{"id":5248,"date":"2026-09-30T05:39:24","date_gmt":"2026-09-29T21:39:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.raxdoors.com\/blog\/dock-door-selection-guide\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T14:16:19","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T06:16:19","slug":"dock-door-selection-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.raxdoors.com\/fr\/blog\/dock-door-selection-guide\/","title":{"rendered":"Choix de porte de quai : Un guide pratique pour les bassins de chargement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Three quotes land on the same Monday morning, all for one dock position. One supplier prices an insulated sectional door, one prices a high speed door, and one prices a roller shutter. The spread between them is roughly three to one. The specification columns do not line up either: one sheet lists panel thickness, one lists opening speed, and one lists nothing but a model number. Nothing on the three pages answers the only question that matters, which is which door this position actually needs.<\/p>\n

We build insulated sectional doors, roller shutter doors, high speed doors and dock equipment in one product family. Quotes like this reach us because the decision was never structured. Dock door selection is not a catalog choice; it is a sequence of five decisions, and traffic comes first. Get the sequence right and the three quotes become one specification. Get it wrong and even the best-built door wears out early.<\/p>\n

The Traffic Decision Comes First<\/h2>\n

Traffic intensity is the first decision because it is the one that kills doors. One dealer’s planning guide puts a standard insulated sectional door at roughly ten cycles a day. The same guide marks around one hundred cycles a day as the point where a high speed door becomes the right category. It also quotes fifty or more cycles a day as the threshold where high speed doors start to suit a position. A door rated for light duty that serves a morning-rush position is not a bargain; it is a door scheduled for premature wear.<\/p>\n

The arithmetic behind that threshold is the spring cycle rating. Our sectional doors carry torsion springs rated for at least 30,000 cycles. A position running ten cycles a day, 250 working days a year, spends that rating in about twelve years. The same door at fifty cycles a day spends it in under three. The spring, not the panel, is what the traffic decision buys, which is why the cycle rating belongs in the specification rather than in the brochure.<\/p>\n

Work the decision as three tiers. The ladder below is the first pass; the sections that follow add the numbers that confirm it.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Low traffic, up to about ten cycles a day: an insulated sectional door, where the spring rating already outlives the building’s lease cycle<\/li>\n
  2. Medium traffic, ten to fifty cycles a day: a sectional door specified with upgraded springs and an electric operator, so the rating is not spent in a handful of years<\/li>\n
  3. High traffic, fifty cycles a day and above: a high speed door running at 0.8 to 2.5 meters per second, opening in a few seconds instead of twelve<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Opening speed is where the traffic bill becomes visible. The same dealer guide times a standard sectional door at twelve to fifteen seconds to fully open. A high speed door finishes the same cycle in under four seconds, and the guide notes the gap accumulates into hours of lost productivity across a week. Our own high speed doors cover 0.8 to 2.5 m\/s across the range, so the tier-three door recovers most of every cycle. The finer points of matching speed to a specific shift pattern are covered in our guide to high speed door opening speeds<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    \"Forklift
    Every cycle the forklift drives through spends the door’s rating: count the cycles before choosing the door<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

    Dock door selection therefore starts with a counter, not a catalog. Put a tally on the position for two weeks, or read it off the WMS event log, and place the position on the ladder. The four decisions that follow are easier once the traffic tier is fixed.<\/p>\n

    Count honestly, and count the peaks with the average. A food distribution dock that runs forty cycles on a calm Wednesday and one hundred and forty before a holiday weekend does not have a medium-traffic position. It has a high-traffic position with quiet days. Specifying to the average is how doors get sized for the day they rarely have and fail on the day they always do.<\/p>\n

    Build headroom into the count as well. A facility adding shifts, taking on a new retail contract or consolidating two warehouses into one will move every position up at least one tier within the spring rating’s life. A rating specified one tier above today’s counted traffic is cheap insurance; a door replaced in year four because the contract changed is not. Where several positions share one yard, count each position separately rather than dividing the fleet total evenly, because docks distribute traffic as unevenly as they distribute trailers.<\/p>\n

    Sizing the Opening From Your Fleet<\/h2>\n

    One facility guide puts the standard loading dock opening at eight to ten feet wide and eight to ten feet tall. Most North American and European dock buildings cluster there. The standard is a starting point, not an answer, because the trailer fleet sets the real dimensions. A yard that handles double-drop deck trailers or high cube boxes does not have a standard opening problem; it has a measurement problem. Once the door is chosen, the next question is what its insulation actually saves, which our loading bay energy plan works through.<\/a><\/p>\n

    Measure the fleet before the wall, and write three lines into the specification:<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
    Line<\/th>\nHow to derive it<\/th>\nWatch out for<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
    Clear width<\/strong><\/td>\nWidest trailer in the fleet plus its load restraint, checked at the mirror line<\/td>\nOne oversized unit in a mixed fleet sets the width for every position it uses<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Clear height<\/strong><\/td>\nTallest trailer plus the leveler lip slope at its steepest service angle<\/td>\nRefrigerated units with raised floors lose height at the threshold<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Headroom and sideroom<\/strong><\/td>\nMeasure the steel above and beside the opening before choosing the door family<\/td>\nSectional doors need overhead track; roller shutters need drum space at the side<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

    That third line is where retrofit projects bleed. The same guide is blunt about it: unmeasured headroom and sideroom are a common cause of revised specifications at installation. A sectional door that arrives with nowhere to run its track turns into a change order, a delayed dock and a contractor’s claim. Half a day with a tape measure and a ladder removes the entire category of risk.<\/p>\n

    The measurement walk should cover the position, not just the hole. Record the leveler width and pit dimensions while you are there, because the door, the leveler and the seal share the same wall opening and the same drawings. Note the apron slope too: a declined approach drops the trailer nose and steals clear height at the threshold that the drawing never shows. Photograph the steel above the opening, note the column positions, and mark anything hanging in the door’s path, from light fittings to conduit runs.<\/p>\n

    Write the numbers as measured, and make the supplier confirm them. A specification that says the opening is 3,000 millimeters wide invites the supplier to assume. A drawing that says 2,940 millimeters at the tightest point, checked at four heights, obliges the supplier to design to it. Every dimension on that drawing becomes a contract line, which is exactly the leverage a buyer wants before the quote arrives.<\/p>\n