Hardwood garage door -how to re-furb.

[Derek Geldard]

Our garage door was hand built by a local joiner out of rainforest mahogany Ca 18 years ago. It has been well maintained ever since but now is starting to show signs of deterioration.

It looks like a traditional panelled door but the panels (which are hardwood faced ply) were fitted into grooves in the framework as it was being assembled, IE there is no beading holding them in. The door has just been professionally re-treated with Sikkens.

The problem is the bottom edge of the bottom row of panels (which gets nearly all the water that hits the door)- the plywood is giving up the ghost. It looks like it's failing because the edge splintered a little when they were being sawn to size and some of the splintering has been exposed for 18 years.

To get panels out would involve a dismantling job of taking off the sides and bottom. IGWS it would ruin the paint finish and open up all the joints all round, all in all not condusive to increasing it's longevity.

The panels are exposed on the inside of the door and from there it looks like they are not too bad under the paint.

So I'd appreciate suggestions as to what to do to improve the worst panels which are at the bottom.

Strip off the years of Sikkens finish over about 1" above and below the join and treat with some sort of hardening plastic sealer perhaps, and then re-apply the Sikkens ?

Give it a severe wire brushing, re-paint it well and fix a drip strip to keep the water away from the offending joint perhaps ?

Any better ideas.

Derek

[Bob Minchin dangling via a don]

Dodgy panels can be removed by routing round the frame on the inside a bit at a time until the panel can be pushed through from the outside. New panels can then be fitted and retained by new beading from the inside.

Bob

[Stuart Noble]

A couple of coats of 2 part wood hardener would probably be your best bet, but the ply should be dry when you apply it. Chicken and egg situation.

Introduce a chamfer at the bottom of the panel if there isn't one already. Car body filler works well.

[Rob G]

To show up your local joiner, my garage doors are pine, they were old when I bought the garage well over 30 years ago second hand, and I reckon it was at least 30 years old then, and are still looking good.

It sounds as if your local joiner needs avoiding for shoddy design and workmanship

Rob

[Derek Geldard]

He's 67 and at least a thousand times better than the plastic windows /sqirty foam cowboys we get nowadays.

True, after 18 years it is marginally disappointing. They did all the hardwood windows and doors + conservatory from basic priciples. The workmanship with the hardwood is very good, the only criticism I've had so far is their insistence on using cheap bent steel hinges on internal doors and using cheap "Builder's quality" locks instead of the Chubb I asked for on the final exit door. Builders *will not* use proper locks for the sake of saving Ca. 3 quid. As a result when a lock failed the manufacturer was no longer in business, and the replacement had a different outline, oh and all the hinges creak, irrevocably.

Probably where the garage door went wrong was in their lack of understanding of using a new material Viz hardwood faced ply. AAMOF a material I really don't like. Panels with raw torn edges shouldn't have been used , or at the very least cleaned up and not with the raw edge at the bottom facing out, and some means of shedding water provided for the lowest couple of rows so they don't cop for every drop of water that hits the door.

Derek

[Stuart Noble]

I bet your garage doesn't face south or west though. I've worked on houses where Victorian windows on the north side were still in good nick, and everything on the south side was shot to pieces

[The Natural Philosopher]

Strange., Its the reverse in my house.

Its the shaded north side where the frost damage, and damp, are most important.

[Stuart Noble]

I suppose it partly depends whether the shaded side has an open aspect, but IME the UV>rain>UV cycle is the killer for wood and paint.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Ah. Use more/better paint.

[Jules]

Yep, same here - the north side of both garage and barn are/were definitely worse off, presumably because that's where it takes things longer to dry out.