Solutions for parking in a narrow garage

Hi CJ,

You may want to try this.

Buy a cheap laser pointer,or possibly two, have them pointing out of the windscreen and mark some cross hairs on the rear garage wall. You will obviously need to be able to replicate the pointers positions once you've calibrated the positions with crosshairs on the wall so you can put them away when you are driving, unless you want to fix then in a semi permanent way.

Regards Will

Problem with laser pointers is keeping them on while you drive into the garage.
The transit range is probably the easiest and cheapest solution. I wish I had as much width betwwen the uprights of my garage door - 5mm on each side that then opens out to about 150mm each side, and I cannot enlarge the door aperture as my garage would fall down if I made it any wider. The other way to do it is to put some flexible rods on each sidewall of the garage, sticking out into the garage so that if you touch one it bends but also wrns you that your are too far to one side

I have a typical 80s estate house with a typical narrow garage. I've rarely put any of my previous cars in my garage but tried my Evoque a few weeks after getting it. In spite of having the surround camera system I found the best aid was my wife. We managed to position the car so close to one side of the garage that the mirror would have hit the wall if it hadn't been folded. Even so I couldn't get out of the other side. I could probably have climbed out of the boot - but I reversed the car in so the boot couldn't be opened. Alternatively I might have been able to squeeze through a door window, but I really didn't want to do any damage to the trim or bodywork.

So in my experience, getting the car safely into the garage is irrelevant as there is no way to get out of it. Possibly this means my garage would be the most secure place to park it.

You can learn from this 87 year old I say.

Brilliant Biker!

I wonder if I'm worrying unnecessarily. I've been assuming that my mirrors would be folded the whole time in the garage, but it's only actually on passing through the doorframe that they have to be folded, it's just dawned on me that inside the garage they could be open again. So maybe I needn't have worried that when reversing I wouldn't be able to tell if I was veering towards the frame (and the vicious metal flanges that narrow the entrance at wheel-arch height.)

Having said that, I still like my guide rails idea, which would enable me to drive in and out quickly without even having my hands on the steering wheel, most of the time. The way I see it working as that I would fit the rubber Kerbstopper rails to the garage floor 1cm in from where I want the insides of the wheels to be, facing outwards. Having the guide rails inside the wheels instead of on the outside means more space to fit their mounting plates on the floor, and more importantly no need to worry about them marking the wheels, which in turn means possibly using the tallest ones available, which should work the best. I would fix the the mounting plate second-nearest to the entrance at say about 30cm in, then bend the rails inwards (if possible) so there was a looser fit right at the entrance, which would reduce any difficulty there might be aligning the car with the rails on approach.

For parking, after folding mirrors I'd drive up to entrance getting right mirror as close to the frame as possible. Once the tyres cross the threshold, one of them shoud touch the outside of one of the rails, at that point I could take my hand off the steering wheel and go forward slowly, and the rails would guide the car to dead centre in the first 30cm, then keep it dead centre all the way in.

I think i know what flanges you mean, you might want to affix something like this (rubber u channel edging strip) to the outer edge:

http://compare.ebay.co.uk/like/180646860...adtype=pla

I would be tempted to use some silion sealant to "glue" the strips in place

Indonexactly the same thing parking my Freelander in the garage and will also be doing the same with the Evoque. Ffold mirrors in as I near the frame once past the frame the garage space opens up which enables me to open the mirrors again if required. Then I fold the mirrors. I've also marked a line on the wall so I also know how far to reverse.

The things we do to park our cars, makes me giggle

I went to a carpet place and bought some cheap off-cuts for a couple of quid. Lined them around the garage at the height the car would touch the walls then marked with tape where the driver’s door was safe to open which would be missing the front garage door and missing the rear garage wall. Also have to bricks resting for the rear wheels so when i touch it's another reminder to brake. Done..!

The carpet is a bit tasteless mind you .....

(30-08-2012 08:33pm)SiT Wrote:  The carpet is a bit tasteless mind you .....

This post is useless without photos !