Garage doors and installation billings mt

5 Uses for Your Second Garage

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Think of all the things you do in your primary garage and of all the things you store in that garage. Think of why you’re always wanting to organize and clean it. A second garage allows you to have everything you’ve always wanted out of owning a garage or extra space in your home.

An outdoor extension cord, a hose, and a little bit of creativity will work wonders for your second garage and allow you to do pretty much anything with your second garage that you wish you could do with any extra space! If you’re not sure why you would want a second garage or what in the world to do with one you already have, here are 5 uses for your second garage that will make both garages more useful and enjoyable!

  • Hobby Room

Even if you don’t have a hobby yet, finding ways to use your second garage as a hobby room will give you some ideas on how you can more enjoyably pass your free time. You can create a canning kitchen, woodshop, sewing room, auto shop, or even a home brewery! Grab a few outdoor extension cords if your second garage doesn’t have electricity. Visit your local Habitat for Humanity store or hardware store for a cheap utility sink, and use your hose, with a nozzle attachment and a sprayer, for the water supply. You never know, a second garage for hobbies may even end up being your new workplace when those hobbies turn into a home business!

  • Second Garage Home Office

Even if you don’t work at home, a second garage home office is the perfect area for paying bills and catching up on mail, or just for spending some much-needed time alone time reading and journaling. Buy some cheap indoor/outdoor carpet for your second garage office, get one of those old tables, a chair, and maybe even a dresser to use as a filing cabinet out of your primary garage, and voila! You have a home office!

  • Party Room

Many of us already use our primary garages for our man-caves (or woman-caves!).  We host informal weeknight gatherings among a few friends in our garages, rather than indoors, to keep the house clean, wave at and recruit passing neighbors to the party, or just to get away from the kids. Keep your party room temperature controlled by buying a portable fireplace or heater, or by placing a window air conditioning unit in the garage. If your Homeowners Association doesn’t allow window units in your neighborhood, place one on some garage shelving with a bucket underneath to catch the drip!

  • Getting Around HOA Restrictions

Homeowners Associations can be very restrictive. If you want a vegetable garden, but your homeowner’s association won’t allow it, create one in your second garage! Artificial ultraviolet light, heat sources, and a do-it-yourself hydroponic system can give you fresh vegetables and herbs year-round! Or, if your HOA doesn’t allow backyard clothes lines, hang clothes to dry in a second garage. Buy some cheap clothespins and clothesline from your local Dollar Store and a heat source or fan, then hang clothes to dry by attaching the clothesline to the walls. You can cut your electric bill by as much as a third when you hang your clothes to dry!

  • Dog House

Why, yes, we do mean THAT kind of dog house – but also the other kind. If you’re frequently in the doghouse at home, a second garage is a great place for you to spend the night (and 9 out of 10 spouses agree!). A blowup mattress and a heating or air conditioning source can be a lot more comfortable than sleeping on the sofa within earshot of an angry spouse. Add a dog bed and some treats and toys for your furry friend, and you’ve even got a place for your preferred companion!

  • Family Expansion

We know we said we only had 5 uses for your second garage, but this bonus idea is one of the best ideas for a second garage for married couples! Anyone who lives with a child knows how hard it can be to try to conceive a second, third, or fourth one when a kid is already in the house. Although you should never leave small children alone, turning your second garage into your family-making room will allow you the privacy you need to finally expand your family. We won’t get into specifics on this one!

Any of these ideas can applied to your primary garage as well, if you just move all your junk from the primary garage to the second garage. Also, think of ways you might use any type of additional space in your house. For the most part, a second garage is not only a cheaper option than adding a room, but a better one! Owning a second garage can be turned into an investment or anything you might dream of doing with extra space in your home. If you don’t have a second garage or can’t afford to build one, turn a backyard shed into one and start enjoying your second garage today!

Visit Bailey Garage Doors for all of your garage door needs!

What You Didn’t Know About Today’s Garage Doors

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Garage doors aren’t an everyday purchase, so it may be as many as fifteen years since you’ve looked at garage door options. This newer generation of garage doors is stronger, better insulated, and more secure than their forebears. They also require a lot less maintenance while giving you broader choices in just about every area.

Materials

Garage doors in the “old days” were often made from wood. Now, most are made from steel backed with insulation. Steel panels range from 24 gauge (the strongest) to 28 gauge, and most are embossed with a subtle pattern or smooth finish. Baked-on primer and a polyester topcoat are two things to look for if you want the maximum rust protection available. Warranties on steel garage doors start at 10 years.

Plastic is an even newer option and may become the most popular one. Like their steel counterparts, plastic garage doors are lightweight and durable with minimal routine upkeep. Unlike the older wooden doors, and even newer steel ones, they aren’t subject to rot or corrosion. Plastic doors also have the advantage of operating much more quietly than doors made from other materials. Plastic doors can carry a warranty of 20 years or more.

Insulation

An insulated garage door is the optimal choice for homeowners in areas of the country that experience three or four seasons. If your garage is attached to your house, or if you have living space attached to your garage, you’ll also want to consider an insulated door. It helps cut down on cold, tamps down noise, and makes the door more immune to denting. Newer model garage doors have what is essentially a steel door “sandwich” – thick layers of steel on the outside with a core of insulation. A thin steel or plastic backing attaches the insulation to the outer steel layers. This “sandwich” construction makes for a very strong but lightweight garage door.

Style

A garage door can make up a significant portion of your house’s exterior. Every major garage door manufacturer offers a range of style options. From basic panels to more decorative ones, you can choose the elements that work with your budget and home style. Even color options have been updated. Where you used to have to choose from basic, light neutrals, many companies are now offering deeper colors and a more refined color palate. If none of the many options are quite what you’re looking for, a custom garage door design can be ordered from most companies.

Contact Bailey Garage Doors today for all of your garage door needs!

Garage Door and Openers Safety Tips

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A garage door and a garage door opener should be dependable. The door should open in most any weather (considering of course you’ve winterized certain components—see the previous two blog posts for ideas on how to do this) because we need the door to be as reliable to our time schedule as anything else in our lives. However, a garage door and garage door opener should also be dependably safe; children, pets, and our belongings should be safe around it. But how do you go about ensuring that your garage door or opener is dependably safe?

Safety Features

New garage doors and openers come with safety features built in. This is a result of legislation. These safety features include a device, which (to give a non-technical explanation) works as an all-seeing eye: there are two devices (the eyes), which are positioned at opposing sides of the garage door, and these eyes essentially watch each other, emitting a beam of light between the two, and, when the beam is broken, the door will not lower to a closed position (unless you override the safety features on the garage door opener). Another safety feature (although one not found on every new garage door) is a unique joint at the connection of separate garage door panels, which prevents fingers from becoming lodged in the garage door, by essentially pushing out anything from the joint as it closes.

Tips for staying safe

It’s a good idea to explain to children that, if improperly used, the garage door could hurt them. Children shouldn’t be allowed to play with the garage door or with the opener. Never walk beneath a garage door after you’ve closed it—if you must close the garage door from the inside—and you then try to outrun the closing garage door—it may be time to invest in a portable garage door opener, if you don’t already have one at home. Remember that garage door openers operate by electricity, and, if you have a problem with your garage door, that all power should be turned off at the fuse box before any repairs are made.

We hope these tips help you to stay safe around garage doors. And, if your current garage door, or garage door opener, model is without safety features, give Bailey Garage Doors a call today to discuss your options to keeping safe.

Common Garage Door Problems In The Winter

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The cold weather of winter is here. The snow is on the ground, people are out shopping in stores that play jingle bells on continuous, others tether bright flashing lights from their rain gutters and plant a big light up Santa with Reindeer in the yard. The beginning of winter means the cheery holiday season, but it can also have far less cheery connotations for your home’s garage doors. Cold weather is a likely culprit for garage door failure. Cold temperatures—below 35 degrees—can cause the oil that lubricates the garage door motor to thicken and the motor could seize. Also, cold weather could cause the metal parts that make a garage door function—leaf springs, screws, tracks, and other metal components—seize up, because the cold air cause the metal parts to contract. Also, a Garage doors springs have a good likelihood of breaking during the cold months.

Another common issue in winter is the possible fogging of the Garage Door sensors (sensors that project a beam of light, that, when broken, stalls out the descent of the garage door to prevent accidental closure on a person or things). Make sure that the sensors are fog free and also that everything is out of the path of the sensors. Often, people have a tendency to keep items like the snow shovel near the front of the garage for easy access.

Also, when the weather is warmer during the day and the snow and ice melt, water can get under the garage door and refreeze as soon as the temperatures drop back down. This can freeze the garage door down onto the pavement. The door may still open when the opener is pressed, but the ice may tear away the seal at the bottom of the door. This component can be replaced and, or, if its undamaged, put back into place. Make sure before you open the door that the door is not frozen down. you wouldn’t want to be caught in the predicament of having to leave an open, damaged garage door.  If you are experiencing garage door problems this winter, please contact Bailey Garage Doors today!

CHI Garage Doors

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Bailey Garage Doors sells and installs CHI Garage Doors. CHI has a plethora of design options for garage doors that range from dark, dramatic stained wood to the whimsical logo of your favorite baseball team.   Needless to say, today’s homeowner has many, many stylistic options to increase curb appeal or possibly display his or her personality with prominence.

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Wood garage doors are beautiful, although garage doors made entirely of wood do require upkeep, and are not as durable as doors built of steel. Wood Accent Garage doors, by CHI, provide the natural look of wood, giving your home that curbside look of sophistication and warmth, although the doors are not made entirely of wood. The Accents Wood Grain finishes make the door appear as if it is made of wood, but it is entirely built of steel. This allows the homeowner to have the best of both worlds, in a sense: the look of wood and the durability of steel. The Wood Accent Garage Door is available in the colors: Cedar, Mahogany, Light Oak, and Dark Oak. CHI also offers a wood plank look, which is available in the same four different color options as the Accents Wood Grain finished doors.

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CHI Garage Doors also makes garage doors with a displayed image. These images allow the homeowner to display their true personality. The images are based on the following four categories: Destinations, Patriotic, Sportsman, and Patterns. In the category of the Sportsman, for instance, you will find an image of a golf scene: serene, bright green fairway with the putting green, pin, and hole shown far in the distance, or an image of dawn on a lake and two men (seen only as black outlines in the new morning light) are casting fishing poles from a boat out into the lake. The Patriotic images include American Flags, and bald eagles, while the Pattern option has unique designs and even camouflage. CHI can also place your favorite Major League Baseball team’s logo on the front of the garage door, so the rest of the neighborhood will have little doubt to which team you cheer for.

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Garage Door Opener Maintenance

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Garage Door Maintenance Billings MT

Like any major appliance in the home the garage door and the garage door opener should be regularly maintained to prevent poor service or possible failure. To begin maintenance, tell everyone in the home your plan to work on the garage door or opener to prevent any possible injury. The first step to garage door maintenance is simple: stand inside the garage with the garage door closed; inspect the springs, rollers, pulleys and all of the mounting hardware for both the garage door and the opener. If there are any signs of damage or noticeable wear to these components, it may be time to call your garage door professional to replace the damaged or worn components (Remember garage doors are held up under a lot of tension, and a trained professional should be called to replace damaged hardware to prevent any possible injury to the homeowner).

The balance of the garage door should also be regularly checked to ensure the garage door is opening and closing with no resistance along its track. With the garage door closed, disconnect the automatic door opener, and, with the automatic door opener disconnected, lift the garage door manually into an open position. If the door moves smoothly and freely into the upward position, the door is in alignment. If, however, the door catches and drags on the rails, a trained garage door technician should properly service the door.

The garage door’s reversing mechanism – devices which have been added to all garage doors built after 1993 and are responsible for the prevention of the possible entrapment of a person under the garage door – should also be tested regularly. To test the door’s reversing mechanism, open the garage door and place a two by four on the garage floor directly in the path of the garage door. With the two by four in place, close the garage door onto it. When the garage door falls on the two by four and makes contact, the garage door should retreat back up on the track into the open position. If the door does not immediately retract, call your garage door service technician to fix the reversing mechanism.

On a final note, a small amount of lubrication can be added to all of the garage doors moving parts. Make sure that the garage door is either in a fully opened or closed position while working on the garage door, and stand clear of the garage door and all of the moving parts when the garage door is activated.

Why You May Need A New Garage Door

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While a new garage door may not seem like a wise investment for your home (your garage door works just fine and if its not broke why fix it right?) and the new doors being built today, at least on the outside, appear to look just like your old trusty garage door; take a closer look, because they are much more improved. For instance, today’s garage doors, at least most models, are made of steel, and that steel is backed by high rigid foam insulation. This means that these new doors are considerably better insulating then their predecessors. Most new garage doors also have a baked on primer and polyester topcoat, and, while those terms seem like industry jargon to the average homeowner, the terms mean that the garage doors that are coated in these materials will have a great amount of rust protection.

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If in your home you have a room above the garage, and many of today’s newly constructed homes do include a room above the garage, an insulated garage door makes perfect sense. A well insulated steel door will both help keep out the cold, and, because of the doors rigidity, it will have considerably less vibration when the door is raised or lowered.

Safety is another issue with garage doors, especially in homes where children are at play, running in and out of the garage. Legislation backed by the federal government requires all new garage doors to include safety additions like an automatic reverse. The automatic reverse functions exactly as it sounds: if something comes in contact with the edge of the garage door, then the door will quit its decent downwards and retract back up into the track. Also, new doors are equipped with a laser eye system, and this system, which is comprised of two small boxes placed on either side of the garage door that emit a light beam between them, to send a closing garage door back up into the tracks when the beam of light is broken.

Also, the newer garage doors, with their numerous designs, add significant curb appeal to any home. Newer window treatments for garage doors, for the homeowner who wants to add them, also add significant style to the home.

Garage Door Openers

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Not all garage door openers operate the same. The opener is one way for the homeowner to customize their own garage door to their needs. Bailey Garage Doors carries three types of garage door openers: Screw Drive, Chain Drive, and Belt Drive openers. Bailey Garage Doors also carries the standard models as well as the premium and high-performance models. All of our models of openers are equipped with PosiLock, which secures the door when it is down, preventing intruders from opening the garage door from the outside. And, all of our openers come with the Protector System, which projects a beam of light under the door, and if anything breaks that beam, the door will not close, preventing the door from falling on a person or object.  garage door openers billings mt

The screw drive opener rides on a trolley that moves up and down a steel rod. The screw drive openers operate with much less force than other models. There are many advantages to the screw drive openers, and the main advantage is its simplicity. There are very few moving parts that the homeowner will need to maintain over the life of the opener.

Chain Drive openers are the most common and oldest of the garage door openers. The opener operates the door up and down by turning a chain (similar in appearance and operation to a bicycle chain) with one end of the chain connected to a part called the J-Arm, which is attached to the garage door itself, with the other end attached to the trolley. Chain drives are also the most economical garage door opener, and, while older chain drive garage door openers were loud, newer technology has quieted the starting and stopping motion of these openers.

Belt Drives are the quietest of the openers, and they operate in the same way as the chain drive openers. Instead of the chain, a belt is used. The belt drive has a sleek appearance, and, because the belt itself is made of a fiberglass, reinforced rubber, the vibrations caused from starting and stopping the garage door is greatly reduced.

All garage doors openers have pros and cons, and a homeowner should give preference to which opener fits both his lifestyle and his style.

Garage Door Safety Sensors

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Garage doors require several electronic components to operate, and when these components age they may need to be serviced. Bailey Garage Doors is one of the leading garage door sales in Montana, and while the garage door is a reliable addition in any home, it receives significant use. In all things with mechanical components, those components will need to be serviced at some point. One of the most common serviceable components for a garage door is the safety sensor. These sensors prevent the garage door from closing upon a person or an item that has been placed under the path of the closing door. garage door safety sensors billings mt

A common sign that the sensors need to be serviced or replaced occurs when the garage door will open properly by touching the wall switch, but when the switch is pressed to close the garage door, the door will start down the track a short distance and then retreat back into an open position. Holding down the switch may close a garage door with a faulty sensor, although the sensors will no longer prevent the door from closing upon someone or something.

Trouble Shooting

The garage can be a dusty place, and when dust covers the sensor it may not work properly. If the sensor appears dirty, wipe it clean with a clean cloth or paper towel. Another common problem with safety sensors is misalignment. The garage is a very busy place in any home, and these sensors can easily go unnoticed. If a person or object bumps the sensor, it may fall out of alignment. If one sensor is no longer pointed toward the matching sensor, it may need to be realigned. If any wires are showing around the sensor, or if the sensor appears to be damaged, you will need to call a professional to service the broken sensor.

Service

Bailey Garage Doors is proud to be one of Montana’s best garage door companies because of our reputation for quality. Our knowledgeable staff can fix any garage door issue you may have and our large inventory of parts can ensure that we have the part that you need.

How to Choose a New Garage Door

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carriage-house-overlay-thumbChoosing a new garage door for your home is a big investment, and one that can affect everything from how safe your home is to its exterior aesthetics. Before you dive into a purchase, consider these tips for choosing a new garage door:

Choose Your Style and Material
There are a handful of different garage styles, and multiple different types of garage building materials. Why style is definitely your personal preference and should go along with the style of your home, consider the climate you live in and your budget when choosing material. Wood doors, for example, are stunning, but can be very expensive. If you live in a place where temperatures are known to change sporadically from hot to cold, then fiberglass doors might be the better option. Or, if you live in an area that’s prone to burglary or violent weather, then steel doors—which are incredibly strong—could offer you exactly what you’re looking for.

Consider Garage Door Safety
A garage door with added safety features can be key, especially if you have children at home who might be at risk of a garage door injury. The newest garage doors on the market are pinch-resistant, pushing fingers out of the way when closing; feature tamper-resistant brackets that reduce the risk of injury under tension; and come equipped with reversing features that will cause the garage door to open back up if something is in its way upon closing.carriage-house-stamped-thumb

Don’t Forget About Insulation
You might assume that insulation in a garage door is a waste of money. But with the increasing focus on energy conservation and space maximization, choosing a garage door that provides adequate insulation may end up being important to you and your family—you could end up using your garage door as a place for social gathering or as a place for work., among other things When choosing insulation for your garage, look for the garage’s R-value. A higher R-value is indicative of more thermal insulation, i.e., a higher R-value is equal to less outside noise and increased warmth. Remember, just because a door looks thick does not mean that it has a high R-value.

Consult with a Professional to Learn More
If you still have questions about what kind of garage door is right for you, don’t hesitate to reach out to a garage door professional to learn more today.