Alberto, the first named storm of the 2006 Hurricane season is presently spinning around in The Gulf of Mexico generating 70 mph sustained winds and this very well might make landfall as a hurricane. A Hurricane Warning has been issued for parts of the Florida gulf coast. You could be hours away from meeting Alberto face-to-face.
Here at A Big Wind this week we’re highlighting practical Hurricane protection information that can help you get prepared today. That’s why we’ve already featured a couple of articles (here and here) on plywood Hurricane shutters. But that’s not enough.
Which leads us to our riddle today…
Which opening on your home stands the greatest chance of failing under Hurricane force winds?
Which opening on your home is most likely to remain unprotected even when you have Hurricane shutters or impact windows installed?
Which opening on your home can you secure yourself for around $150, 45 minutes using an electric drill and 1/2″ masonry bit?
Answer: Your garage door. When A Big Wind started researching how to protect your garage door opening we were pleasantly surprised to find information like that which we found in this story on Bob Vila’s site about protecting your garage door in hurricane. The story features DAB’s Hurricane Master Garage Door System* – a Hurricane garage door solution that focuses not only on bracing and stronger garage door skin, but also on a common point of failure on garage doors, the stiles.
“We use anti-distortion end stiles and a 24 gauge steel skin on our doors,” explains Hunto. In hurricane-strength winds regular garage door end stiles endure enormous forces and often rotate, causing the garage door to “dump out” or give way.”
The article mentions a cost of around $1,200 and up for a Hurricane garage door.
Our question is what inexpensive and effective options are there for protecting your garage door?
Garage door retrofit kits. Secure Door* in Plantation, Florida sells the kits featured in the Bob Vila story and they appear to offer a lot of protection for the money. For $149.99 you can install one brace on your garage door (Secure Door’s recommendation for a single opening garage door). Secure Door recommends two or three braces for larger double-opening garage doors. Check them out on the web here. According to the story on BobVila.com:
“Retrofit kits like Secure Door’s products commonly include bracing systems that install on the inside of the garage door. Secure Door’s telescoping lightweight, high-strength aluminum braces install vertically through the header above the door and through floor mounts that are drilled into the concrete floor. The braces also attach through the hinges in the door itself to protect both from external pressure and internal negative pressure in a hurricane. “3 of our braces installed on a 7 foot by 16 foot garage door will protect up to 180 mph,” says Stumpff. “It takes about 40 minutes to retrofit the garage for our reinforcing braces, and all a homeowner needs is an electric drill, a 1?2 inch” masonry bit, an adjustable wrench and a screwdriver.” Once the garage has been retrofitted, the braces themselves take three to five minutes to actually attach in preparation for a storm.”
Any hitches?
Possibly – the retrofit kit for your garage door won’t do you a lot of good if your garage door is weakened from weather and old age.
So what are you waiting for? According to FLASH, the Federal Alliance for Home Safety, approximately 80% of residential Hurricane wind damage starts with wind entry through a garage door. Would you like to hear more about the threat that an unprotected garage door or other opening presents in a Hurricane? Flash.org has a fantastic video here that shows you how Hurricane winds compromise a structure and also graphically presents some solutions for protecting windows and doors (the information on garage doors is at the end of the video).
* A Big Wind Does Not Endorse Products
The appearance of third-party advertisements, sponsorship acknowledgements, or editorial links to third party products on ABigWind.com or its forum is not a guarantee or an endorsement by A Big Wind or any of our content partners, of the organization, product or service or the claims made for the product or service in such advertisement, sponsorship acknowledgement, or editorial link.
1 comment so far ↓
I never would have guessed the answer. Thankfully our garage is not attached and acturally serves as a horse barn and we are a long way north of the normal path of hurricanes. Came here by way of Pure Florida. Very interesting blog.
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