Expanding Garage Door
 

My garage is stretched by at least 4’ on one side, but only have a regular 16’ garage door. The space good easily accommodate an 18’ (or even 20’) garage door. Of course I’d want/need to expand driveway as well. This would make getting vehicles in and out infinitely better.

My question: has anyone in a similar situation widened their garage door opening? Has it had the benefit you were hoping for?

We are on a corner lot and I have considered widening garage to add golf cart garage area, but utilities are on that side so it would become a quite costly process. Just having better access to my already ‘oversized’ garage could be the ticket.

Picture would help? I suspect you have a 4’ bump out wall that would need removed to do the expansion?

OP, the first thing you need to do is get your house plans and see how the lintel beam is installed. I suspect it goes ONLY from support to support, so this will be a much bigger project as you would need to replace the lintel beam for the wider width. I am sure this will require an engineering firm to design the new beam, as well as all of the permits. If you are in Sumter County and your house is less than 10 years old you should be able to get your plans from the building department.
IMHO, this will be expensive, and I am not sure if you will find hurricane rated garage door for this width.
As an option I would suggest 2 9 foot (9.5 foot) door with a center support for the new lentil beams, this would allow more conventional garage doors, openers, etc.

As you say, he really should see the construction plans, but I'd be surprised if the Lintel didn't extend beyond the existing garage door opening. Doing it any other way, would be a very odd way to frame a home. Of course, if there's an easier/cheaper way to do things, the TV construction team has figure it out.

Thanks both. It’s just an idea I’m kicking around. Of course I would be looking to get all info before pulling the trigger on actually doing something. I was just curious if any one had done something similar and was happy they went through it on the backend.

I build automobile dealerships and used to build custom homes. Every INCH you add to your garage, is almost always a huge plus. Adding 2' would be huge.

You might want get some estimates. With cost involved that might make up your mind. :highfive:

We had a corner lot in Duval, with a 2 car 16’ door and golf cart garage. House was built 12/09. In 2019, We wanted to expand the cart garage to 3+ car garage, also bump out the laundry room/office adding pantry/storage. Addition was 6’x20’ for garage the bump to office sharing a wall with garage 6’x12.

With moving the electrical panel, AC, water line, sprinklers, cable boxes, new garage door, extension of driveway, plans, permits. The 3 quotes was $41,490 to $45,250. Since the roof going on 11 years new addition shingles wouldn’t have matched, so we probably would have re shingled entire house at additional cost.

Didn’t love the house that much, sold it, went with a new construction.

Lintel Supports are only 8 inches wide
 

I will try to attach a construction picture from 2012 for a house in Gilcrest. The lintel is supported on one half block (8 inches) on either side of the garage door opening. There is one block support for the area that has two garage door openings butting together (provides 8 inch support to both lintels). There is no way to widen the door opening without fully removing the current lentil and replacing it with a wider lentil. This would require a complete redo of any load bearing elements such as roof trusses, truss ties down straps etc.

I can not get the picture to attach on the preview. If you send me pm I can send you an email with the picture.

If I looked at this route, I don't think we'd stretch it that much, but I'm sure cost would be similar since it still involves moving utilities, etc. This is why i was thinking just having a bigger door would be a net positive. Sounds like that would open an engineering can of worms that really wouldn't be all that cost effective either. But I may stretch the driveway regardless. Just a bit too narrow for two cars side by side (for visitors and such).

Thanks for the feedback; it was an interesting experiment.

Odd way to frame in my opinion, but TV often does things differently.

We are on a corner lot and the setback rules for corner lots are not in your favor. Even though we have a ton of space on the side about 36’ we can not add a golf cart garage. Lucky we have an 18’ garage door.

And of course you will need to submit plans the the architectural board for approval.

Lintels In Concrete Block Walls Are poured Concrete in Metal Forms Onsite
 

My comments were based on block construction and not wood framed.
The Villages system for creating lintels in situ is very smart IMHO for block construction. They use standard length metal forms placed on top of the block walls, insert reinforcing, place concrete into the forms. Then they complete the next block course and add the truss straps into the wet concrete, or mortar in the block cells. All of this work is done by the masons without the use of cranes to lift prepared concrete lintels. They are now ready for placing the roof trusses the next day. The metal forms are a permanent part of the wall. They are used above windows also. This is why drilling into the block wall for shades etc. is tricky since you need to drill through both metal and into reinforced concrete.
The concrete is placed when the masons have a concrete pumper onsite and are filling the block cavities' which have the reinforcing all the way to the footings. The ends of the lintel bearing column has reinforcing and is concrete filled to the lintel. If you look at the block wall before stucco is applied you can see the plywood covers at the bottom which serves as inspection points for the building inspector to verify the cavity filling is complete.
I have never seen the lintel to block wall details in person. A quick look at the construction drawings did not show any special connectors.

The certainly have their construction means & methods down to an efficient work flow.