Here’s How To Choose Your New Garage Door
Before your garage door installation, you have to choose the right door for your home. This means picking the style, material, construction, and interior designs. We understand that all these choices can become overwhelming, which is why we personally walk you through each step of choosing your new garage door. We work with some of the best garage door manufacturers to provide our customers with top-quality garage doors. Read below to find out the steps of choosing your garage doors Austin TX and learn more about our process by visiting our Garage Door Installation page.
Step 1: Garage Door Styles
There are three garage door styles: traditional garage doors, carriage garage doors, and modern garage doors. Each style of garage door offers its own unique features that make them stand out. Choosing a garage door style is the first step to achieving your perfect garage door.
Carriage Garage Doors
Carriage garage doors get their name from barns that opened outward and held horses and carriages. They offer an elegant look for any home, while also keeping that classically elegant, historic feel. Carriage garage doors come with many options in designs so that your door is unique to your home’s architecture and color. To give your carriage-style garage door an even more personal feel, you can add decorative handles and nail head clavos.
Traditional Garage Doors
Traditional garage doors have a timeless design and are the most commonly used garage door design for American homes. Traditional garage doors typically have rectangular, short or long panels to give your home a clean and classic look. Even though traditional doors have a standard design, you can still customize your door to complement your home perfectly. From the color of your doors to the size of windows, we can help you make the best selections to upgrade your curb appeal.
Modern Garage Doors
Modern garage doors are the ideal choice for someone looking for a stylish garage door with clean lines. Modern garage doors tend to feature metal and glass materials, made of aluminum and glass to give a sleek, contemporary look. When you choose a modern garage door, you can choose the color of your frame as well as the glass type and cosmetic options. We offer a wide range of brands, frames, and colors so that your new garage door can reflect your vision perfectly
Step 2: Garage Door Materials
Glass Garage Doors
Glass garage doors are durable, full-view doors that offer a wide range of glass, frames, and tracks to suit your door needs. Glass garage doors can be a great addition to any home looking to increase curb appeal. With recent upgrades to glass garage doors like insulation and colored or textured glass, you also don’t have to sacrifice energy efficiency or privacy.
Steel Garage Doors
Steel garage doors are highly durable and have flexible design options. They can even be upgraded with polyurethane insulation to give you the best energy efficiency and temperature control. Steel garage doors are the most affordable garage door option, and also require less maintenance over time. They are perfect for homeowners who want a simple, yet beautiful garage door.
Wood Garage Doors
Real wood garage doors are custom doors that are durable and long-lasting. Because each wood door is custom-built to client specifications, these natural doors will certainly bring a unique, timeless style to any home. You can choose between numerous different wood species to make your real wood garage door match your home.
Faux Wood Garage Doors
Faux wood garage doors are well-functioning garage doors that mimic the appearance of real wood garage doors. They are steel doors that look like wood, giving you the appearance you want without the upkeep you don’t. With faux wood garage doors, homeowners can get the same beautiful wood look for an affordable price.
Step 3: Garage Door Construction
One-Layer or Pan Garage Doors
Pan garage doors are often considered the cheapest option for a new garage door. They are made out of a thin layer of steel, and as a result, are not very durable. Their construction cannot support their weight, which is why they can’t be installed on a wide door. You’ll see that over time, the door will start to collapse in the middle, which will damage the panels. It will also start to wear out your opener and other parts. So while people think they’re getting a great deal with a pan door, it will actually cost you more money in the long run. Pan garage doors dent easily and are known to snap in half, so you want to consider two or three-layer garage doors if you’re ready for a new garage door.
Two-Layer Garage Doors
Two-layer garage doors are a great way to achieve better construction while still keeping a low price point. They contain an outside layer of steel alongside an inside layer of polystyrene insulation. These doors are not as durable as sandwich garage doors but will insulate your garage while still being affordable.
Three-Layer or Sandwich Garage Doors
A sandwich garage door uses three layers. The outside is steel, the middle is polyurethane insulation, and the back is steel. If you envision staying in your home for 5 years or longer, we strongly recommend this type of door. They have reliable construction, better energy efficiency, temperature control, and noise reduction. These factors make sandwich garage doors well worth investing in.
Step 4: Garage Door Interior
Garage Door Tracks
Garage door tracks are typically galvanized, or coated in zinc, so they are protected against rust. They come in three different types: standard lift, vertical lift, and high lift. While standard lifts are popular for residential homes, vertical lift tracks are mainly used for commercial use. Vertical lift tracks don’t need a horizontal track, but rather use a vertical track to move the door up and around the opener. High lift tracks are a variation on standard tracks and are used in homes with tall ceilings. We are familiar with the unique needs of homes that have low roof pitch or slanted openings so we can ensure your tracks function seamlessly.
Standard Track Sizes
The most common standard garage door track size has a 15-inch radius, which requires 15 inches of headroom to house the track. Radius sizes also come in 20 inches and 32 inches, but as they get larger, they require more headroom. We typically don’t go below 12 inches for radius size, as it gets too small to fit the motor and curve of the track.
A standard track size for a vertical track is 6 feet 4 inches up through 14 feet and 4 inches. The three widths available for tracks are 1, 2, and 3 inches. 1-inch tracks are found most commonly in trucks. 2-inch tracks are normally used for residential and commercial use. 3-inch tracks will be used for heavier, industrial-type doors. Residential tracks come in three different thickness sizes: .055, .062, .075 inches.
Low Headroom
This type of track uses less headroom space than a typical 12-inch radius. It is sometimes called dual-track because of the second horizontal track it has. This second track is used to move the top section of the door, while the lower sections move along the lower track. A low headroom track is a great option for homes that have a low or slanted roof pitch.
High Lift Tracks
High lift tracks offer a blend of standard lift and vertical lift features. There will be a vertical track, a short horizontal track, and a high lift extension. Your track is extended so that your garage door is close to the wall and sits higher. Because the garage door track is closer to the ceiling, it gives you more space to install a car lift, have RV parking, or numerous other applications.
Garage Door Openers
There are a few standard types of garage door openers: chain drive, belt drive, screw drive, jackshaft, and direct drive. They vary in their motor operation, which causes different results in terms of functionality and noise level. They’ll also come with different price tags. While direct drive, jackshaft, and belt drive openers are on the higher cost end, they have much quieter operations and a great track record. We can help you find the best garage door opener for your home, so you can feel confident that it will keep your garage door system running smoothly. Check out our Garage Door Opener Installation page to learn more about openers!
Our Garage Door Manufacturers
Amarr Garage Doors
Amarr Garage Doors provides a wide range of residential garage doors, designed with durability and energy efficiency in mind. Door styles include traditional, carriage house, and modern, which can be customized to fit your design preferences. Amarr’s Classica Collection is popular due to its clean style with multiple window and color options. Their WindPro collection features storm-rated garage doors, built to withstand strong winds. If you’re looking for a beautiful garage door to increase your curb appeal, an Amarr Garage Door is a wonderful option. Our team at ServiceBasix is impressed with Amarr’s array of products and its aptitude for success.
Clopay Garage Doors
We partner with Clopay Garage Doors to provide strong, efficient garage doors qualified for effective operation. Clopay offers many collections, including Canyon Ridge, Coachman, Grand Harbor, Classic, and Reserve Wood. These doors offer varying levels of insulation and layered construction. Most collections provide multiple design options, with excellent color choices, windows, and decorative hardware. Through our work with Clopay Garage Doors, we’ve found that customers love their affordable products that feature handcrafted architecture. We’re always happy to install Clopay products near Austin, San Antonio, and Dallas TX.
CHI Overhead Doors
CHI Overhead Doors provides excellent garage doors known for their custom designs. Their contemporary collection features Plank, Sterling, and Skyline Flush designs, each with varying colors and wood tones. The Carriage Collection features Shoreline and Overlay carriage house doors, giving the classic, clean appearance of carriage house doors. In the Timeless Collection, you’ll find raised panels, stamped carriage house design, and stamped shaker doors. The Full-View Collection features the pairing of glass and aluminum, which creates a bold, modern overhead door. These options provide beautiful garage doors sure to increase curb appeal and enhance the convenience of your system.
Our Happy Clients
Paul L.
This company came to the house I’m renting and replaced my garage door The communication and job they performed was amazing. In today’s age and these “unprecedented “times it’s very nice to know that they’re still organizations out there that are very respectful
Chris M.
Yesterday, the service from the Servicebasix technician was fantastic. He arrived as promised, very punctual, very friendly and went straight to work replacing our garage door. Afterwards, he explained further details about the newly installed garage door and made sure I had all my questions answered. Very professional, courteous and efficient. Yes I would recommend Servicebasix!
Prqueeniam
EXCELLENT service!!! Orrin came to do initial assessment and John and team came the following day for install!! I had a terrible experience with another company just a few weeks ago so this was SUPER refreshing! Even the administration office was pleasant when I called to follow up on schedule! Although this company was assigned through my warranty company, I will use them for all garage needs! Highly recommend!!!