Unless you’ve bought one, you may be surprised by how much thought must go into finding the right garage door for your home. This is largely due to the importance of choosing the right types of garage door materials. From insulation properties to appearance, price to maintenance demands, the material you choose for your garage door can have a long-term effect on you and your home.
Garage doors come in various materials, each with their own pros and cons. Some of the most widely used garage door materials are:
Steel
Steel is often seen as the standard for garage doors. Highly popular and providing great value for money, steel garage doors are one of the more durable options. With steel garage doors, you’ll also have a variety of designs to choose from, allowing you to find the door that best suits your home’s aesthetic. If you compare wood and steel garage doors, steel is much lighter and easier to manage, not to mention more affordable.
While steel is typically susceptible to corrosion and rust, steel garage doors are usually manufactured and treated to resist these dangers. To further protect your steel garage doors, you should wash them at least twice a year.
Aluminum
Aluminum is another popular material used in garage doors. Extremely lightweight, aluminum is easy to install and delivers less stress to the operating mechanism than many other materials do. Aluminum is also highly resistant to many dangers, such as corrosion and ultraviolet (UV) rays. This makes this material perfect for coastal climates. It also helps it to maintain its premium and modern appearance, and perform well for longer periods of time, especially in cold climates.
Aluminum is typically less durable than other materials, such as steel. However, many garage doors use reinforced aluminum, which makes it harder to mark or dent. Even with reinforced aluminum, care should be taken to avoid damaging your doors.
Wood
A traditional and still highly popular choice for garage doors, wood delivers a natural and classic aesthetic that can enhance your home’s curb appeal. Since it’s easy to customize, you can enhance that appeal further by designing your doors to perfectly suit your home. Wood is also a great insulator that keeps heat in your home during winter and out during the summer. It’s also a renewable resource, meaning that it has a smaller impact on the environment.
As a premium material, wood is one of the most expensive materials that’s commonly used in garage doors. Regular maintenance can help keep your wood garage door at its best, and extra protection is available to further protect your garage door from the elements. Wood garage doors are best-suited to milder climates that don’t experience drastic changes in temperature.
Usually built with a strong wood or steel frame and a composite overlay, faux wood garage doors offer many of the same benefits as real wood, but to a lesser extent. It looks similar to real wood, with higher-quality faux wood replicating the appearance more accurately. It also offers fewer but still plenty of customization options, and is a good insulator, particularly when it has built-in insulation.
Faux wood also has some advantages over real wood, such as reduced maintenance demands and lower cost. Faux wood is also highly resistant to moisture, rot and insects, making it a great choice for humid environments.
Glass
A glass garage door is a less common option due to its higher price, but it can deliver an aesthetic that’s hard to replicate with another material. Allowing natural light in makes your garage interior that much more appealing, too.
Glass garages offer various design choices. They provide plenty of options for frames, such as aluminum and steel. You can also customize the layout of the glass windows to create your preferred style of door.
Regular cleaning is important to keep your glass garage doors looking their best. The glass can be tempered for additional strength, reducing the risk of impacts causing cracks or dents, though care should still be taken to avoid hitting your doors.
Vinyl
Vinyl is popular in garage doors thanks to its budget-friendly prices, low maintenance requirements and durability. It’s unlikely to dent, and any scuff marks will be hard to notice. It’s also unlikely to crack, although it may do so in extreme cold. However, vinyl can be safely used in most climates thanks to its resistance to salt, sand, wind and moisture. It also won’t rust like metal or warp like wood, and a UV-resistant finish means the sun won’t fade its color.
Vinyl is that it shouldn’t be repainted, as this could nullify the door’s warranty. However, it’s extremely easy to maintain and keep clean, meaning it will retain a premium appearance for a long time.
How to Choose the Right Material for Your Garage Door
With so much information, choosing the right material for your garage door can be challenging. To make your decision easier, consider:
Your local climate: Some materials will cope better in your local climate than others. If you want to enhance the longevity of your garage door, choose a material that is suitable for your climate.
Your desired aesthetic: Each material delivers a unique appearance, so consider how you want your garage door to look and how that will tie in with your home’s aesthetic.
Customization options: Wood is often considered the most customizable material for a garage door, but every material offers some scope for customization. You’ll also have plenty of door designs to choose from for each material.
Maintenance demands: If you want a garage door that requires less maintenance, you may prefer one made from faux wood or vinyl.
Insulation capabilities: If you need your garage door to provide reliable insulation, wood and faux wood are great options.
Your budget: Some materials cost more to purchase and maintain than others. The most budget-friendly materials for a garage door are vinyl and steel.
Your preferred door type: Some materials can’t be used with certain types of garage doors, so research what materials are available in your preferred door type.
Find the Perfect Garage Door for Your Home
A homeowner’s guide to garage door material can help you take that first step and decide what material you want for your garage door. Next, you need to find a supplier who can deliver that door.
Cornwell Door Service has supplied premium garage doors to our customers in Pennsylvania since 1972. Over the last five decades and more, we’ve perfected our range of garage doors so that our customers can always find what they need, whatever their preferred garage door material types are.
To find out more about how our garage doors can complete your home, contact us today.
