Garage Door Insulation Panels?

[Christopher Charles]

Hello all,

I moved into a new (1950s) house about a month ago and am starting to get things under control. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself

The new shop is a 2 car garage with two new standard Overhead Door steelhead garage doors. The good news is the seal on the door is quite good when closed. The bad news is they are not the insulated version, my doors face west, and I'm expecting to be cooking in a month or so. I've looked a bit into the various pre-fab panels, NASA style space blanket, and DYI foam approaches.

I'm wondering if anyone has direct experience insulating a steel garage door and/or tips?

Thanks,
Chris

[Charlie Hinton]

It just so happens I put some insulation on my garage door yesterday and today.
It was not especially difficult.
I bought 4x8 panels and cut them on the tablesaw.
I cleaned the door and used foam panel adhesive and some screws, got everything from Home Depot.
if a kit had been available in the store I would have probably done that.
Hopefully it will make a difference.
I still need to blow insulation into the attic too.


image.jpgimage.jpg

[Christopher Charles]

Hi Charlie,

That looks great! Looks better than most kits i've seen b/c your panel completely cover the vertical supports. Do you mind if I ask who makes the panels and what they're called? And about how much they cost?

Best,
Chris

[Bob Bouis]

It depends on how your garage door is constructed obviously, but I found the best way to do mine was to put a layer of fiberglass batt directly against the door and to fit in a piece of foam board over it. The door had a channel that the foam board could be fitted into so that it was held in place by the fiberglass. For the fiberglass I just used regular bats and split them into about inch and a half thick slices. The foam board was 1/2 inch polyiso from Home Depot.

[Charlie Hinton]

I used this.
https://www.homedepot.com/p/R-Tech-1...0821/202532854
My door is all metal and is 30 years old.
It does not have channels that form rectangles in the door panels.

[Mike Ontko]

Just a thought - you could also add a thin sheet of plywood (MDO) or other material on top of the outside surface of the door panels to provide some amount of shade. If you were to mount that material using a short spacer of some kind; rubber grommets, washers, wood blocks, or whatever, it would allow air behind the shield that would take away most of the heat. You'll need to consider the clearance at the top of the door jam for when your raising and lowering the door. The crude diagram below illustrates the idea.

heatShield.jpg

[Mark Blatter]

I did it about five years ago with my door. It also faces west and on hot summer days the garage would heat up to around 100 degrees inside. I used standard R-11 batts covered with 1" white foarm. If I was to do it over again, I would try and find some polystyrene that was abouit 3" thick as it would fit better. I found some of the polystyrene last summer on a job site that was packing material and used it to replace some of my original insulation and it worked really well. I do not know what the R difference is though.

What I will say is spend the extra money to make it as air tight as you can so it stays cleaner and it will also work better.

Good luck.

[Bob Bouis]

I would emphasize that you shouldn't compress fiberglass batts because it reduces their r-value. You might get less than you would with a thinner one that fits better.

[Frank Pratt]

I would emphasize that you shouldn't compress fiberglass batts because it reduces their r-value. You might get less than you would with a thinner one that fits better.

Probably not true. As you compress a fiberglass batt, its total insulation value decreases, but the R value per inch increases. Only to a point though, as extreme compression will bring it back down. If you only have an inch or 2 space for the batt, you'll get better insulation by using a slightly thicker batt & compressing it moderately than you would by using one that is just the thickness of the space.

[Bob Bouis]

I stand corrected. Apparently compressing an oversized batt usually gets you marginally better insulation than using one that's the right thickness.

There are still good reasons not to compress it, though--waste of material, extra weight on the door, etc.

[Brice Rogers]

About 10 years ago I added styrofoam panels to my aluminum overhead shop doors. My shop is 24 x 36. Our climate is generally warm (San Diego inland). In the summer the air temps will hit close to 108 for a week or so at a time and in the winter, the daytime lows might be in the 40's occasionally and night-time lows in the mid 30's occasionally.

I have two OH doors (one is a double-wide and the other is a single-wide) and both face West. The single-wide door has a single vertical metal stiffener in the middle. The double-wide has 3 stiffeners. The stiffners are exposed and reduce the benefit of the insulation a bit. I bought either 3/4 or 1" 4x8' sheets and cut them with a drywall knife. The door panels had a horizontal lip , so I could stuff the panels inside of the lip and not need any adhesive. I had to slightly squash the styrofoam on the edges to get it to slip under the lip. The shop walls have 3-1/2" fiberglass batts and the ceiling has 6" FG batts. So the OH doors were the biggest factor for heat gain/loss in the workshop.

Adding the Styrofoam makes a big difference both in the winter and summer. I'm glad that I did that.

BTW, I really like the looks of the foil backed panels from Charlie Hinton. I'm wondering if both sides were foil lined or not. If not, I'm wondering if they might have been more effective with the foil towards the summer heat-source.

[Scott Verson]

It just so happens I put some insulation on my garage door yesterday and today.
It was not especially difficult.
I bought 4x8 panels and cut them on the tablesaw.
I cleaned the door and used foam panel adhesive and some screws, got everything from Home Depot.
if a kit had been available in the store I would have probably done that.
Hopefully it will make a difference.
I still need to blow insulation into the attic too.


image.jpgimage.jpg

What I have heard of some people doing is buying the rigid foam insulation, preferably the pink stuff, then buying sheets of 1/8 inch luan plywood. Then you glue the plywood to the pink foam insulation. Once it dries, you use a table saw to cut pieces of the foam/plywood to fit the door. The idea is that the plywood won't damage as easily as the rigid foam would be damaged if you were hit to accidentally hit it with something like the lawnmower. Also, the plywood accepts paint to match the door paint or the room paint.

[Ben Rivel]

What I have heard of some people doing is buying the rigid foam insulation, preferably the pink stuff, then buying sheets of 1/8 inch luan plywood. Then you glue the plywood to the pink foam insulation. Once it dries, you use a table saw to cut pieces of the foam/plywood to fit the door. The idea is that the plywood won't damage as easily as the rigid foam would be damaged if you were hit to accidentally hit it with something like the lawnmower. Also, the plywood accepts paint to match the door paint or the room paint.

With all that added weight though Im betting youll have to have the spring adjusted to compensate.