The floor of your garage is designed to keep the water out by sloping down from the back and sides of the garage to the door. Some garages have a step up outside the garage door that serves as a damn for water that might otherwise get into the garage. Of course, there are people in McHenry and Lake County this past Spring and Summer who saw water that went much higher than any step outside their garage door.
If you’re having your garage built, before the slab is poured, it’s a very good idea to make sure that the garage floor will take water into account. Once the slab is poured, and the concrete sets, it’s too late. But, there are other things you can do.
The best way to keep water out of a garage after the garage is built, assuming the floor wasn’t designed properly in the first place, is to add something that will impede access for the water. This generally means adding a threshold kit. Threshold kits come in a variety of styles.
With some threshold kits, the garage door, when closed, will sit down on a flat strip of rubber behind a slanted, rubber water damn. Others are sloped down on either side of a thicker piece of rubber. In this case, the garage door comes down on the center of the rubber garage threshold piece.
Whatever type of threshold kit you use, it’s important that the weather stripping attached to the bottom of the garage door is in good shape so that it matches tightly with the garage threshold kit.
It’s also important to note that, if the threshold kit causes the garage door to stop higher when closing, you probably need to adjust the garage door opener and, possibly, the eyes at the bottom of the garage door opening.
Other ways to keep the water out of the garage are more labor and cost intensive. For instance, you could cut a channel in front of the door so the water is caught and flows out to the sides away from the garage door opening. You can also redo the area in front of the garage door. If you have a solid drive leading to the garage door, this is a major renovation. Even if you have a gravel drive, this is a big job. And, it may not be as easy as it seems. What you’re trying to do is to modify the topography in front of the garage door so that water flows away.
One of these latter options is the more likely solution if you’re dealing with a serious problem of water coming into the garage. Assuming that’s not the case, however, it’s important that you install the threshold kit properly. If you’re not sure you can do it right, it’s better to call in a professional from the start. It will often cost more if the professional first has to fix something that went wrong when you were trying on your own.
