Granted, repairing your garage door bottom seal isn’t dangerous work, and it’s not difficult either. It’s not like replacing a garage door spring, balancing a garage door, or installing a brand new garage door — jobs that absolutely require the expertise of a professional to ensure safety and precision. Repairing the weather stripping or bottom seal on your garage door safely falls into the DIY garage door repair category.
And yet, it doesn’t hurt to have your overhead garage door’s bottom seal replaced by a professional. After all, you can make your own breakfast perfectly fine — but isn’t it nice to go out to brunch and enjoy a garden-fresh omelet prepared by a professional chef?
Yes, it is. Nobody doesn’t like brunch.
So why not let us repair your garage door’s bottom seal for you? It’s a fairly simple job, but it does require 2 to 3 hours’ worth of work. Have a garage door pro do it for you and not only do you not have to give up precious weekend time, but you also don’t need to wonder if it was done right, because garage door repairs are kind of what we do. So why not give us a call, open a beer, and spend that time watching the game or enjoying the beautiful Sacramento sun at the beach?
Most People Ignore Their Garage Door’s Seals
Sadly, most people don’t even think about their garage door bottom seal in the first place. Some might not know that it’s there or what function it performs. But even though it’s a simple garage door part, it’s still important to keep maintained.
The garage door bottom seal is the weather stripping on the bottom of your garage door that keeps out, well, the weather. It prevents rain, flood water, leaves and other debris from getting into your garage during the storm. (And we all know that winter rainstorms in Sacramento, California can get pretty intense.) It also prevents critters like rodents, bugs, snakes, and mice from getting into your garage and starting an infestation.
Since seals for overhead garage doors are made of rubber, it will eventually wear out. It will crack in the hot summer sun. Pieces will break off. It loses its effectiveness over time. Rubber is awesome for so many reasons, and you’d likely be surprised how much it plays a role in your daily life. But since it’s a natural material, it degrades with exposure to sun, water and extreme temperatures.
So just like you should check out moving parts of your garage door for rust and corrosion, so should you be checking your garage door’s weather stripping for signs of it failing to be weatherproof anymore.
You really should replace your garage door bottom seal every few years. We recommend inspecting the bottom of your garage door whenever you do your seasonal inspection. That’s one of the first things we look at as garage door professionals.
How to Replace Your Garage Door’s Bottom Seal Yourself
To be honest, replacing the garage door bottom seal is not a difficult garage door repair. You can purchase a new seal at most hardware stores. If you do decide to DIY this job, be sure to measure the seal exactly. There’s nothing worse than sliding in a new seal only to realize you’re a few inches short.
Golden Rule of any home improvement activity: measure twice, cut once. Although, it never hurts to measure 3… or 7 times. Depending on how high-strung you are. Either way – better safe than sorry.
Once you’ve purchased the materials, unscrew the attachments holding the garage door seal to the bottom of your garage door. Remove the old seal and slide in the new. That’s the job in a nutshell.
But of course problems will always present themselves — rusted bolts, the wrong size of weather stripping, lining everything up just right. The other Golden Rule of any home improvement activity: however long you think it’s going to take, multiply it by 2 and add 30 minutes.
Is this really what you want to be doing on your Saturday?
We’d guess not.
24/7 Professional Garage Door Repair & Bottom Seal Replacement
Need that cracked, loose weather stripping replaced but aren’t into doing it yourself? Call us instead. We do 24/7 emergency garage door repair all across the Sacramento area, including Rocklin and Folsom. Our repair professionals can come out at a moment’s notice and take the job off your hands! You can get back to relaxing and enjoying the rest of your weekend knowing that the job was done right.