Benefits of Overhead Doors

Lose the Slider Doors and Gain the Use of Your Shop Again

It’s no secret that the wind blows here in Saskatchewan. And if you have sliding doors on a Quonset or an arched rib shop, you probably suffer from a little bit of anxiety every time it does. I often get calls from farmers and ranchers who have had their doors blown off and the shop now looks more like a bird sanctuary than a farm shop. All your machinery gets covered in bird excrement and the snow blows drifts 4 feet high in the wintertime. It’s not good. The good news is there is a good way to reclaim your shop from the pigeons.

The best option in these cases is to install a sectional overhead door. We have helped a large number of our agricultural customers retake ownership of their shops. With the cost of building a new shop, replacing the door is a cost-effective way to increase your working space on your farm. Whether it be a heated workshop, cold storage or anything in between, a shop is only as good as the door that is on the front!

There are 3 types of buildings that we typically get called about. The first one is the steel quonset. These buildings were all the rage at one point. Fast and cheap to put up, every farm has one it seems like. But the doors are horrible. Heavy sliding doors that freeze in the winter and blow off in the summer. After years of driving over the bottom track, you end up having to use a tractor to push them shut. We often see the bearings go on the rollers. That’s when most people just leave them open, and the pigeons take over.

The second type of building we remove sliders from the most is the wooden arched ribbed shop. These are similar to the steel quonset but they are slightly easier to work with because wood is more forgiving than steel. The main problems are the same though. The sliding doors freeze and get blown off or just don’t move freely over time. The third building that we typically see sliding doors on is the pole shed. Pole sheds are a newer feature on Saskatchewan farms and are ever more popular. Goodon Industries sells over 400 per year. And with good reason, straight walls allow for the installation of windows so your shop isn’t dark like with curved buildings. They are fast to frame up. There is more usable square footage due to the straight walls. But once the doors blow off or freeze open, that square footage becomes a home for the birds.

There are a number of good reasons to install an overhead on your shop doors. Firstly, a more reliable access system will make your shop more usable. You won’t have to worry about birds and critters getting in. Secondly, we can add a fullview section to the door so that more light comes in. If you’re using your shop as a workshop, this is a nice feature, especially with the curved building because windows are not an option for the curved walled buildings. Another one that is becoming more and more important is insulation. Most commercial doors have an R value close to the equivalent of your walls. And with spray foam insulation becoming more available, you can turn your old shop into a much more enjoyable and usable space for much less than it would cost to build a new one. Not to mention you won’t need the permits and plans that a new building will require.

Electric operators are a game changer for farming and ranching. I have met a lot of ranchers, and none of them have ever complained about being able to open their shop door from the cab of the tractor in order to do chores. When it’s cold out, the tractor will always start and be warm when you get it in. You don’t need to crawl out and risk a hernia because you have to force the sliding doors open. This is one of the nicer features about a sectional overhead door. And if an operator isn’t in the budget, a chain hoist on a well-balanced door is still significantly easier than pushing heavy sliding doors open.

There are a few things to consider before getting rid of your sliding doors. The main one is headroom. Headroom is the amount of between the lowest point in the ceiling and the top of the door opening. In a steel quonset, the lowest point ends up being the bottom of the rib at the corners of the opening. Most commercial doors require 15” of room above the opening for a standard lift track system. So, it is quite likely that some framing will be needed to make a sectional overhead door work. There are options to fit an overhead door in less than 15”, however. In some instances, we have installed them in as little as 6”, there are options. We always try to maximize door height because farm and ranch equipment doesn’t seem to be getting any smaller.

To sum it up, a shop without proper doors is basically a waste of space. A reliable sectional overhead door can be a great asset to your ranch by protecting your equipment from the elements and allowing you to have more usable square footage to work in. It also protects your investment by keeping critters out of your building. It also increases the resale value of the farm should you decide to sell. If you would like more information on upgrading the door system on your farm shop, don’t hesitate to get in contact with me and I will be happy to help you out.

Justin Carrier
Owner/Operator
Eagle Overhead Door LTD
j.carrier@eagleoveheaddoor.ca.

Call for more information call (306) 861-7736

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