New Garage Doors for Wilmette Homes, Street-Facing and Off the Alley

Four numbers decide what can physically be hung: the opening itself, the clearance above it, the space either side, and the depth behind. All four get taken with a tape in your garage, never over the phone. Older detached garages here tend to be tight above the header, and where standard track will not fit the curve and the shaft, a low-headroom conversion goes in rather than a bodged compromise. Tall newer garages run the other way, and a high-lift arrangement can carry the door well clear of the space below.

Wide openings need their own thinking. A sixteen-foot double wants bracing across the top section and heavier gauge track and hangers, because the same door hung on minimum hardware sags in the middle and starts dragging on the seal within a season.

Steel gauge, insulation type, hinge count, roller quality, the bottom seal and the spring specification decide how a door behaves in five years time. A heavy door hung on the manufacturer's minimum hardware is the single most common reason we get called back to a door that is barely middle-aged.

Fitting day starts with a strip-out. Everything from the old installation, spring hardware included, leaves on the truck rather than sitting in your alley. The header and jamb legs get looked over while the opening is bare, since new steel screwed to soft timber will not stay where you put it. Sections then go up one at a time and are checked as they stack, and the springs are wound to the weight of the door in front of us rather than the figure on the paperwork. Before we go you get a run through the manual release, the seal and the safety reverse.