Im working on improving a 1929 2 family rental property right now. It has a set of original wood carriage doors that open into a basement 2 car garage area.
Basically my agenda is to bring things up to code, modernize horribly outdated and broken stuff, and do a hell of a lot of scraping, sanding, and painting.
Its part of what was a 4 house city development in the late 20s, and all 4 houses are set on a hill with under house garages. Over the years, the other three houses have all been converted to overhead vinyl doors, and IMO, it really destroys the character of the house, even for the one where the definitely spent big money on the replacement overheads.
The one im working on is definitely in the worst shape as far as exterior trim and repair, yet is the most interesting from the street because of these carriage doors with glass windows, and nice arches above. I really don't want to remove them.
At the same time, the tenant has asked about improving their utility, and I have to admit, they are a PITA to open and close. The driveway is a cut out of the hill meaning you are opening your driver door in a narrow space right into a concrete wall, and you have to get out of your car, open the right side door, open a floor lock, open a ceiling lock, then open both doors until the lock in position, pull car in, then unlock the open position, close, redo all the other locks and whatnot.
I did have a garage door guy come by and quote on some overhead doors, and since the size (width) would have to be custom, it was a 7-10k quote to do both. This would explain why on the other 3 houses whoever did the conversion built about 2 feet out from the original side of the house to accomodate the track system for a stock width
since then, I found this company that sells these interesting carriage door openers-
Real Carriage Door Hardware - Carriage Door Openers
The one im most interested in is this one-
Real Carriage Door Hardware - Carriage Door Openers
Its A. cheaper, B. will work much better with the interior ceiling of the garage, which is odd.
I have never ever seen one of these. Anyone used one or installed one?