Frequently Asked Questions

You may be able to tell which size you need just by looking at your garage door. Most standard garage doors that have 4 panels require a 21 inch rack and most five panel doors require 18 inch rack. To verify, just measure on the outside of the garage door the width of the panels. If it is not a 21 inch or 18 inch panel, you may need one of our custom adapters. We have a variety of options to help you custom fit the Cobra Rack to your garage door. Just contact us by phone or email and we will get you what you need. 

If you look at the photos on the website you will see you should alternate the positioning of the reels on each slot. Simply insert the tip of the pole in first and then slide back and install the back end. On the next slot have the reel positioned on the other end.

Definitely! The Cobra rack is designed to clear a 3 - 1/2 inch hurricane bar but a few garage doors have hurricane bars that are made wider than that. You would simply need to add spacers to the feet of the Cobra rack to clear the difference of the bar along with some longer bolt hardware. We offer spacer kits right here on our website. 

Each set of racks can safely hold up to 10 pounds when mounted on the garage door. 

No! Years of testing have proven that there is no additional wear on your garage door that interfers with functioning of the door. The garage is lifted by the springs on the door and the garage door motor is above and out of the way of the Cobra rack. The motor for the garage door assists the springs in lifting. If your garage door is unbalanced, we recommend having a professional garage door installer balance the door. You can test this before and after you install the Cobra Rack by following these steps. 

1. Close the door from the inside.
2. Detach the garage door from the opener using the red manual release rope.
3. Move the door open and closed manually.
4. Then lift the door halfway and release. If it stays in one place, it is properly balanced. If it closes or snaps open, the door is off-balance.

The Cobra Rack should not interfere with the balance of your door. If your door is balanced before you install, but then out of balance after installation, you may be storing too much weight on the Cobra Rack. We recommend a 10 pound weight limit for each Cobra Rack. 

Absolutely! The Cobra rack is designed to be installed by clamping or by hard mounting. If you have soft insulation is able to be pushed back a bit the clamping block will fit between the panel and the insulation. If you have hard insulation, you can use a self-tapping screw to hard mount the rack. Instructions for both can be found here.

There are a few varieties of garage doors. The majority of garage doors are your standard version with edges for the Cobra Rack to clamp to. In the southern region wind restraint or hurricane bars are installed on each of the garage door panels for strength during high winds. These are typically 3 1/2" or less but can be made up to 5" in width. The Cobra Rack is built to fit over the 3 1/2" hurricane bars. If your hurricane panels are wider, we have spacers available to fit over them. 

The panel width of each panel can vary also but the standard sizes for the panel width on about 90% of the panels is 21 inches on 4 panel garage doors. The other standard width is 18 inches on 5 panel garage doors which is on about 8% of the panels. The standard height of the entrance to your garage door is 7 feet measured from the ground to the transom at the entrance so either four 21” panels or five 18” panels equal 7 feet. Garage doors with larger entrances may have more or larger panels. We have adapters to fit these types of doors as well. 
We recommend measuring your panels before ordering to ensure you order the correct size. Please let us know if you have a non-standard garage door and need us to custom fit the Cobra Rack to your garage door.