fixed on the inner surface of the web to improve its thermal insulation properties. Glazing elements or additional locking devices can be installed in the canvas. As an additional equipment, a side door can also be made in the kit for such a gate - naturally, all in the same style.

Lifting gates are controlled using a button installed inside the garage or a remote control. Manual drive comes as standard product, but in order to connect the automatic control, you will have to additionally purchase an electric drive.