Looking to replace your old commercial garage door? Perhaps you're new to these types of doors. No matter what you're looking for, make sure you understand the difference between the three most common types of commercial garage doors.
If you listen to homeowners, garage doors are nothing more than sectional doors that rise to the ceiling and ride along tracks. While this type of garage door is likely what they are most familiar with, it's really only one of the many types of doors.
Non-residential properties often have entirely different needs, though. Commercial, agricultural, and industrial properties need doors made of steel and that are reinforced with rubber and fabric materials.
The Ruling Champ - The Overhead Sectional Door
These doors are quite similar to standard residential garage doors. They are made of sections called panels and ride on a set of tracks. Unlike residential garage doors, though, these come in all shapes and sizes.
What makes these doors different is how they move and the hardware they use.
Commercial properties are not like a house. They have high ceilings that make it crucial for a garage door to maintain the maximum headroom. To do so, sectional doors ride along the wall, travel up, and then move back once they meet the ceiling.
Several different styles of movements work with these doors. It all depends on how high the garage door is as well as the height of the building's interior.
The 3 movements you'll likely find are:
- Standard: The same movement as a residential garage door
- High lift: The door travels all the way up along the wall and turns once it reaches the ceiling
- Full vertical lift: Found in loading docks and loading bays
To achieve maximum insulation and robustness, most commercial sectional doors are made of galvanized steel and then injected with insulating polyurethane foam.
For buildings without heating or cooling, you can also find non-insulated doors. These are commonly used for buildings used to store agricultural machinery.
Rolling steel doors
You probably guessed it—these doors roll! Unlike sectional doors, these doors do not need a set of tracks. Instead, they just roll up above the door.
So they can roll up tightly, these doors have to be made with different types of sections. Rather than tall panels, rolling steel doors use thin slats. Though every door is different, you'll find that most slats measure no bigger than 3 inches!
Rolling steel doors are used for all sorts of reasons. Usually, they are installed inside a building to help separate one area from another. This can help keep dust or debris from crossing into other sections of a factory or other commercial property.
The doors may also be used as firewalls to meet insurance requirements. Rolling steel doors are built to withstand anywhere from half an hour to 4 hours of fire exposure. For this reason, they can help prevent a fire from spreading from one area of your property to another.
You may have even seen these doors used to close a foodservice counter or in a shopping center as a metal grille.
No matter their use, they're all the same - they roll up.
High-speed roll-up doors
It's not as easy to find high-speed roll-up doors as it is to find rolling steel and sectional doors, but if you look in a food distribution center or the mining and rail industries, you'll find them.
The food distribution industry likes to use this type of door to seal refrigerated areas. If the doors are left open for too long, the area will warm up, and food will spoil. To help prevent this, distribution centers use high-speed roll-up doors.
With opening speeds up to 96 inches a minute, these doors certainly live up to their name. Though they do close a little more slowly, you'll appreciate the added safety of not having a door drop on top of you.
These doors are often made of either thick reinforced rubber or reinforced vinyl material to withstand significant impacts.
Need more information on one of these doors?
Contact us now at 613-749-2138 if you're in the Ottawa and surrounding areas.
We'll answer all of your commercial and industrial garage door questions with experience and expertise. Here at RamDoors, we'll help you find the right commercial garage door for your building without over-extending your budget!
When it comes time to make a purchase, we'll even send you a no-obligation quotation by email.
Curious what our commercial doors look like?
You can take a gander at all of our products in the Commercial Door Pictures Gallery for some creative insight.
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