Name: Parker Garage Doors & More
Address: 22350 N 20th Ave, Phoenix, AZ, 85027
Telephone: (602) 870-9848
Rating: 4.8

Help Minimize Heat With Garage Door Insulation

The Arizona summer is upon us and with it comes increasing temperatures and higher energy bills. Summer temps can feel like a scorching hot oven, especially if you plan on spending any time in your garage. Many people utilize their garage space using it to exercise, work on cars, as a workshop for various tasks, and even as a man cave.

During the summer months you can expect your garage to be between 10-20 degrees hotter than the temp outside!

Living in Arizona we know the highs can get into the 120’s which means your garage space can reach up to 140 degrees on some days! Not only does a temperature that high make being in your garage unbearable it also makes it unsafe! And let’s face it, if your garage is connected to your house like most peoples are, it makes keeping your house cooler a little harder. This means that your air conditioning system works harder and in turn you see your energy bill go up even more so during summer months. And let’s be real, no one likes a higher energy bill!

Did you know the summer heat can greatly affect your garage door’s opening system?

The heat creates issues with the electronics involved and can hinder the opening and closing mechanisms and even cause the motor to overheat. Should your opener’s motor overheat it is essential that you call a professional garage door repair expert to ensure any damage is repaired before leading to more severe issues.

What Can You Do To Make Your Garage Cooler During Summer?

Use & Time of Day- The early morning hours up to about 10am prove to be a much cooler time to spend in your garage. Opening your garage door a little to allow some of the trapped hot air to escape also helps. Definitely avoid being in your garage between 3-6pm when temperatures are the highest making your garage a Dutch oven!

Garage Door Colors/Material- Believe it or not the color of your garage door and outer exterior matter! Darker colors tend to conduct more heat. Installing a lighter-colored door or choosing to paint it a lighter shade can reduce some heat. Same goes for the material of your door. Steel doors are heat conductors whereas wood doors are natural insulators.

Ventilation System- Your garage ventilation system or lack of one can be a huge factor in the rising temperatures in your space. An active ventilation system is a bit pricer than the normally used passive systems but also a lot more economical and efficient.

Installing a Fan- While a fan can only help to a certain extent it does help to improve the airflow and circulation, which can help to break up that hot stagnant air! Removing clutter and creating a more open space can help airflow as well.

And…

The #1 Way to Help Minimize Heat…Garage Door Insulation

Garage door insulation is the number one way to help combat that horrible summer heat. All of a sudden you can see yourself spending time in your garage again! On top of helping to decrease the higher temperatures in your garage, insulated garage doors offer so many other benefits as well!

Benefits of Insulated Garage Doors Include:

Greatly reduce heat transfer
Lower energy bills
Insulation helps quiet noisy garage doors
Reduces outside noise
Helps keep cold air out during winter
Better constructed as opposed to uninsulated garage doors

Now that you are aware of some of the benefits of an insulated garage door what do you need to know when choosing the right insulation?

R-Value- The R-Value of a garage door is key! What does R-Value mean? This is basically the number that measures the insulation in your door. The higher the R-Value the better the insulation. In fact, an R-Value of R18 or higher can help reduce radiant heat, ultimately helping to keep the inside of your garage a lot cooler.

Thank you.

Overall Insulation– An insulated garage door can do wonders for the temperatures within your garage but in order for them to work to their maximum potential it helps if the walls of your garage and attic space are insulated as well.

Type of Insulation- The type of insulation matters. While the R-Value measures the performance of insulation it helps to understand which types are best. For example, convex reflective foil-faced foam utilizes radiant heat which helps to reflect the heat away from your garage. Flush foam insulators help to absorb heat from conduction, while reflective foil has a 97% reflective rate.

If you are looking to survive the summer heat while still being able to utilize your garage spaceit’s highly beneficial to look into replacing your garage door with a higher R-Value door or by adding insulation to your existing one.

One more positive factor to consider when deciding on insulating your garage door… it helps add to your homes overall value!

If you have any other questions or want to insulate or upgrade your existing garage door, give Parker Garage Doors a call! We’ve been providing honest, affordable service in Phoenix, Lake Havasu and throughout the valley for over 20 years. We are family owned and operated and know our stuff when it comes to garage doors.

Overlay Carriage House Garage Doors

2018 XHI OVERLAY CARRIAGE HOUSE DOORS

The Homeowner’s Guide to Garage Door Inspection and Maintenance

Many small residential garage door problems can be repaired on your own with a little bit of elbow grease and some knowhow—which we hope to provide you with here today—but do keep in mind that some repairs should be performed by a professional who has the experience, specialized tools, and replacement parts to fix the problem. Safety is the number one priority when it comes to repairing and garage door issue. Sp please remember this should you choose to go at a few repairs yourself.

For example, lubricating the rails is a safe and easy DIY project anyone with a few minutes and a silicone spray can handle. However, depending on the type of garage door you have, a project like spring replacement could be at best difficult and at worst potentially dangerous. Let your personal experience and comfort level guide which repairs you can do on your own and which repairs you should call the pros in for.

In this post, you’ll learn about some of the following topics:

How to diagnose common garage door problems
Safety tips to avoid injury
How to inspect your garage door safely and thoroughly
DIY maintenance and home tune-ups
When to call in professional garage door repair experts

As garage door technology has improved, so has the complexity of these devices. However, it’s still possible to inspect them yourself as long as you’re very careful and know what to look for. Let’s begin by discussing the most important safety procedure, after which we’ll cover how to perform an inspection on your own.

The #1 Safety Procedure for DIY Garage Door Repair

While many garage door repair activities require further safety measures, there’s one thing you should always do while repairing, maintaining, or even simply inspecting your garage door.

Can you guess what it is?

Always work with the door down.

Of course there are some situations where the door has to be up—these are often good cases to make an appointment with a residential garage door repair company like ours—but generally speaking, most activities can and should be performed with the door down. The last thing you want to happen is for the garage door to rapidly and perhaps unexpectedly crash down while you’re working.

Additional Garage Door Repair Safety Tips

Before doing any work on your garage door, make sure you’ve safely cleared out children, pets, and basically anyone else who might get in the way. This is especially important if you’re working on the sensors for an automatic garage door, because they prevent the garage door from closing completely if something passes through them (like a car, but also a dog or small child).

Since it is likely that you’ll be working on an automatic garage door, it’s also a good practice to disable the opener while you perform repairs or maintenance. This will require cutting off power to the opener, the process for which varies depending on your garage door setup. Sometimes it’s as simple as unplugging the opener, but you may need to shut it off in your home’s fuse box. Either way, do it—this will prevent accidental opening/closing of the garage door.

Finally, here’s a tip that’s not necessarily about safety, but you’ll be glad to know it anyway: always work on your garage door with your cars parked outside! Just in case something goes wrong and the garage door is stuck in the down position, you’ll have access to your vehicles until you can get a professional service technician to come over.

How to Perform a Home Garage Door Inspection

Discovering problems before they become major repair issues can save you both time and money, so regularly performing a garage door inspection is a good idea for any homeowner. Assuming everything appears to be in good working order and you aren’t having any problems, a good inspection schedule would be bi-monthly or at the most once every 90 days.

Inspecting your garage door on your own is a fairly simple task if you know what to look for. Begin by standing in your garage—remember, anytime you’re inspecting or maintaining the garage door, the door should be in the down position—and carefully look at the following components:

Springs
Cables
Pulleys
Hinges
Sensors
Rollers (the “wheels”)
The door itself

Visually inspect each part. What you mostly want to look for will be signs of damage or visible wear. Cables are a common culprit for garage door problems, but can usually be spotted when they start to fray. Check for hardware that may be coming loose and needs to be tightened down. Look at the sensors and make sure that they’re properly aligned. The springs shouldn’t “wobble” and should remain snugly in place.

If you see damage or wear, take down notes about parts that may need to be repaired or replaced. Decide which problems you think you can fix yourself and which problems may require professional assistance. If you are in need of professional garage door service, call Parker Garage Doors at 602-970-9848.

While standing in the garage safely away from the garage door, open and close it. Since most of the time you’re probably opening and closing the garage door from inside your car, this will give you the opportunity to pay special attention while viewing and listening to its operation.

Look for anything that catches, halts, or grinds. View the springs to ensure that they’re attached properly and stretch out symmetrically. Listen for any unnatural sounds (you’ll know it if you hear them). Squeaking, grinding, and so on can indicate problems.

Twice yearly, a small amount of lubrication should be sprayed into the garage door tracks, hinges, and rollers. It’s not uncommon for homeowners to forget this (often for years at a time). If the garage door seems to be struggling to move properly or you hear some of the aforementioned noises, the door may just need to be lubricated. A silicone spray is usually a fine choice.

After lubrication, perform the same test where you stand and observe the garage door. If the noises are gone, you solved the problem with lubricant—if they persist and you can’t find any visual evidence, you may need to call a professional to diagnose the issue.

How to Test Your Garage Door Sensors

If your automatic garage door was installed after 1993, it almost certainly has a pair of sensors designed to activate the reversal mechanism. After this time, that was the law. If something activates the sensor while the garage door is going down, the garage door should automatically reverse. This prevents people and adults from getting accidentally injured.

The sensors work by casting an infrared beam between one another. If the beam is disturbed (e.g., someone walks through it) the reversal mechanism is activated and the garage door returns to the open position.

As part of your inspection, the sensors should be tested. It’s important! If they aren’t working, it would be quite difficult to know until it was too late and someone got hurt.

This is one of the few cases where you need to work on your garage door with the door in the open position. Stand near the garage door (not underneath it). Hold a long object you can use to test the sensors—you’ll be using it to break the beam between the sensors.

Use the remote or have someone help you by pressing the wall button to close the garage. As the garage door is closing, put the object between the sensors. The door should immediately go back up. If this happens, your sensors are working properly.

However, if the garage door continues to go down even though it appeared as if you disturbed the beam, it means that your sensors aren’t working. Assuming a visual inspection doesn’t present any obvious damage to the sensors, it may be that they simply need to be cleaned. With the garage door closed, use a dry cloth to wipe down the sensors and remove dust or debris.

Examine the sensors and to the best of your ability ensure that they’re both aligned to face each other. Note that when sensors are working properly their alignment doesn’t have to be perfect, in almost all cases “eyeballing it” will be good enough. If they look aligned, they probably are.

Repeat the test with the broom handle. If the problem was resolved and the door reverses when you interrupt the beam, odds are the sensors were out of alignment or dirty. If the garage door still comes to a complete close, you should have your sensors replaced immediately.

How to Know When to Call a Garage Door Repair Professional

Knowing how to do basic inspections and minor repair work are both excellent skills for any homeowner to have. However, in some cases over the lifespan of your garage door, you’ll almost certainly need to call a professional garage repair technician. Maybe it’s for a problem you just can’t track down or for a specific part you can’t replace by simply going to the hardware store.

Whatever the situation may be, the staff at Parker Garage Doors would be pleased to diagnose and repair your garage door. Is it time for an upgrade? We’ve got you covered there too. We offer a large selection of new garage doors to choose from. Please feel free to call us at (602) 870-9848.

June: Keeping Your Garage Door Safe & Secure

As we continue to celebrate National Garage Door Safety month, the professionals at PGD will like to share with you a list of maintenance tips to ensure your garage door is safe and secure. Be sure to tell everyone in the house you are doing maintenance on the garage door to avoid serious injuries and/or property damage.

Organizing Your Garage

In many households, the garage is used as an extended closet, or storage place for the family. Ideally, we will all like to park our vehicles inside the safety of our garage, but the truth is some of us have too much stuff stored inside to make that a reality. The garage is normally used to store items that do not fit inside the house.

Keep your garage door organized by using pegboards, milk crates and plastic storage totes. These storage utensils are a great fit because you can see everything! No need to guess what is inside. If you really want to be organized, you can have a summary on each plastic storage totes of what is inside making it easier to find a missing item.

You can also use old metal garbage cans. You can recycle them and use them for storing fertilizer, dog food and other items.

Standard Garage Door Safety Features

In the 1993, federal law required all manufacturers of residential garage doors change the way they make their product. All residential garage doors manufactured after January 1st, 1993 must have the following:

A built-in automatic reverse feature that reverses two seconds after sensing an object is under the garage door.
A 30-second reverse timer that activates the garage door to open 30 seconds after sensing the door has not fully closed.
Have a secondary entrapment protection system. (Example: edge sensor, a photoelectric eye etc.)
The ability to close the garage door with manufacturer’s suggested devices. (Example: remote, keypad, etc.)

It is very important to make sure that all sensors are active on your garage door. If the sensors are not working properly, the garage door will continue to close, even when something is under the door. You can test this functionality by placing an object below the garage door when you close it. The sensors mentioned above will cause the door to reverse if something is stopping the door from closing.

Maintenance To Prevent Costly Repairs

You should get in the routine of visually inspecting the mechanical parts of your garage door on a regular basis. Open and close your garage door to see that everything looks and sounds correct. If there is something that looks out of place, or if your garage door is noisy, call a service technician to diagnose the issue right away.

Keep an eye on the rollers, tracks, springs, cables, pulleys, bolts, angles and struts that allow the garage door to function properly. Make sure they are lubricated and in working condition. These parts on the garage door can easily become worn down over time if not maintained.

Preventing Garage Door Injuries

The best way to avoid injuries is to always keep your hands and body away from the garage door while its opening or closing. It is important to teach your children and others in the household about garage door safety. Small children are well known for playing with the garage door opener to pass time during summer. Teaching your family how to operate the garage door safely can prevent injuries in the future.

Inspecting your garage door regularly is also essential to maintaining a safe garage for yourself and others. You can save money by doing it yourself, but hiring a trained professional to tune-up your garage door will ensure safety and security. Have the comfort of knowing your garage door will be functioning.

Safe and Secure

PGD recommend that you have more than one way of accessing and opening your garage door. We suggest at least 3 ways to open your garage in the case of an power outage, lost or stolen device. Make sure you test your garage door opener devices on a regular basis so you are always able to open and close the garage door when needed.

There are also ‘Smart’ garage doors that allows you to control your garage door from a smartphone or tablet. Call (602) 870-9848 now if you are interested in transforming your garage to a ‘Smart’ garage door.

June: National Garage Door Safety Month

June is National Garage Door Safety Month! You may not know this, but the garage door is the most used entry point for the home. On average, the garage door closes and opens at least 4 times a day. More than 70% of homeowners use their garage door as the main entrance into their home. With that much traffic in and out the garage door, it is important to ensure your garage door is working correctly at all times.

The use of our garage doors have become such a daily part of our family lives that we often don’t take the time to stop and see if the basic components of the garage door are functioning correctly. Checking up on your garage door not only keeps your family safe, it will also keep your door safe and operating for years to come.

Is Your Garage Door Safe?

In recognition of National Garage Door Month, the professionals here at Parker Doors & More will like to share some tips with you on maintaining the security and safety of your garage door. Below is a list of common garage door accidents and how to avoid them. Garage Door Safety is a must:

Do-It-Yourselfers

Some of us are more handy than others and would rather work on their own garage door compared to seeking help. This is an affordable option for quick maintenance and repairs, but you also increase the chances of receiving an injury if you are not familiar with garage doors.

If you are still motivated to do the repair on your own, be sure to study the instruction manual for your garage. There are over 1,500 injuries a year from homeowners trying to fix their garage door. Contact a professional if you have any questions or if you are not sure on the proper procedures when repairing your garage door.

Kids Playing With Doors

This is very common, especially during the summer when the school is out. Little ones love racing under the door as it opens and closes. They also like testing how long they can maintain their balance on the bottom door panel as the door opens. Approximately 100 children are injured each year playing with garage doors.

The best way to prevent this is by simply educating the children that live in the home to not treat the garage door as a toy. Practice garage door safety with your young ones. Parker Doors & More suggest that you keep small children away from automatic garage doors and garage remotes at all times.

Continue Use Of A Broken Garage Door

You will be surprised by the number of households who continue to use their broken garage door. Whether it is a broken panel, bad sensors or a problem with the garage door opener, we always recommend that you repair the issue as soon as possible to avoid injury. Hundreds of Americans are injured every year by broken garage doors.

It is a good idea to visually checkout your garage door from time to time. Be sure that the mechanics and the moving parts of the garage door look in place. We recommend having a professional perform routine tune ups to avoid serious repairs and injuries.

Avoid Racing The Door

We have all have had a time when we realize we left something in the house as we are backing out of the garage. Even though modern garage doors have sensors as a safety feature to avoid accidents. Over 130 people injure themselves, damage their homes, damage their garage door or damage their vehicle each year while trying to race the door.

The best way to avoid injury is patience. You may have to wait a few moments as the door reopens, but you will avoid injury and damage to your home and/or car.

Trapped Fingers

Before attempting any ‘Do-It-Yourself’ repairs, make sure that the power is disconnected. Even once the power is disconnected, the garage door can still be very dangerous and should be handled with care. Nearly 200 people hurt themselves every year. Fingers can easily get caught between the rollers, cables, tracks and springs.

Children and adults should always be very careful. Garage door accidents can lead to severe injury or even amputation in some cases.

Broken Glass

If your garage door is a contemporary glass-based design or if you have glass windows on your garage door, then you will have to deal with broken glass at some point. It is important that you pay attention to cracked and broken windows to avoid serious injuries or damage to the tires on your vehicle.

Although there is not much you can do to prevent glass from breaking, try to take extra precaution while cleaning the mess. Sweep the area two or three time to make sure there aren’t any glass shards being left behind.

Falling Garage Doors

Once a garage door has been damaged, or if the door has been improperly maintained, there is a good chance that a garage door panel, or the whole garage door itself can fall and cause serious harm to yourself, your car or your house. Maintaining your garage door is the only way to avoid major malfunctions. We recommend doing seasonal check-ups on your garage door. Make sure the bolts and screws are tightened and that the hinges, rollers and tracks are in proper working order.

Summer Safety

With June marking the beginning of summer vacation, garage door professionals thought it will be a good idea to use June as National Garage Door Safety month. We increase our garage door use in the summer storing garden supplies, sporting equipment, kids bicycles and cars. It is the perfect time to pay a little more attention to the functionality of your garage door.

Garage Door Service With Parker Doors

Parker Doors & More offers a variety of services to keep your garage door safe and working properly. We are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, There is no job too big or too small. If you are in need of a repair or a tune up, call 602-870-9848 or contact us online. Ask about our June Tune Up Special!

Tips To Keep Your Garage Door From Breaking Down

If you are eager to learn more about garage door maintenance and safety, you have come to the right place. Usually, the garage door is the largest movable object inside your home. When used correctly; your garage door allows you to park your vehicles, garages can be used as storage space or you may use it as an additional living space for your house. Your garage can even help you save money if insulated properly.

Here Are Some Tips To Keep Your Garage Door From Breaking Down

Though having a garage door is very convenient, it can also be very dangerous causing serious injury, or even death. Even if you are capable of making small repairs to your garage door, we always suggest that you call a professional. Especially if you are in need of a new garage door installation or spring replacement for your existing garage door, leave that task to the professionals. So here are some tips to keep your garage door from breaking down.

Call A Professional

‘Do-It-Yourselfers’ repairman can easily be injured when working on a garage door, but children can also be seriously injured. Small children have a bad reputation of playing with garage doors. If you have little ones, it is important to teach them that the garage door is an operating system, and not a toy.

Feel free to take time to browse around the Parker Doors & More website for more information on the products and services we provide. Our goal is to offer information and techniques to best maintain your garage door so you can get the most of its use over the years. We will show you how to perform routine checkups and outline garage door safety for all ages.

Garage Door Safety

Not only does Parker Doors & More want you to be educated on your garage door, we also want you and your family to be safe when operating the door at all times. Here are safety tips for you and your children:

Do not play with the garage door or garage door opener. They are dangerous if misused and can cause serious injury, or even death.

When the door is closing, do not stand, walk or run in the door’s path.

Children should not be allowed to have access to the remote controls or push the wall controls for the garage door opener systems. Keep all remotes out of reach of children.

Keep fingers and hands away from the door sections when the garage door is opening or closing to avoid injury.

Perform routine maintenance on the door to keep it operating properly. Annual maintenance by a trained technician is recommended.

Remember that the garage door is powered by electricity. Always unplug the garage opener before repairing the wiring and other electrical issues.

Never attempt to repair garage door springs or garage door cables. Cables and springs are under a high amount of tension. Special tools are needed to repair and install garage door springs and cables. It is best if a trained service technician performed these repairs.

If someone backed into the garage door, call a service technician to perform a full inspection. Even though it may look as if no physical damage was done, the alignment can be off, creating a dangerous environment.

Garage Door Check-up

Below are a few maintenance techniques you can perform on your garage door to ensure it is working properly. By following these maintenance directions, you will better understand how your garage door operates and you will be able to prevent any major, costly repairs. Before you perform these tests, make sure everyone in your household is aware that you are working on the garage door and it should not be used.

Perform the following in this order:

Monthly Visual Inspection: Stand inside the garage with the door closed. Inspect the garage door springs, cables, rollers, pulleys and the mounting hardware. Check for signs of any damage, fraying, wear or tear. Does the mounting hardware look loose? Are the cables beginning to fray? If something doesn’t look right, or if the garage door doesn’t sound right, call Parker Doors & More to have the garage door inspected by a professional.
Monthly Balance Test: If you have an automatic opener for your garage, close the door and disconnect the automatic opener. Once the automation is disconnected, manually open the garage door. The door should lift smoothly with very little resistance. Once the garage door is fully open, it should stay open on its own. If the door is difficult to open, or if it doesn’t stay open on its own, the door might be out of balance and will need to be looked at by a professional.
Monthly Reverse Mechanism and Photo Eye Test: Garage door openers manufactured after January 1, 1993 are required, by law, to be equipped a reverse mechanism, meaning that is something is in the garage door path while closing, the door will automatically reverse.
Photo Eyes. If your garage door has photo eyes, or sensors at the bottom of the garage door, test to see if the sensors are working properly. Push the button to close the garage door. While the door is closing, place an object where the garage door touches the ground, blocking the sensors. The garage door should reverse automatically. If your door fails any of these tests, call a professional from Parker Doors & More.
Semi-Annual Lubrication: Apply a small amount of spray lubricant to the door hinges, rollers and tracks.

The Take Away

Although some of these tips may be obvious to some, we can easily forget them with our day to day lives. Apply these tips to keeping your garage door from breaking down, and you’ll increase your garage door’s life span.

Garage Door Service 24/7

Parker Door’s & More is a leading garage door repair company in Phoenix and the surrounding areas. We provide high-quality garage door services for commercial and residential customers throughout the Valley. We are family owned and operated, established in 1988. We only work with high-quality garage door and opener products and aim for exceptional customer service.