OnPoint Pro Doors Pennsylvania installs real wood doors, wood-look steel and composite doors, and carriage-house styles that open like any sectional door, on rowhome garages, township houses and farmhouses around York. The measuring visit and the estimate are both free.
Tell us what the door is doing. Nothing begins until you've heard the number, and hearing it is free.
Real wood doors are built from species such as cedar, hemlock or redwood, and nothing else has quite the same warmth on the front of a house. They are also the heaviest choice and the one that asks the most of its owner, because wood moves with the weather and its finish wears.
Steel and composite doors pressed with a wood grain get most of the way there without the upkeep. Up close the difference shows; from the sidewalk it mostly doesn't. Composite holds a deeper grain and shrugs off dents better than thin steel, while steel is the lighter and simpler option. All three come in the same carriage-house designs.
Which one suits you usually comes down to two questions: how close the garage sits to the street, and how much time you want to spend on the door once it's up.
A carriage-house door borrows the look of the old swing-out doors on stables and coach houses: vertical boards, crossbuck braces, decorative handles and strap hinges, often with a row of windows along the top. Underneath it is an ordinary sectional door, so it rolls up into the garage on tracks and needs no room in front to swing open.
The details decide whether it looks right. Overlay patterns, hardware finish and the size of the window panes are chosen to suit the house, and on a two-car opening a pair of single doors sometimes reads better than one wide one.
Wood takes on moisture and gives it back, and the weather here gives it plenty of practice. Winters that swing above and below freezing and summers thick with humidity make a wood door swell and shrink, and a door that swells too much starts to rub in its opening or stick at the bottom.
The finish is what slows that down. Every face and edge of a real wood door needs sealing before it is hung, the bottom edge most of all, since it sits closest to snowmelt and puddles. A door that arrives finished on all sides, or is finished before installation, lasts far longer than one sealed only on the face that shows.
Carriage doors with windows suit the older farmhouses and the outbuildings around them, where the garage is often in plain view from the road. On the narrow alley garages behind brick rowhomes, a simpler wood-look door with flat or short panels usually fits the old opening and the brick better than a busy overlay pattern.
Township split-levels and ranches can carry either; it comes down to the trim and windows on the rest of the house. Where a historic district reviews changes to street-facing doors, it pays to ask before ordering, and the samples can be photographed against the house to help with that conversation.
A wood or carriage door is made to order, so the visit to measure matters as much as the install.
A real wood door can weigh a great deal more than the steel door it replaces, and everything that lifts it has to be chosen for that weight. Springs are sized to the door, cables and drums matched to them, and heavy-duty hinges and rollers carry the sections. Wide doors get the reinforcement the maker specifies.
The opener matters too. An older or light-duty opener that coped with a hollow steel door can struggle with solid wood, and it is better to hear that at the estimate than to find it on the first cold morning.
Most wood-look steel and composite doors are built with a foam core sealed between the faces, and that matters on the split-levels and ranches where the garage sits under a bedroom or beside the family room. A core like that keeps the room above steadier through a cold snap and a humid week alike, and it takes the rattle out of a door that used to boom in the wind.
Some real wood lines also come with an insulated backing. It adds weight, so the springs are sized with it in, and the bottom seal and side weatherstrip go in new with the door, since gaps around a good door let the weather in all the same.
Expect a real wood door to need its finish renewed every few years, sooner on a face that gets hard afternoon sun or sits close to the alley's splash. Peeling or graying at the bottom edge is the early sign, and catching it then keeps the wood itself sound.
Wood-look steel and composite doors ask for very little beyond an occasional wash. Either way, the moving parts of the door are the same as any sectional door's, and they wear the same way, so the springs and rollers deserve the same attention as the face.
For some houses, yes. Real wood looks like nothing else, but it needs its finish renewed over the years. If that sounds like a chore, a wood-look steel or composite door gives most of the look with very little upkeep.
Like any sectional door. It rolls up into the garage on tracks, so it needs no room in front to swing, even though it looks like a pair of swing-out doors.
Yes. Steel and composite doors come with wood-grain faces and carriage overlays, and they don't swell or need refinishing.
A properly sealed door moves far less. Doors that stick are usually ones finished on the front only, with a bare bottom edge soaking up water.
Sometimes. Real wood is heavy, so the springs carry most of it, but an older or light-duty opener can still struggle. You hear which at the estimate.
Yes. Most wood-look steel and composite doors have a foam core, which keeps a room above or beside the garage steadier and makes the door quieter.
Yes. A row of windows across the top section is the classic look, and frosted or textured glass keeps the garage private.
Yes. The measuring visit and the written estimate are free, and nothing is ordered until you approve it.
Say what's wrong and we'll commit to an arrival window you can plan around. The visit and the estimate is free, wherever you are.
Want to talk instead? Call (484) 312-5999.
Tell us what the door is doing. Nothing begins until you've heard the number, and hearing it is free.