Hurricane proof garage doors

Question about hurricane proof garage doors in Miami, FL.

I understand all new doors in south Florida need to be hurricane proof doors. Does anyone know what exactly that means?

It is a special kind of doors or does it mean a special way of installing the door with reinforcement?

Thanks,

MC

Reply to
MiamiCuse
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Hurricane garage doors are very susceptible to blowing out in a hurricane thus allowing the wind to enter the house, blow out the windows and possibly lift the roof. Most garage doors in Florida are metal doors. What they do is put horizontal metal braces across the door. Then they give you at least one vertical brace (usually stored on the door itself). This vertical brace would be placed on brackets installed on the door and then into a socket on the garage floor. This would prevent the wind from blowing the door in.

Reply to
jerryl

Thanks, so if it's a standard metal door, the other hurricane proof measures (bracing) and done at install time?

MC

Reply to
MiamiCuse

The one I have seen has steel reinforcement. A friend had new g. door installed. The floor was drilled so the bars clamp to the g. door and extend into the floor to brace the whole thing. The principle is that the door takes a huge amount of wind force, and normal framing was not sufficient to hold it in place. Seems it would be much more an issue of bracing than the strength of the door alone.

Reply to
Norminn

I retrofitted my door by adding a bracing kit to each door segment and using 2 4x4s at the 1/3d points across the width of the door. These go into a 1/2" bolt "red headed" into the tie beam over the door and masonry anchors in the floor via a simpson post clip.

3 hurricanes later it is doing fine. The only problem is storing the 4x4s but you have the same thing with all these doors.
Reply to
gfretwell

Check out the video of garage door hurricane protection at

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Rich
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Reply to
Rich

That is what I have seen too, the additional bracing, I have seen some with a horizontal rod that extends into the holes of the sliding rail and center vertical bracing as well. So I thought one can use any garage doors but it is an additional installation measure.

Until I started to call around to get quotes on new garage doors, and they came and gave me brochures to look at and I ask how much is this one, and the guy said "OH this one is not hurricane proof". I asked what is the difference in the actual door, he said the hurricane doors are all steel doors so I asked if the one I pointed to is steel and he said yes, but this one has not been tested.

So I am still confused, apart from the fact that they have to be steel doors, what is so special in the construction of a garage door that makes them hurricane proof?

I am looking at this site and it has some real interesting stuff:

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but none of them are tested for hurricane. So I am back to just plain old Clopay.

MC

Reply to
MiamiCuse

What I think you need are depressions in the floor the size of your shoes, then a steel bar is inserted and clamped so that YOU don't blow away in a hurricane.

But seriously, a while back I saw that someone said most Florda roofs could be saved if the roof were actually attached to the rafters, I think it was. That the problme was the roof was just sitting on the rafters and the nails basically just kept the plywood from sliding off, but not from being lifted off. And that simple straps nailed (or screwed?) in place between the plywood and the rafters, or was it the rafters and something else, would prevent the loss of most roofs.

I suppose this is completly or largely true, but I don't remember if there was to be a campaign to refit roofs or if they were planning for new construction only, and I don't remember how old your house is or know if you should do anything aobut all this.

Reply to
mm

Hurricane straps have been a building requirement in Florida since the '80s, according to my contractor. They are metal straps which hold the rafters to the walls to keep the roof from lifting off in hurricane winds. Houses with hurricane straps qualify for a discount on their homeowners' insurance (or, at least my company gives a discount --)

Reply to
JimR

There is more than one level of hurricane wind protection. As I understand it, it works this way --

-- 1. Basic metal garage door composed of about 5 horizontal sections. No special hurricane protection

-- 2. Basic door, with each section reinforced with a u-shaped horizontal brace that goes across the middle of each section. When you buy door panels the reinforcements come in a separate package that you then mount on the door panels. AFAIK This is the standard requirement for Florida except for the Miami-Dade / Ft. Lauderdale area. It may be possible to retrofit an older door to this level by buying and installing the horizontal reinforcements.

-- 3. The reinforced door, with an additional vertical post which provides additional bracing. I think, without confirmation, that this meets the requirements for Miami-Dade.

I have the type 2 door, above. It went through five hurricanes in 2004-5 without any problems. The only damage was when an itinerant handiman came around looking for hurricane clean-up work and accidentally backed into the garage door, then took off without telling me about it --

Reply to
JimR

Way before that. My 1963 house has a 16" solid poured tiebeam and straps over the trusses. Some builders may have been cheating but it was code for half a century.

Reply to
gfretwell

After Andrew the Florida building code was upgraded and as of 2002 there was a unified FBC that makes the "Miami/Dade" references obsolete. The new coastal code that affects all of peninsular Florida and close to the beach meets or exceeds the old Miami code (the 130MPH zone), Areas near the beach in South West Florida are in the 140 zone and the SE coastal zone plus the Keys is 150.

Reply to
gfretwell

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Reply to
gfretwell

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