Getting a wide car safely through a narrow garage door,

[Rostfritt]

Have you considered getting a smaller car? Perhaps an Austin 7?

[Pan Pan Pan]

a11y_m said:

Is retrofitting electric folding mirrors to the car an option? Reverse in most of the way using mirrors to line up, then fold them in at last possible moment.

Not to boast, but I reverse my VW T5 LWB van into garage with 2" to spare either side, although that includes the mirrors still being out. What I'm trying to say is the mirrors really help me align it as I enter, so if you can a way to keep using yours til the last second then it might be the solution. Even pausing partway and manually reaching over to fold them if electric folding isn't an option.

Thanks again. it seems that mirrors may be the answer, but mounted on the back wall of the garage, and angled so that I can check the 30mm clearance between the door frame and the parts of the cars body that cannot be seen from the drivers seat. the mirrors on the car are the manually folding type, so unfortunately I don't have the luxury of being able to fold them in/out to clear the garage door frame whilst I am still in the car, and with the car between the garage door frames, I cannot get out of the car to fold them in/out manually.

[Mr Ben]

Horman (or Hormann?) are the manufacturer and well respected amongst the numerous posts/forums I read while researching the topic.

I had the door fitted by a local specialist (garage door type) company who advertised said product.

Together with my carpet tiles nailed to the wall efforts am pleased with the result.

Not the cheapest option but incredibly well made.

Regards

Mr Ben

Pan Pan Pan said:

Mr Ben said:

Although not a daily problem I faced the same issue with my weekend/fun car. Did my head in to the point i didn't want to use it in the dark.

Bit the bullet and replaced with a Horman sectional door. Secured directly to the brickwork of the garage either side thus negating the need and therefore removing the timber frame which the old up and over door was fixed.

Increased gap either side by 3 inches and a better door.

Might work in your circumstance too.

Regards

Mr Ben

Thank you for your comments. the car in question is (like yours) not my daily driver, but it is my pride and joy, so when I do use it I do have `some' time to mess about making sure it is perfectly aligned, but by the same token I really don't want to scrape the sides either, and putting it in the garage in the dark (where you lose the light from the headlamps once the car is between the frames) is currently not very appealing at the moment.
The Horman sectional door sounds interesting, because if I could get rid of the up and over door frame between the jambs, it would give me another 100mm / 4 inches of clearance which would do me. Are they a UK company, do you have any contact details for Horman?

[Pan Pan Pan]

Rostfritt said:

Have you considered getting a smaller car? Perhaps an Austin 7?

When I can find one that can do 0-62 in 5.5 seconds and 175 mph, then perhaps I will

[raceboy]

I'd look in to different design doors that give an extra few inches to the opening, this is what I looked into but I also had the problem of not being able to get out the car once it was in the garage.
Luckily I found this out before I bought the car by getting the salesman to bring it round to see if it fit as a condition of sale....it failed, I'm currently looking for a new house with a double garage to solve the problem.

[JeffreyB]

Clearly you have plenty of space once you are in the garage otherwise you wouldn't be able to open the door to get out of the car. If that is the case, can't the opening be made wider?

[Pan Pan Pan]

Fastpedeller said:

I like the channeling idea - If you had a V shaped trough on one side, bolted into the floor with an extension piece which is the length of the wheelbase and clips on outside of the garage (if that makes sense), then all you would need to do is get the wheels in the trough, let go of the steering so the trough guides it, and drive in. Remove the external part and place it under car and shut the garage door.... Hmmm how do YOU get out of the car though?

Hi fast pedaller. As posted earlier, once in the garage (whilst still a bit tight), getting out is not so much of a problem, as it is only really the width of the brick piers at either side of the garage door, plus the width of the garage door frame which cause the constriction,
Getting out is of course helped by me having the physique of a cut down racing snake!

[raceboy]

Is it possible to put something soft around the door at the point it would touch the car, some cloth or foam of somesort?

[Pan Pan Pan]

raceboy said:

I'd look in to different design doors that give an extra few inches to the opening, this is what I looked into but I also had the problem of not being able to get out the car once it was in the garage.
Luckily I found this out before I bought the car by getting the salesman to bring it round to see if it fit as a condition of sale....it failed, I'm currently looking for a new house with a double garage to solve the problem.

That's the trouble with being a petrol head, if the house, or her indoors cause any problems for our wheels, they have to be let go!

[Funk]

How has no-one yet asked what the car is? I'm curious; care to share PPP?

[PorkInsider]

ChemicalChaos said:

I used to regularly get a discovery into a garage door with about 6" clearance on each side.
Reverse in slowly having aligned the car properly with the aperture. Use the mirrors to keep the gap even each side until the drivers door is level with the opening, at which point fold the mirrors in and use the bonnet to keep the gap even (though with 3/4 of the car now inside you shouldn't be having to adjust the steering angle any more).

Job jobbed

With all due respect, 6" clearance on each side is what's known as "a fkload".

I don't think I've ever garaged a car with anywhere near half of that to spare.

I can understand OP's issue here. One of my previous cars allowed around 40mm each side with the mirrors out and I managed to catch one of the mirrors on one of the the garage door arms, which levered the door down onto the bonnet.

[Pan Pan Pan]

Funk said:

How has no-one yet asked what the car is? I'm curious; care to share PPP?

I may let on, but being a bit cheeky thought I might leave that fact hanging for a while

[Pan Pan Pan]

PorkInsider said:

ChemicalChaos said:

I used to regularly get a discovery into a garage door with about 6" clearance on each side.
Reverse in slowly having aligned the car properly with the aperture. Use the mirrors to keep the gap even each side until the drivers door is level with the opening, at which point fold the mirrors in and use the bonnet to keep the gap even (though with 3/4 of the car now inside you shouldn't be having to adjust the steering angle any more).

Job jobbed

With all due respect, 6" clearance on each side is what's known as "a fkload".

I don't think I've ever garaged a car with anywhere near half of that to spare.

I can understand OP's issue here. One of my previous cars allowed around 40mm each side with the mirrors out and I managed to catch one of the mirrors on one of the the garage door arms, which levered the door down onto the bonnet.

Porkinsider Looks like you know exactly where I am coming from, the problem is the clearance is so small, I have the feeling that even when taking great care to get the thing lined up perfectly, a day will come when I don't quite do it perfectly enough, and will consequently scrape the side of my P&J. which will really p*ss me off.

[Vanin]

My father-in-law came up with the idea of dangling two tennis balls on a bit of string lined up with your eye when sitting in the car.
When you approach the garage you should only see one ball if you are lined up correctly until that ball hits the screen and glides over the roof to reveal the second ball.
The first one hangs from the up and over door in my case and the second one is further in
The first ball should glide harmlessly over the screen and roof as you aim for the second ball, hopefully you have not fitted a roof rack or fancy aerial!

[Funk]

Pan Pan Pan said:

Funk said:

How has no-one yet asked what the car is? I'm curious; care to share PPP?

I may let on, but being a bit cheeky thought I might leave that fact hanging for a while

It will, I'm sure, be the highlight of my day.

[eliot]

+1 on changing the door for a sectional. I've got an insulated roller, but they are not as secure (or windproof) as an insuluated sectional.

[DonkeyApple]

Pan Pan Pan said:

ChemicalChaos said:

I used to regularly get a discovery into a garage door with about 6" clearance on each side.
Reverse in slowly having aligned the car properly with the aperture. Use the mirrors to keep the gap even each side until the drivers door is level with the opening, at which point fold the mirrors in and use the bonnet to keep the gap even (though with 3/4 of the car now inside you shouldn't be having to adjust the steering angle any more).

Job jobbed

Thanks for the suggestion, but I just don't have the luxury of 150mm of clearance at the side (think about an inch and a quarter - 30mm max on each side) the space in front of the garage is also limited so that with the car just outside the garage there is perhaps 1.5 metres between the end of the car, and a brick wall. (don't you just love these house designers) so relatively little room to align the car straight before driving forward between the door jambs.
I can do it, but it takes a while making sure the car is `perfectly' aligned before moving between the door frames (Not helped by the shape of the car`s body where parts of it cannot be seen but only guessed at from the drivers position), which is quite frankly a bit tedious.
I had thought about using finished timber rails approx. 50mm 2 inches high, which could be slid out from the garage to `channel' the car into the correct and very limited position, but have not yet thought of how to mount them onto the garage.

It's not 3cm per side though. In reality it's 1cm on your side and 5 on the other. And that's being measured from folded mirrors? So much more space for the body work.

Where are you actually worried about catching the car?

If it's an issue of being concerned about keeping the car straight as you go in then just set a navigation point on the back wall?

When younger I had to get a car in and out of a classic 60s garage and I nailed some old carpet down the sides, hung an Ariel power ball at the point where it would hit the windscreen before the nose hit the wall and I also fitted plumbers pipe lagging strips to the bit of the door frame either side. Eventually I decided it was easier to reverse in and you have no need of mirrors if you just set a navigation point to the correct position on the back wall and pilot using that. It suddenly becomes very simple.

[richs2891]

I have this issues as well, wide, car, tight garage and driveway that on an angle to the garage. I always back in a I find it easier.
I ended up with two pieces of finished timber that fit the full length of the garage on the inside of the tyres, to line the car up,
Also have two reflective lines on the end wall of the garage that I know I have to have to line the outside edges of the interior mirror up with. Found this easier than getting the line in the middle of the mirror.

Have to reset them when I swap cars but not an issues. Also wrapped the door frames in cloth for a bit of extra protection.
I'm going to have to replace the garage door with a roller on as the height clearance is too low to get one of my 4x4 in. This will make it easier as should give me an extra 5cm per side.

The mirror idea is good will look at those today

[Johnnytheboy]

Tangential, but I put pipe lagging on the exposed edges that I may have caught my car on, on my old garage. Better to rub against that than the metal edge of the door mechanism.

[MDMA .]

surprised no-one has suggested these yet :



magnetic door protectors. just stick them on when you pull up outside the garage.

but if it is really your pride of joy, give it the garage it deserves.