When you live in an area that gets snow, regular garage winter maintenance is necessary to help keep your garage space clean.
Ignoring garage winter maintenance leads to your space being a slushy, watery mess and a safety hazard. Road salt residue left on your floor also damages the flooring and detracts from your garage’s interior look.
Garage floor clutter and disorganization isn’t ideal at any time of the year. During the winter time, it’s especially inconvenient, however. After all, who wants to be searching through a disorganized pile of things for that specific snow shovel in frigid temperatures?
Garage winter maintenance also means ensuring your garage’s energy efficiency is functioning at its most optimal level.
Here are three garage winter maintenance tips to make those last few weeks until spring arrives (and next winter) a little easier.
Protect your garage floor from the damage done during winter time by investing in a durable polyaspartic floor coating.
1. Protect and maintain your garage floor
If you reside in a climate that gets extreme temperature shifts, the process of a garage floor contracting and expanding in accordance with the temperature changes is normal. Expansion joints help facilitate this process.
That process is put under more strain, however, when melted snow enters cracks in the garage floor and then refreezes when the temperature drops. Deicing road salt that recrystallizes inside the cracks only adds to the problem. Existing cracks will get deeper and longer and new cracks will eventually form.
Using the proper type of garage floor coating is your best defense against the ravages of winter on your flooring surface. Investing in a high quality polyaspartic garage floor coating like Floortex™ provides the best protection against water and salt damage. Floortex™ floor coatings can be also be applied any time of the year.
This durable floor coating looks great and has a textured surface that offers better traction than epoxy coatings. That’s a useful feature for your garage floor surface to have when the mercury drops.
And garage winter maintenance with a polyaspartic floor is easy, too. A squeegee quickly removes any standing water. When the floor is dry, you can give it a fast sweep to remove dirt and salt particles. Pick a milder winter day to give your floor a more thorough cleaning.
2. Make garage winter maintenance easier with a clutter-free floor
There’s no more important time of the year to park your vehicles in the garage than during the winter. They’ll warm up faster. You’ll also save yourself from the discomfort (and extra time spent) clearing ice and snow off your vehicles when the weather is unpleasant.
A clutter-free garage floor makes garage winter maintenance significantly easier. In addition to making the aforementioned floor cleaning easier, you’ll also simply be able to function much better in an organized garage space.
An organized garage using the right storage systems removes clutter from your garage floor to make room for parking and maybe a bulky snow blower. You’ll also have easier access to your handheld snow removal tools. Using these storage systems will minimize the effort you’ll need to put into your garage winter maintenance routine:
- garage cabinetry provides storage space for tools and winter-related items like bags of deicing salt and sand
- slatwall storage keeps your snow removal tools off the garage floor and well-organized
- tire racks, heavy-duty overhead racks, and other specialty storage racks provide storage space off your floor for bulky and seasonal items
Prevent your bulky second set of vehicle tires from cluttering up your garage floor by using a sturdy tire rack.
Another part of your garage winter maintenance should include checking to make sure your garage is being energy efficient.
Has it been ages since you upgraded your garage’s insulation? Are you detecting drafts in the garage or perhaps in your heated living space with a door that connects to the garage? Here are a few improvements you can make:
- upgrade your garage’s ceiling and wall insulation (or add some if you neither)
- invest in more energy efficient garage windows or upgrade your garage access door
- ensure weatherstripping and door thresholds aren’t peeling away or letting drafts in
Your garage door also warrants attention to help with garage energy efficiency. In terms of garage door materials, steel is a better natural insulator than wood or aluminum (especially a thicker lower gauge steel).
Modern garage doors offer much better insulating features than older door models. This helps improve energy efficiency, makes the doors stronger and less likely to dent, and provides sound insulation benefits as well.
Any upgrades you make to your garage to help with energy efficiency during the winter will also deliver benefits throughout the rest of the year, including a lower hydro bill.
Garage winter maintenance tips that make spring cleaning easier
Investing time in some garage winter maintenance during the year’s coldest months will make your garage spring cleaning all that much easier.
To get expert help to outfit your garage for the winter and year-round, you’re only a link click away from getting things started. Schedule your free design consultation with Garage Living.
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