Chatham is a small community in southern Chester County, surrounded by farmland and close to West Grove and Avondale, in the countryside around Kennett Square known for its mushroom growers. If you were searching for Chatham, New Jersey, or Chatham on Cape Cod, note that this page is about the Pennsylvania village.
The area mixes older stone farmhouses and outbuildings with newer subdivisions, so garage door needs vary widely. Humidity, summer storms and winter freeze-thaw are the constants.
Older farmhouses and outbuildings
Stone and frame farmhouses in this part of the county were built long before cars, so garages were often added later or converted from barns and sheds. Those openings are rarely standard sizes and are often out of square.
Custom-sized doors and adjustable hardware solve most fit problems. Where a barn or shed opening is very tall or wide, a heavier door with properly rated springs and track is needed.
Stone walls take care to anchor into. Track and spring brackets should be fastened to solid wood framing, or with masonry anchors rated for the load, never just screwed into old mortar.
Newer homes and attached garages
Subdivisions built over the last few decades around West Grove and Avondale typically have attached two-car garages, sometimes with homeowners association rules on exterior appearance. Builder-grade doors from that era are often uninsulated, and their original springs are reaching the end of their cycle life.
Upgrading to an insulated door with a polyurethane core and replacing a noisy chain-drive opener with a belt drive are the two upgrades that make the biggest day-to-day difference in these homes.
Humidity and the bottom of the door
Southeastern Pennsylvania summers are humid, and moisture collects at the bottom of a garage door where the seal meets the slab. Steel doors rust along the bottom edge, and wood doors and jambs rot from the ground up.
- Keep the bottom seal intact and replace it when it hardens or cracks.
- Make sure the driveway drains away from the door, not toward it.
- Repaint chips and scratches on steel doors before rust spreads.
- Seal every edge of a wood door, including the bottom.
Long driveways: remote range and backup power
When the garage sits far back from the road, a remote that only works a few feet from the door gets old fast. A weak battery is the usual cause, but radio interference is another: some LED bulbs installed in or near the opener are known to cut remote range, and bulbs labeled as compatible with garage door openers usually fix it.
Backup power matters more out here, too. Rural roads can lose power during summer thunderstorms and winter ice, and a battery-backup opener lets the door run until the lines are repaired.
Quick checks before you call
A surprising number of dead openers come down to something simple. These checks are safe for anyone and take a few minutes. If none of them explains the problem, or the trouble involves springs, cables or a door hanging crooked, stop there and get a technician out.
- Is the opener plugged in, and has a GFCI outlet or breaker tripped?
- Do the remote and wall button both fail, or only the remote? A weak battery affects only the remote.
- Are both photo-eye lights steady, with nothing blocking the beam?
- Is the manual lock bar on the inside of the door engaged?
- Has the emergency release been pulled, leaving the trolley disconnected?
Last updated by the American Garage Door Team.