Doors for RVs, Trucks and Oversized Vehicles

We get this call regularly across our whole service area — someone has bought an RV, a lifted truck or a tall trailer and discovered the garage door is the constraint.

Measure the vehicle properly

Not the manufacturer's specification. The actual vehicle, as it sits, including anything on the roof — air conditioning units, antennas, roof racks, light bars. And measure the width at its widest point, including mirrors if they do not fold.

Then add real clearance. A door opening with two inches of margin is a door opening you will eventually hit.

Then measure the building

This is where most of these projects run into reality:

• Headroom. A taller door needs the same headroom above a taller opening. Raising the opening height eats into whatever was above it.
• Structural header. Widening or heightening an opening means the header carrying the load above it has to be sized for the new span. This is structural work, not door work.
• Sideroom for the vertical track on both sides.
• Interior height — the door has to go somewhere when it opens, and a tall door occupies more ceiling.
• The approach. A steep or short driveway can make a tall vehicle physically unable to enter regardless of the opening.

Spring and opener sizing

A larger door is a heavier door, and everything scales with it:

• Spring sizing must match the actual door weight. This is calculated, not guessed.
• Track and hardware move up to heavier-duty grades.
• The opener needs to be rated for the door — an opener sized for a standard residential door on an oversized one fails early.
• Struts across wide sections to prevent bowing.

High-lift is often the answer

If the constraint is that an open door hangs too low for a tall vehicle rather than the opening itself, high-lift track raises the whole assembly and may solve it without touching the opening.

Free on-site measurement — we would rather tell you what the building will take before you buy the vehicle. Call (423) 262-3147.