I have to install new garage doors, but I have no real information on this subject. Can somebody tell me how I would install insulated garage doors to minimize air leakage? As far as I can see, the installations are so bad that there is no point in paying for insulation.
Here in New England garages are considered "outside". There is insulation around the house, but it does not include the garage. You don't really want to pay for heat in a garage. Also, I've heard that allowing snow to melt off your car releases the road salt in it and that eats away your frame and body. It is probably good to allow a bit of air circulation to carry out any moisture in the air, not to mention gas fumes. Finally, minimizing air leakage is hard to do because you open the garage doors regularly.
Just my opinion. No facts to back it up.
There is always going to be air leakage around the door. It is the nature of the beast. You must have the gaps for the door to properly operate.
Insulation makes them much quieter to operate and in severe climates most likely keeps the frost off the door and helps with the overall garage temp. In 10 years in this house we have only had a few days where the frost formed on the door and the room over the garage was uncomfortable. But this is a pretty moderate climate in the winter (Central KY). If I were farther north I would probably go insulated.
Colbyt
Insulation still helps and keeps the garage quieter. Check out Wayne Dalton garage doors and their IDrive opener for something different though the weatherstripping is typical. Their springs are fully enclosed and the Idrive opener fits above the door instead of having a rail of its own.
In my experience the insulation helps, but don't expect miracles. With a little care you can get a reasonable seal around the door.
Yours is a typical misunderstanding.
Garages are cost-effective because they control humidity, not temperature. The real enemy to your car is a condensing atmosphere, which a garage mostly eliminates, even if unheated and even if uninsulated. Ordinary jamb seals and panel seals work fine to eliminate infiltration of damp outside air.
The amortized cost of a garage is less than the amortized cost of corrosion to your ungaraged-vs-garaged car, for typical cases of "garage" and "car".
So it typically *costs* you money *not* to have a garage.
While you generally will save on insurance and maybe increase resale value and may protect the paint from sun damage with a garage; in the snow belt, you will generally cause more corrosion damage with a garage. Keeping the car below the freeze point will keep the salt and water inactive. Putting it in a garage, which will generally be warmer, will warm it above the freeze point and corrosion will start.
An unheated garage will not be thawed with outside freezing more than a few days per year, for one season. The differential is a few degrees and the outside ambient must be within that narrow range. Depends on the local climate how often this is the case.
But a garage *will* avoid a condensing atmosphere, for many, many days per year, all year long.
The "freezing avoids corrosion" thesis also is questionable. Condensing vs non-condensing has to be many times more effective than freezing vs thawed, as regards not promoting corrosion.
This really depends on a number of factors. However you need to consider that the car when put back into the garage is going to contain a lot of heat that will warm the garage. In my experience that very often brings it above freezing.
I disagree here as well, although again that may be dependent on the local conditions. When a car is driven into a garage wet, the garage tends to hold in the moisture for an extended period so often even on a nice warm dry day the inside of a garage is still damp as the dry air can not remove the moisture.
Again however I would caution anyone from reading too much into this part of the issue. I don't believe the difference between garage or not garage is a major corrosion issue with cars. When it is a noticeable factor, I believe it may go either way. There are just too many individual differences to draw any certain conclusions.
Come on. We're talking about outdoors, soggy wet with dew nearly every night, vs a garage, perhaps more or less humid, but rarely condensing.
Park your car outside, it gets wet through-and-through by condensing vapor intrusion nearly every night. That's murder for corrosion.
I've lived with and without garages for a while. No doubt in my mind of the value of garaging.
In New England, garages speed corrosion. Roads get salted duriong the winter, and cars end up with a salt/wet sand/leaves mixture lodged in every crevice. Chemical reactions are accelerated by warmer temps. That said, corrosion on modern cars is far less of a problem than it used to be.
BB
I always wanted to believe that, before I could afford a garage. It comforts you when you're out on the street scraping off snow and ice, despite the fact that as corrosion goes, drier (garage) beats cooler (outdoors).
Have another drink of WD-40, Kinch. I realize science doesn't agree with you. You're "special". Does gravity work where you are?
BB
Correct, if by "science" you mean credulous endorsement of popular falsehoods. Rain falls in teardrop shapes, electrons orbit in circles, centrifugal forces keep your bicycle balanced, humidity is relative, and leaving your car outdoors is good for it. Or so sez the guy who got his "science" from a public school.
If by "science" you mean critical thinking applied to actual observations with mathematical analysis, I haven't seen any from you, so I can't say whether I agree with it or not.
True or false: chemical reactions are faster at higher temperatures and slower at lower temperatures.
BB
Salt corrosion is largely an aqueous phenomenon. It's plenty hot and salty in the deserts of the southwest US, but that is exactly where the airline industry wisely parks its mothballed aircraft, to minimize corrosion. Because it is warm and DRY.
"Thermodynamics proposes, kinetics disposes." [Uncle Al]
True or false: chemical reactions are faster at higher temperatures and slower at lower temperatures.
BB
Subject: Re: Garage Doors Newsgroup: alt.home.repair => BinaryBillTheSailor@Sea++.com True or false: chemical reactions are faster at higher temperatures and slower
What kind of question is that? That makes no sense.
Most chemical reactions are faster at higher temperatures, assuming all other factors are the same.
Now try explaining that to Richard Kinch!
BB
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