Garage door replacement

[Ratter]

I have a double garage with a very tired looking fibreglass door.

This is split in several places and looks awful and can't be very secure.

A replacement door would appear to cost well over £1000 for a 14' size so I've been looking at alternatives.

Since the supporting framework is sound, I thought about getting some thinnish but strong wood slats and making up a new door, but obviously this will be heavier than the fibreglass.

I've also seen roller shutter doors advertised on eBay for a few hundred pounds - I can see advantages in cost and space saving because they roll up rather than pivoting into the garage when open.

I'm sure there are drawbacks as well.

Any ideas welcomed.

 

[shenks]

Since the supporting framework is sound, I thought about getting some thinnish but strong wood slats and making up a new door

I have seen (and replaced) fibreglass garage doors that are based on a wooden frame with the fibreglass layed up directly on to it. Is this the sort of door you have or is yours a steel frame?

Wood framing tends to be fairly poor quality, the rigidity of the door comes from the fibreglass and who's to say the wood isn't totally goosed? and if it's a steel frame then is it galvanised to prevent rust or has it already rusted away in places?

A 'Heath Robinson' approach might work in some cases but I'd be wary of taking on something like this without a great deal of thought.

 

[Ratter]

Thanks for that.

My door has a galvanised steel frame which looks sound as the splits in the fibreglass are not where the frame is and there is no rust.

The fibreglass itself is little more than a couple of mm thick and it is supported by a wooden subframe which is then screwed to the steel one.

It doesn't look too difficult to separate the door and subframe from the steel frame, so my idea was to make up a new door and then just swap them over. I'm quite good at woodwork and have all the necessary tools.

Another possibility might be to just replace the door moulding if they are available separately, because presumably a substantial part of the cost of a new door would be the running gear and steel frame