Decorating for Halloween? Don’t forget the potential of the garage

This homeowner decorated right

on out of his garage and into

the front yard. This is an example

of the possibilities that exist

for decorating your garage this

Halloween.

Some folks go all out decorating for Halloween. Some generally throw up a few spooky decorations and call it a … well, spooky night.

There’s a lot you can do with Halloween decorations. But, if you consider it’s potential, you don’t want to neglect the garage or the garage door. The garage, with the door open, can represent a frightening cavern with bats hanging from the rafters and ghouls peeking out from the corners. 

As for your garage door, you can think of it as a large palette where your most spine-chilling imagination can run rampant.

A trip to one of the Halloween outlets that pop up in empty strip-mall stores can provide you with ample material to turn your home into a ghostly experience to delight Trick-or-Treaters of all ages. If you have time for delivery yet, you can probably order decorations online.

These options may cost more than you want to spend. With some creativity and ingenuity, however, you may achieve wonderfully scary results using materials around the house.

You may provide a spooky presentation based on a random assortment of Halloween-based decorations. The overall appeal of your presentation may work out better if you come up with a theme.

The next step is to assemble some of the materials that might help: 

• Cardboard
• Sheets
• Paints
• Markers
• String
• Etc.

You may want to go online and look for ideas. You’ll probably find plenty of concepts you can use. Pinterest is probably a good place to start.

Then, let the creative juices flow. You can setup a table in the garage where you work on the project. Think of yourself as something of a Dr. Frankenstein – a mad scientist. Build a Halloween display worthy of the phrase, “IT’S ALIVE!!!”

Just remember to maximize on your home and garage’s potential. From the front yard, to the eaves extending out from the house to the garage door and garage, with a little effort, you can turn your home into horrifyingly delicious Halloween presentation.

Time to replace the weather stripping on your Antioch garage door?

Autumn is a wonderful time of year as beautiful fall colors combine with mild temperatures to make Antioch an even more fantastic place to live. But autumn won’t last forever; winter is ready to sweep in behind it with snow, blowing winds and cold. That cold and snow will make every effort to work its way around the edges of your garage door.

By all means, enjoy autumn while you can. Go apple picking. Carve pumpkins and decorate for Halloween. But even by the time Thanksgiving comes around, we’re liable to find the temperature in Antioch falling precipitously. 

How can you keep the snow and the cold from seeping into your garage from around the edges of your garage door? Weather stripping is the key.

There are different types of weather stripping to seal your garage door from the elements. And there are different types to use in different areas of the garage door.

Essentially, there are two areas around the garage door where you need to seal: around the sides and top, and across the bottom.

For the top and sides, you can use a brush type seal. The brush type adapts well to the movement of the garage door while performing well to keep out dirt, leaves, rain, snow and the cold.

Another option is a rubber, vinyl of plastic seal that is mounted on both sides of the garage door.

At the bottom of the garage door, you may have a metal threshold mounted to the floor. But you still want a seal mounted to keep the cold, wind and water out.

Weather stripping makes a tremendous difference. If you have a heated garage, it help to reduce the workload on your heater. Even if your garage isn’t heated, weather stripping is a welcome addition.

Of course, you probably have weather stripping on your existing garage door. But, after a number of years, the question is what kind of condition the weather stripping is in. 

Winter is coming to Antioch, though you still have some time. But why wait to check your weather stripping, and replace it if necessary?

Do you have to lean to make your crooked garage door look straight?

A crooked garage door faces greater wear and tear

Something seems funny, kind of out of whack, when you look at your garage door. Is it you or is it the door? If, when leaning slightly to one side, your garage door looks straighter, you may have a garage door that isn’t aligned straight in its tracks or the garage door opening. You may want to do something about this.

Assuming your garage door was aligned properly when it was new, something must have gone wrong over time. This isn’t out of the realm of possibility; wear and tear can cause garage doors to go out of alignment. Parts can break which can also result in a crooked garage door.

• Worn cables
• Broken springs
• Rusted springs
• Broken rollers
• Misaligned rollers
• More

If you never used your garage door, time will still take its toll. Parts will rust. Springs can loose their tension. But, no doubt, you do use your garage door.

Every time you raise and lower your garage door, parts grind against each other. Tension is applied to parts. There is wear and there is tear. 

If you keep your garage door properly lubricated and aligned, you reduce the amount of wear and tear. The durability of your garage door is improved. But once things start getting out of whack, additional strain is placed on your garage door and garage door opener.

The moral of the story is that you don’t have to stand leaning to one side when looking at your garage door, and it won’t help to reduce the harm caused by a misaligned and/or damaged garage door. Have it fixed promptly and you’ll spare the door all that extra wear and tear. 

In the meantime, timely garage door maintenance can help keep your garage door straight to begin with.

Time to replace your Twin Lakes garage door?

Have a little fun and choose a garage door you’ll like

The bad news is that your Twin Lakes garage door has given up the ghost. It’s weathered beyond functionality. It’s broken, bandaged and ready to be abandoned. Hopefully, your garage door opener isn’t past its prime, too. But it’s a good idea to check with a trusted garage door technician who isn’t determined to sell you whatever they can. 

Once you’ve accepted the bad news, it’s time to consider some good news. The good news is ‘You Have Choices.’

You can choose to replace your garage door with a flat, white garage door – the simplest and most straightforward choice you can make. But you’ve still made a choice. As long as you’re making a choice, one way or the other, why not have some fun with the decision.

Garage doors come in a variety of styles and materials. Some are insulated. Some aren’t. 

Insulated or not, garage doors come in the following materials:

• Metal
• Aluminum
• Fiberglass
• Vinyl
• Wood
• A Wood Composite
• PVC

Some garage doors have windows. Some have molding. Of course, they also come in different levels of quality. That’s often apparent with the price of the garage door.

In terms of quality, certainly, you want a garage door that will last. You want a garage door that will stand up to the weather. In these regards, once again, check with that trusted garage door technician. They have experience with garage doors and can, most likely, tell you which doors experience the most problems that the technicians are called upon to fix.

Beyond quality, however, you also want to consider the ambience of your new garage door. What style fits your garage and home the best? What color works best? 

With some materials, such as a vinyl garage door, the color on the surface is the color of the material throughout. In such a case, if you scratch the garage door, you won’t expose the color of the subsurface material. Scratches are less apparent.

Some garage door materials are easier to paint. They designed to be painted. You may want to take a sample of the trim color of your Twin Lakes home to the paint store and have them set you up with paint that matches precisely. 

We all hope that our garage doors will last indefinitely. Reality is that, while a good garage door will last a very long time, as a thing mechanical, we can’t expect them to last forever. As long as you’re replacing your Twin Lakes garage door, why not make the most of it?

Why is your garage door slipping or sticking?

You can hear the garage door opener working but, somehow, the garage door isn’t opening as fast as it should – as fast as it usually opens. What the heck is that all about?

There are several possible reasons that your garage door isn’t opening as expeditiously as you’re accustomed, including:

The door is binding in the tracks: With rollers, the garage door rides up and down in the tracks on either side of the door. If the tracks are out of adjustment, bent or otherwise damaged, the garage door may stick when it’s supposed to roll. Your garage door opener is working its little heart out but the garage door isn’t cooperating.

The garage door opener requires adjustment: If the sensors are not adjusted properly, it can throw the garage door opener out of whack. An adjustment is in order.

The rollers and chain require lubrication: If the rollers aren’t lubricated with an appropriate amount of frequency, the rollers can stop rolling. Before they get that bad, they will stop rolling as smoothly. The hinges between the door panels need lubrication from time to time. Even the chain and the tracks require occasional lubrication.

Foreign objects and dirt could impede the travel of your garage door: If a stick got stuck in the track of your garage door, it could very well stop or slow the travel of the door. Dirt can build up in the track. Dirt does not provide a smooth surface for travel, its buildup can affect the spacing between the rollers and the door.

The belt drive needs adjustment: There is a certain amount of tension required when your garage door opener has a belt drive. If it’s too loose, or too tight, this can affect the way the garage door opener operates.

Assuming that your garage door was installed properly (if not, the problem was probably apparent from the beginning of the operation of the garage door), problems that can affect the smooth operation of your garage door are generally rectified with a fair amount of ease. That assumes that the person rectifying the problem knows what they’re doing. 

What to do if you drive into the garage door

Probably the worst thing about backing into your garage door is explaining to your spouse how that happened. The next worst thing is the cost of repairing your garage door. After that, it’s a matter of inconvenience and security until the garage door is fixed.

One of the first things to do is to remind yourself that you’re not the first person to drive into their garage door. It’s happened before and it will happen again.

We all try to be as careful as possible but sometimes things happen. You may not have realized you were that far forward, or backward, as the case may be. Or you may have thought the car was in drive when it was in reverse, or was in reverse when you thought it was in drive.

Other times, garage doors may suffer because a driver was in a bit of a hurry and didn’t wait long enough. They pulled through the garage door opening before the garage door was completely out of the way.

Now, before you get out of the car, it’s important to ensure that it’s safe to do so. There may be sharp debris on the floor that could cut your feet or legs. When you open the door, portions of the damaged garage door can fall on you and cause injury, sometimes serious injury.

You may be better off to back out of the danger zone before exiting the vehicle. Even then, however, be careful that you haven’t dragged some of the garage door with you where it can still cause injury.

The first thing to do, once you’re safely out of the vehicle, is to call your agent for your homeowners of business insurance, depending on which applies. They may have instructions on how to proceed.

They will most likely suggest that you call a trusted garage door repair service. It’s possible that you’ll need emergency clean up of the garage door debris and boarding so you can secure the opening until repairs are completed. 

Depending on how badly you hit the garage door, it’s possible that repairs can bring the garage door back to life. This is generally the case if you’ve only bumped into the door a bit. But if you’ve hit it a solid blow, there’s a good chance you’re garage door is beyond repair.

In either case, your garage door technician will want to examine the tracks, springs and the garage door opener to ensure that they are still properly aligned or whether they require repair or replacement, too.

If you do need a new garage door, hopefully, you have time to do some shopping to find the right model. Even if you have to pay a little more than the insurance covers, this is an excellent time to get the garage door you’ve always wanted.

If a mousetrap can hurt, a garage torsion spring is frightening

Leave garage door repairs to the pros

Have you ever set a mousetrap and had the spring slip so that your fingers were caught in the trap? Hurts like heck, doesn’t it? For it’s size, the spring is a powerful little bugger. It’s only a little more than an inch long and about one-quarter inch in diameter but it will snap the trap shut with enough force to, well, leave a mark.

If a mousetrap can hurt that much, just think about what the torsion springs on your garage door can do.

A garage door can have one torsion spring or come in a set of two – a left-hand spring wound to the left and a right-hand spring wound to the right. The springs generally range from 16- to 48-inches long. They range in inside diameter from about 1-3/4-inches to 2-5/8-inches (commercial is usually anything above 2-5/8-inches and runs to 3-5/8-inches).

Those torsion springs are designed to raise garage doors that can weigh as much as half a ton. They’re rated by Inch Pounds Per Turn. Depending on the inside diameter of a spring for a residential application, and the wire comprising the spring, those springs can be loaded with as much as 50 IPPT. This refers to the inch-pounds of force from each turn of the spring.

If you multiply the IPPT by the number of turns in the spring, you should arrive at the total inch pounds of force generated by the spring. It’s possible that you’ll have 10 coils of the spring in 1-1/4 inch. 

As an example, let’s suppose you have a 30-inch spring 10 coils per 1-1/2 inches. Let’s also assume that the IPPT is 36.1. That spring has 200 coils, each packing a punch of 36.1 IPPT.

Make no mistake about it; if a mousetrap will leave a mark, a garage door torsion spring will take off a finger, an arm or something even more vital.

According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, close to 30,000 individuals suffer injuries each year from garage doors that include fractures, crushing, and amputations.

The point is that repairing a garage door is not a DIY type project. There are some times when you want to call in a professional. And when the garage door requires service, that’s one of the times to call a professional. And when the repair refers to garage door springs, there’s no question about it.