Today’s two and three door garages are typically outfitted by an automated overhead door but fifty years ago it was common to see single lift or swing out doors that were manually operated. As homeowners continue to modernize their beautiful old homes they are discovering that replacing their manual garage doors with an automated overhead door can be quite challenging as well as cost prohibitive.
A typical overhead garage door is made in sections that are hinged together and open using a vertical track where the sections then pass through a curved section of track and finally ride along a horizontal track where the door remains suspended overhead until it is closed. The most popular standard radius track is a 15” radius, which requires 15” of headroom to accommodate the curve of the track and all other track components and equipment. That’s fine for new homes as builders ensure the garage door will fit property but what about older homes and homes where enlarging the garage door opening is desired?
In comes the headroom. Headroom clearance is the distance between the top of the garage door opening and the ceiling of your garage. As older homes were designed for manually operated doors, headroom was not an issue and thus garages were framed accordingly. However homeowners who want to modernize their garages are finding that the typical overhead door requires the purchase of a low headroom kit (most headroom kits also limit the height of the garage door section to 8’) or they simply have no alternative but to stay with their current manual door. Oh, and if you are really ambitious, you can also dig out your garage door floor and re-frame your opening.
Now customers have an additional option as our horizontal garage door systems can be mounted where headroom is limited to as little as four inches. In addition, you can install door sections up to 14’ and as wide as 24’. As our system moves horizontally, our customers also enjoy an unobstructed ceiling space when the garage door is open, a cleaner overall look and minimal maintenance as our system does not use springs nor counterbalances.
Now you may be thinking “Great, your garage door will work but I am losing an entire wall in my garage”. This is not the case as our system only requires 6 inches of space along the returning wall and therefore, if you choose, you can build a false wall in front of our system to use for storage. A false wall not only provides for storage but also adds extra protection for your garage door when fully open.
Providing a Horizontal Garage Door System to solve a low headroom issue is by design at no additional cost. In fact, our system is designed to solve many common issues found with Overhead Sectional Garage Doors such as non-standard openings, material selection, noise and maintenance to name a few. Please contact us for more information.
