Which garage door is better? |
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Sectional steel garage door |
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Sectional wood garage door |
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Available in variety of colors and finishes. Raised panels design is one of the most popular sectional steel doors style.
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Natural look of wood. Manufactured in wide range of colors and shades. Most popular species: cedar, hemlock, fir, and redwood. Wood garage doors can be stained or painted on-site in any imaginable color.
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Perfect option for any garage.
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Resistance to wind mainly depends on hardware and installation quality. Some steel doors designed to withstand strong wind or hurricane
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Depends on wood door design. Many wind load rated wood garage doors manufactured to withstand over 90 mph wind. |
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25-gauge steel garage doors are susceptible to dents, but still they have fair resistance to impacts. |
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Good impart resistance properties. |
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Fire-rated steel doors have excellent resistance to open fires. |
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Wood garage door can be easily damaged by fire.
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Non-insulated steel panels have very low thermal efficiency. Insulated with polyurethane foam steel doors significantly increase energy efficiency of a whole house. |
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Depends on door style and insulation R-value.
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Steel is durable material.
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Depends on wood species and door quality. Some hardwood garage doors are extremely durable.
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Steel panels can easily last 60+ years, but garage door hardware has much shorter lifespan.
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Lifespan greatly vary. Wood garage door can last over 80 years if installed properly and maintained adequately.
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Minimum care required after installation. |
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Wood door has to be treated properly in order to extend its lifespan. |
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Greatly vary. Typically garage door producers offer 5 years limited warranty on steel sections and 3 years on door springs and hardware. |
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Warranty on wood garage doors depends on manufacturer and product quality. Wood garage doors producers might offer from 1 to 3 years limited manufacturer warranty on their products.
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Depends on door dimensions and steel gauge. On average 16’ x 7’ insulated 25 gauge steel garage door weight about 210 – 250 pounds (95 - 113 kg).
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Greatly vary. Some solid wood garage doors could be extremely heavy. |
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Sectional steel garage doors are one of the most affordable options. |
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Prices greatly vary and some custom made wood garage doors might be quite expensive. |
Installation cost (labor)
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Cost of sectional steel garage door installation normally lower compare to wood garage door installation. |
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Normally it is cheaper to install steel door compare to wood.
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Moderate difficulty task.
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Sectional wood garage door installation is not a complicated task, but proper mounting door tracks, adequate installation of torsion springs and door openers might require some skills for performing the task successfully.
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Depends on door size and overall work complexity. On average, basic installation of 8’ x 7’ sectional steel garage door is a few hours project for an experienced installer with a helper. Replacement might take twice longer.
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Professional garage door installer with a helper normally is able to install 14’ x 7’ sectional wood garage door and programming door opener in 5 – 7 hours. |
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Easy to repair. Damaged steel sections could be replaced with new ones. |
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Sectional wood garage doors are not hard to repair.
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Loose hardware, broken spring, door opener failure, rollers out of the track, dents or rust on steel panels. |
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Springs failure, problems with door opener, rotten wood panels. |
Sectional steel and wood are both great garage door options. Steel doors tends to be more popular because simplicity of installation and lower price. Wood garage doors normally are a great choice for custom build expensive houses with attached garages.
1 Rating was estimated on the scale from 1 to 5, accounting 1 as lowest and 5 as the highest quality of a product. Always consider the fact: not all products made equally the same, and performance of particular garage door significantly depends on individual product quality, adequate installation, and proper maintenance.