Converting Conventional Doors to Swing-Open Carriage Style Garage Doors

Carriage style garage doors swing open elegantly and add a classy look to homes. They’re especially popular for Victorians and other period homes, because they instantly give a sense of authenticity to the home by helping to hide modern conveniences behind a time-tested design.

If you’re interested in replacing your existing roll-up or tilt-up overhead garage door with carriage style doors, be sure you know what you’re getting into first! Here are a few things to consider about carriage style doors and the conversion process.

Carriage Doors Need Extra Space

If you’ve gotten used to pulling into your driveway before hitting the garage door opener to activate your roll-up door, you’ll need to change your habits when you get carriage style doors. Because the doors swing outwards as they open, you need to leave adequate clearance between them and your car. You will also need to be sure that there aren’t any other cars, stray bicycles or kids’ toys blocking the doors before opening them from the inside.

Carriage Doors Offer Design Flexibility

Traditional garage door designs are limited by the amount of weight that the garage door opener can support. With carriage doors, however, you have much more freedom to use fine woods and other heavy materials, because carriage doors open on heavy duty hinges that can handle more weight than a lifting system can. You can also put windows and decoration anywhere you like on the door, without worrying about accommodating the hinged panels.

Carriage Doors Need Special Openers

When you convert to carriage doors, you’ll need to tear out your existing garage door opener system and install a new one that is specially designed for carriage doors. There are two main types of automatic carriage door openers. The first type has two units that mount on the wall directly above each door, and open and close the door by extending or retracting a jointed arm. This type of opener requires so little power that some brands are fueled by solar power. The second type has a single overhead track, along which glides a little box attached to a pair of rods that push the doors open or pull them closed.

Carriage Doors May Require Garage Alterations.

While square carriage doors can fit easily into the space left by a traditional roll-up or swing-up door, arched carriage doors will require alterations to your garage. The garage opening will have to be enlarged and shaped to fit the door.

To learn more about converting to carriage style garage doors, consult a custom garage door provider.

One response to “Converting Conventional Doors to Swing-Open Carriage Style Garage Doors”

1. Kevin Naderi says:

   March 7, 2016 at 10:34 am

   Awesome