Garage door Insulation & draughtproofing

[Tony Hooper]

Hello,

I am considering the above, what improvements could you experts suggest? The door is a steel up and over.

My current plan is to stick expanded polystyrene cavity batts inside the door and source some long brush draught excluders to fix around the edge.

Thanks in advance for your input

Tony

[Christian McArdle]

Use Celotex/Kingspan instead of polystyrene. It is only a small area, so the cost won't be prohibitive, but the insulation will be double.

You may find that the up-and-over mechanism either need adjustment, although I suspect it will be OK, as insulation doesn't weigh as much as the steel.

Christian.

[Andy Hall]

I did this and measured the behaviour of the electric door openers before and after. It was negligible. Weight of Celotex is much less than doors.

I used vinyl seals (big heavy grade ones) and that seems to do a good job of draught proofing.

[Dave]

I've stuck 25mm xtratherm in mine, 'negligible weight increase. I was going to skin the inside with oil-tempered hardboard but the weight increase was too much; after a few experiments I've decided to use Correx sign board as a skin as it's tough enough, light and cheap.

To seal the bottom half of the verticals I've formed a small lip on the frame that the door shuts onto. Next step is to add a rubber "O" section (from a car trimmer) to the top but I can't find anything at a sensible price for the bottom.

[Stanley]

Snip snip

I did that to mine using 3/4 inch polystyrene and it is great. I also battened the walls and roof and put 3/4 inch polystyrene on those as well with plasterboard on the top. It all made a great difference.

Don't add to much weight to the door or it will affect the balance.

Consider fire risk. Opening a blazing up and over door to get out could be interesting.

[Capitol]

but I can't find anything at a sensible

I used 22mm pipe insulation, which fits over the steel bottom edge, and crushes slightly. The garage door opener didn't object!

regards Capitol