Best Options for Garage Door Insulation?

[geteh]

Hey everyone,

I'm looking to insulate my garage door to keep it cooler in summer and warmer in winter.

I've seen options like foam boards, reflective insulation, and fiberglass batts, but I’m not sure which one works best for a garage.

The door is standard aluminum, and I’m wondering if anyone has experience with these methods or another recommendation?

I also want to know if insulation really makes a noticeable difference with energy efficiency and temperature control.

Any tips on installation would be great, too!

 

[geteh]

Hey everyone,

I'm looking to insulate my garage door to keep it cooler in summer and warmer in winter.

I've seen options like foam boards, reflective insulation, and fiberglass batts, but I’m not sure which one works best for a garage.

The door is standard aluminum, and I’m wondering if anyone has experience with these methods or another recommendation?

I also want to know if insulation really makes a noticeable difference with energy efficiency and temperature control with the help of tlsenergysavers.com.

Any tips on installation would be great, too!

thanks in advance for any help

 

[mrmikey]

I'd say foam Your best bet would have been getting the door as insulated when you bought it (hindsight's 20/20) as it's foamed in place and adds considerable strength to the door. I don't know what it would be like without insulation but I can imagine an 8' x 7' uninsulated piece of aluminum would not be warm in the winter.

 

[SARG]

"Best option" = replace the door with one that's insulated.

 

[KennyG]

The easiest thing is to get a roll of reflective foam insulation and cut to fit the panels in the door. Get closed cell foam, not the bubble wrap stuff. It won't be perfect but it will help. You could get more elaborate with rigid foam but you will still have the ribs that bypass the insulation so it's not possible to get great insulation on a garage door, even a factory insulated one.

 

[319Quahog]

Yes, it makes a HUGE difference in the garage temp. Don't believe me, start shooting things with an IR thermometer in the garage and see where the heat loss/gain is. Of course if you're like me and leave the door open much of the summer, it won't do much good to keep heat out.

Put me in the camp of replacing the door. Note that if you get an insulated door with windows, ensure those windows are insulated as well. I made that mistake with an R12 door that came with single pane windows. Will eventually get window film for them.

Also, insulated doors are heavier, you might have to upgrade your opener.

 

[EddieWalker]

When building my parents house, we went full insulation in the attic with R60, then R13 fiberglass bats in the walls and insulated garage doors.

In the heat of summer here in East Texas, it can be hard to breath in the afternoon when outside. In their garage, it's noticeable cooler and comfortable.

I'm adding on a garage to my house and I'm using insulated garage doors.

I've been in several houses with insulated garage doors, and I've seen where people have added foam to their doors to insulate them. In some of the older homes, there isn't much difference in appearance between the foam that came from the factory, and the foam people added to the doors.

If I had an uninsulated garage door, I would buy the thickest sheet of foam that fits inside the door panels and cut it to fit. Then I would glue it in with something like Lexel caulking. I might even run a can of expanding foam around the edges just to make it as tight as possible.

In my experience, almost all the benefit from insulation is from the attic. Max that out, and then you can improve on it by making the walls air tight. Insulation on the walls helps, but it's not as important as keeping the outside air from getting into the space. Wind is your biggest enemy.

 

[ponytug]

I'm with @EddieWalker small air leaks make a big difference. I would add my vote to reflective panel foam at least as thick as thick as the ribs, glued on with a compatible panel glue. (If you make it thicker, you have to bevel the foam to allow the door to roll up. I think it is not worth the effort.)

But, I would make sure that the door seals are all good, and the door is aligned in the frame to seal well. As @EddieWalker wrote, don't forget to max out the attic or ceiling insulation.

All the best,

Peter

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

I've had both insulated and one that we insulated with that foam board. Foam board is almost useless. The door gaps still don't seal, there are so many thermal breaks... When we built this last time we went insulated on all of our overhead doors. Anything else is lipstick on a pig

 

[bigtiller]

I had some insulated doors on my garage that I thought were pretty good, until they started falling apart after 20 years.

I replaced them with doors that are 2" thick with sprayed on, closed cell foam.

There is a big difference between the old big-box-store door and the new ones.

 

[JimRB]

I put R19 in my attic this year. In Georgia that was good for 5-10 degrees cooler garage. I have suffered in the summer with that heat coming down from the ceiling. I do have an insulated garage door but after 27 years it does not seal tightly. That is a bigger deal in the winter when I might want a warm garage. If the garage cools down at night to 75ish, it stays 5-10 degrees cooler than outside on a 90+ day. If I really want to be cool I turn on the window AC unit which now has a chance to keep me cooler even with no insulation in the walls.

 

[bigtiller]

Insulation keeps the heat out as well as in. R19 is a great start for Georgia but R30 would be better and Google says while your at it, R49 would be good for Georgia.

 

[ponytug]

If in doubt, add more insulation. It is so cheap compared to the energy costs. Also, I would not overlook the cumulative losses from air leaks around doors, windows, outlets, air registers, plumbing from one floor to the next (basement/crawlspace to house, and house to attic), the fireplace damper, poor, or non-functional dampers on bathroom and kitchen exhaust fans, and the wide open flues on gas and propane powered ovens and water heaters. The latter are ridiculously large sources of outside air. A little spray foam, caulk, and weatherstripping goes a long way.

Not exactly a glory job like painting, roofing, or putting up plaster board, but adding insulation has big returns on investments.

All the best,

Peter

 

[2manyrocks]

There is a lot of surface area around a garage door for air leaks and not so easy to seal.

 

[jyoutz]

I’ve done this before using foil covered dense foam board. Pretty easy to cut the board to fit inside of the door panels and attach with construction adhesive.

 

[bdhsfz6]

My neighbor installed this product on his uninsulated garage door:

https://www.amazon.com/Matador-Garage-Door-Insulation-Designed/dp/B00RGZ9C10/ref=asc_df_B00RGZ9C10/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=692875362841&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=13367142118022816146&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9058761&hvtargid=pla-2281435180938&psc=1&mcid=e73beea817393382a16597dfbe129a12&hvocijid=13367142118022816146-B00RGZ9C10-&hvexpln=73

He says it does make the garage a few degrees cooler in summer and a bit warmer in winter. In his case, the relatively low cost will likely pay for itself in a few years.

Not so in my case. 20 years ago, I replaced my garage doors with 2" insulated Raynor doors when the old wooden doors wore out. Yes, there is a difference, but I doubt I will ever make up the installation cost with savings in heat / AC.

Every situation is different but IMO, there is little or no cost savings when replacing a perfectly good garage door with an insulated one. Replacing it for comfort reasons is a different story though and may justify the expense.

 

[oosik]

I don't have any garage doors here. In AK my garage door was insulated with some type of rigid foam. The advantage was - it increased the structural strength of the door. And I suppose it kept the garage warmer.

A couple garage door companies were selling "no freeze" garage door lips. If you had an unheated garage - sometimes the rubber lip could freeze to the concrete floor. It very seldom got that cold in Anchorage. I could always go in thru the "person door" and flip on the heat.

 

[jyoutz]

Hello. I have a double single skin up and over garage door, and it gets sharpish in the garage over the winter months, up in’ North. Does anyone have any thoughts on insulting such a door? was thinking something like the insulating boards, used for underfloor or cavity insulation?

Buy the thickest foam core board with foil exterior that will fit into the inside door panels. Cut to fit and install with construction adhesive.

 

[not2old]

I have to finish the wiring in my shop in the spring, before I can insulate and heat it so I have no experience with keeping the cold out yet. During hot weather however, I used a laser thermometer and the temperature of the under side of the roof (no ceiling yet) was 55 degrees C. or 131 degrees F. I have no doubt insulation will help with that.