Garage door repair, installation and openers in Renfrew

Half of Renfrew's houses predate 1960

The 2021 Census counted 3,955 occupied dwellings in the Town of Renfrew. 2,035 of them were built in 1960 or before and another 985 between 1961 and 1980, so three quarters of the town was built before 1981. Only 105 were added between 2016 and 2021. The population was 8,190, down 0.4% from 2016, and the average age was 49.4.

Renfrew was named around 1848 and grew on the lumber that came down the Bonnechere. John Lorn McDougall's mill went up beside the river in 1855 and the swinging bridge in 1885. A garage on a house of that age was built after the house: behind it, at the end of a long drive, or off a lane. It was sized for the car of its own decade.

The narrow opening and the truck that will not fit

Doors come in standard widths, and the door on an older single garage is usually the narrowest of them. If the truck you drive now only goes in with the mirrors folded, the fix is a wider opening, and that is framing and header work before it is door work. Seventy winters of frost also leave an old opening out of square. A new door fitted to a racked opening seals on three sides and leaks at the fourth corner, so the opening is measured at the top, the middle and the sill before a door is ordered. Where the width is fine and the door is the problem, the choice is a new residential door or a replacement sized to the opening as it is.

Where the freeway ends

The 417 stops west of Campbell Drive at Arnprior. From there to Renfrew, Highway 17 is the two-lane Trans-Canada, and Ontario is twinning it: 22.5 km from Scheel Drive to west of Bruce Street, with the Calabogie Road interchange finished in 2023 and the design contract for the rest put out to tender in February 2026. Until it is built, the last 30 km of a Renfrew call runs at two-lane speed behind whatever is in front. Highway 17 was routed around the town in 1977, so the van comes off the bypass into the grid rather than down Raglan Street.

There is no Renfrew premises. The old site claimed one; there was none. Repairs are booked same day, and the window is wider than a Nepean one. Ask for it when you call.

Commercial doors in the town

Renfrew Victoria Hospital, Bonnechere Manor and the hockey-tape plant of Scapa Tapes are the town's larger employers. A loading door that stands open on a January afternoon wears differently from a house door, and Protech services and replaces commercial doors and commercial openers alongside the residential work.

Permits, from the Town of Renfrew's page

The Town needs a permit for "carports, garages (detached or attached), and other accessory buildings", and exempts a shed under 15 square metres with no plumbing. Applications go through its City Reporter portal, and it says typical residential permits are issued within 10 days. A wider opening on an existing garage changes the structure; ask the Town at 127 Raglan Street South before the header comes out.

Repair or replace on an old Renfrew garage

A broken spring on a sound door is a repair, whatever the door's age. A wooden door whose bottom rail has rotted from the slab up, or a steel door on a garage that is about to be widened, is a replacement, and the spring money goes into the new door. A stripped gear inside the opener is a fraction of a new unit. Ask for the repair figure and the replacement figure together.

Call from Renfrew

(613) 845-9950 rings at any hour. Say the street and what the door is doing. For a new-door quote with no urgency, email info@protechgarage.ca or use the contact page.