The Art of Cladding

   We offer a big variety of panel designs, colours and customisation options. But our customers, with the little help from the architects, are pushing the limits. And when you think that there is nothing more to be invented or designed an enquiry for something extraordinary comes.

    Many different reasons why people are ready to put their money into the garage door. Covering a significant area of the house facade, garage door becomes quite a significant element of the whole design concept. Firstly, architects are keen to get consistent design and match the door with the whole architectural setting. Secondly, customers who need door replacement, are tired of boring uniform design and want to stand out of the rest.

    On picture 1 the sectional garage door clad with double cutting calibrated larch laths. Timber was fixed to the smooth surface door panels and coated with oil. The door panels are in 'Anthracite Grey' finish to match facade clinker tiles. Larch itself is very resistant to water and weathering. Oil gives 'deeper' colour and additional protection from the elements. The combination of 'primary' materials like rusty steel, clinker and timber, create an image of sustainability.

1. Sectional garage door clad with latch laths

The door in picture 2 is 7.5 metres wide. During the renovation of the original house from the Tudor era, permission was given to build an additional building which had to match the main house design. 

So we used 12 mm thick okoume plywood to create an image of the Tudor era design. We cut planks out of plywood the same width as joists in the front wall and painted the same colour. Okoume is a hardwood which is most resistant to the water. So it can resist weathering for years without additional maintenance. 

   The architect provided us with the design scheme so we just had to follow it to get the desired image. The final result looks like the building was built in the XVI century and recently refurbished.

2. 'Tudor House' design garage door

   Another one interesting job - the garage door forged out of green-copper. As you can see in picture 3, actually, it is 10 metres wide sectionals clad with 0.75 mm thick green-copper tin. We covered thermal gaps with additional tin ribbons so the whole plane of the door looks like a solid structure. 

    Of course, adding additional weight on the door will put extra load on the whole door construction. Accordingly, we need to calculate torsion spring size, add additional reinforcement bars to keep door panels safe in the open position and add extra suspension brackets. For such size a door there are no electric garage door openers on the market. So we have to pick one of the industrial electric sectional door openers to cope with the weight. 

3. Green copper cladding

   Pictures 4 & 5 depict garage door cladding options matching with the facade design. Traditionally cedar and larch were used for facade cladding. These are two affordable hardwood sorts resistant to water and the elements. Of course, there are some exotic hardwood sorts suitable for outdoor cladding. But they are quite expensive, so used mainly for luxury shipbuilding. 

   Recently new wood processing technology entered the market. The result is called - thermowood. Timber is treated in high pressure and temperature so it becomes resistant to the weathering. But the main point is that cheap sorts of timber like pine can be used for outdoor cladding.

4. Garage doors matching facade design

5. Custom design garage doors & facade

But as you can see in picture 6, some exotic hardwood timber sorts are used as well. The door along with fascia panel are clad in 'Redheart' hardwood planks.

6. Door and fascia clad with 'Redwood' planks

   The most popular type of cladding is okoume plywood. We use 12 mm thick plywood sheets, but for special designs, we apply 18 mm. We carve plywood to get a custom design. On our product range, there are many standardised designs that can be modified, but the customer also can order a completely bespoke design. 

    By milling 8 mm deep and 10 mm wide grooves we can create the desired image of the door. It doesn't matter for us how complicated design - the programmable CNC machine-tool does the job. After milling we prime plywood to make it more resistant to water. According to customer specifications, we can paint plywood in almost any RAL or BS colour or coat it with varnish if wood image must be retained.

Pictures 7 - 10 show a few examples of how okoume plywood cladding looks like.

7. Garage door with custom design okoume cladding

8. Okoume plywood cladding with window

9. Plywood varnished to retain wood image

10. Vertical rib design cladding

   Timber is the most usable material for cladding, but different materials can be used as well. We did some jobs with various facade composite panels pic.11, fibre-cement planks and even glass pic.12. Usually, for cladding base, we use our standard sandwich-type garage door panels. To get a louvre effect we can clad glazed panels as on picture 13.

11. Garage doors clad with facade composite panels

12. Mirror glass cladding

13. Louvre style cladding on glazed panels

For more information about Ryterna garage & front doors, please visit our web site.

https://www.ryternagaragedoors.co.uk/