Garage Door Options for a Heated Shop
It has been brought up a few times here that garage door manufacturers love to oversell their products significantly. And it seems the regulations have yet to change there. What options are those in the community finding to be best, particularly with air sealing? Personally, I wouldn’t care if the door is automatic or not. Our primary vehicles remain outside, the garage is mainly where my machine shop resides, along with a single project car, but even when I decide to drive that multiple days in a row, it stays outside. I like to keep the temperature decent out there for working and it helps to keep the machines from rusting and having other issues.
I’ve got some pretty good details on thermal break for the door and so on, but haven’t really found any great options on doors that seal well. There are hinge and track options that sort of push the door into the seal that may work decently? I came across an article on a Canadian passive house where they used a Krispol garage door, but upon reaching out them them, they do not supply to North America. A single 16×8 was my plan, but if there are better options for single doors, I can get away with a pair of those, I just figured it would introduce more paths for leakage.
Has anyone actually gotten blower door results from their garage? I know it would be a bit odd, and maybe an expensive use of limited blower door time.
At work we have cold boxes used for vehicle testing, essentially giant freezer doors that can fit a full size pickup. Good for -40* starts even in the summer! Not the best for a house that you may want to look halfway decent. They were basically carriage doors with pins at the top and bottom in addition to a big latch. Anyway, leads me to think that carriage doors may be the better option for air sealing than normal garage doors?
Thanks for the feedback!
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Replies
Superman22x,
Sorry I don't have an answer for you, but I'm also very interested in your question. I'm planning a heated/cooled workshop and I'd like to install a 10' overhead garage door that seals half way decently.
While surfing the 'net, I ran across a product called ThermoTraks. They make a special track that pushes the door tightly against a seal right before the door is in the final closed position. It looks like an interesting idea but unfortunately I don't know anyone that has actually used them. Do a quick Google search and see what you think.
I hope you get some good answers to your question. Good luck!
I gave it a shot and installed ThermoTraks last year, though have yet to install their special seal that came with the tracks as well. They do work and function as advertised and I hope I'll get to put in the seal before this year's winter as well. I did also upgrade the hinges to 'green hinges' -- https://www.greenhingesystem.com/. If I'd had to choose either one I'd go with the hinges first as they are roughly half the price.
I'm a little skeptical of the Green Hinges. By applying constant pressure during the whole movement of the door, it seems likely to prematurely wear the seals, and perhaps even put too much strain on the motor. Leaving the regular hinges on the bottom also seem like a potential leak point.
Is it possible to divide your garage into a heated side and an unheated side? Put the garage door on the unheated side and build an exterior-quality wall between them?
I've seen the thermotracks, but also unsure how well they really work. I'm leaning towards doing two sets of carriage doors and building them myself at this point. Maybe 2x4 frame and insulation sandwiched inside. Plus, I like that it frees up the ceiling. I think I would do two 9x8 or 10x8 doors instead of a single 16x8 if going carriage. An 8 foot wide door seems like it could be difficult.
Dividing it won't work too well for me. Some of the machines are fairly large (really hoping for a CNC sometime in the future too), and I would like the car side of the shop to be heated too.
I've made DIY bifolds out of metal insulated door slabs. Does need some beefy hinges and a side structure the support the extra weight. Way less cost than a decent garage door with glass. Uses off the shelf magnetic weather stripping so it is pretty well sealed, much better than any garage door.
It also has the nice side benefit that you can use one of the elements as a man door. 8x16 is hard, 80"x12' is pretty simple, you can go larger but than the slabs are very expensive.
That sounds nice! Any chance you have some pictures?
I was just browsing heavy duty hinges on McMaster Carr, yeah, they add up quick!
Have you figured out what to do with the thermal bridge at the edge of the slab? It represents a huge heat bypass.
Yes, different options I've seen for that. A builder (I think he is a member here) sent me a good detail he uses. There are some decent off the shelf options too I believe.
Superman, can you share that detail please? I’m interested as well. Thanks
Here are a couple of shots. The hinges are standard commercial 4" ones with ball bearings, not cheap but not that expensive either. McMaster is not the place for low cost items, I would try a local door supply place. The bifold is held in place with a set of pull latches. Relatively easy to open/close but not something for everyday car use.
Akos, doors look good! I've seen some implement a slider for the inner door as well. Not sure if that would cause issues with the seal though.
Tdbaugha, I'm not sure I should share his details publicly without permission. Let me see if I can find it here first and just link to it. I think I saw it posted once, but not sure.
Edit: thought I had seen the details here. Creating_Comfortable posted some great details in this thread. This is what I am thinking I will use, it seems simple enough and effective. He has lots of good techniques for efficient and affordable building.
https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/question/retaining-heat-at-a-garage-door-part-2-a-07x
If you have the means, I thought this was a pretty cool way to build a door as well.
https://youtu.be/Us892XfFQ7I