How do you guys do the buck around a garage door opening, typically? The reason I ask is because the garage door installer tells me I have it the old way on my drawing and he doesn't want me to do it that way.

I was planning on having a double 2 x 12 on the jambs with a 2 x 6 on the flat on the inside surface of the wall onto which to mount the hardware. See the detail below. The installer says that's the old way, even if the door company shows that in their instructions. Around here everyone puts 2x in the wall so that the solid mounting surface for the garage door hardware is flush with the interior finish of the garage wall. He was pretty adamant about having plenty of wood around the door opening to mount the hardware. He said they just recently installed a door in an ICF garage and had to make 14 trips there before the owner (builder?) got things fixed so they could hang the door. Charged the guy an extra $500.

So how's your way to have something like 3" x 6" of solid wood in the opening, flush to the inside, onto which the door hardware gets mounted?

I'm thinking of doing something like an "L" shape with a double 2 x 4 nailed perpendicular to the side of the 2 x 12. I would have to cut the inside foam back for the double 2 x 4. Or maybe I'll ask him to tell me exactly where all the mounting screws for the track brackets, torsion spring, and door opener need to be and I'll put Simpson ICFVL connectors in those locations.

What's your suggestions?

Your method works and is still used to this day

Another route to look at is use 3X12 as opposed to the double 2x12 and use a 3x4, create your 'L', cut the required foam on the inside of the garage and use a piece of plywood to diaphragm it for the pour, when done you can drywall right over it and the garage door guy can attach his lag bolts through the drywall into solid wood.

We use V-buck on the jamb and on the inside we cut the foam block back to fit a 2X6 treated, we install the 2x so that it gets screwed to the V-buck and use gal metal attachments to hold the 2x to the concrete, scab and brace the piece and the V-buck for the pour.

On the bottom we install a 3 1/2" discharge hose where the garage door will be meeting the floor, the floor is poured up to it on one side and the apron on the other side, this acts as our expansion joint as well as our thermal break, and door seal. Make sure you radius the edges at the hose when doing this so you have no sharp edges. If the tube ever goes bad simply remove the tube and replace with a new one in the nice c channel it has created. (by the way we have only had one go bad in five years of doing this and that was in a commercial where the fork lift got it took about 10 min to replace.

We install a 2 by wood buck, anchored back to the concrete.
Next we install J-bolts beside each jamb pointing into the garage and also a couple centered above the head where normal attachments are made.
Attach 2 by six on the J-bolts beside each jamb, floor to ceiling and a block centered above the jamb.

Our garage door people charge no extra.

This is a great idea. I was planning on putting a piece of blue board on edge, tapered to ~ 1/2" at the top of the slab for a thermal break. I was planning on the door bottom seal being the only seal. Your hose idea sounds a lot better. What kind of hose, exactly, are you talking about? Concrete pumper hose, smooth radiator hose, similar type water hose, or what? Where's a good place to get some, Grainger, plumbing supply house, concrete supplier?

Thanks for the idea.

I'm not so sure about this idea, as the hose would fill with water and get skunky. Fill it with flexible closed-cell
foam, OK. But there's still the problem of the concrete breaking over the hose at the thinner points.
The blue-board idea is good, although the top surface would damage easily.

dmaceld, I think he means water-pump discharge hose, which is rubber, fairly stiff, with a non-corregated surface.

Quantum you are correct it is water pump discharge hose, which is very similar to a tractor radiator hose.

As I stated above radius the edge where the concrete meets the hose, if you just trowel up to the hose you will have a sharp edge that will break easily, but if you use a concrete edger trowel it will work great.

Because this is a rubber hose and you have poured up to the hose on both sides it seals very well and actually keeps moisture intrusion to a min. Remember that under this hose you have rock or sand fill so what little moisture manages to get through will dissapate into that material and just disappear, but again the amount of moisture is that gets through is almost none. I suppose if moisture is a concern you could put a bead of calk along the joint.

This product is available at most hose supply stores, I get ours from a store in Fargo N.D.

I think that if my garage door installer told me it took him 14 extra trips and an extra $500 charge to do someone elses garage door then I would quickly fire him and find a different installer.

I almost agree. Two reasons I will probably use him anyway. Price - he's a hundred bucks less per door than the next lowest for the door I want. My builder consultant - he does all the garage doors for the builder who's working with me on this project so I don't want to do anything needless to antagonize my builder/consultant. And like I always told my kids, "You can't have everything."

Besides, I like the idea of the wall being flush all the way to the door jamb!! But I will use ICFVLs in the header area to anchor the spring and opener rail even though the garage man wants to see a wood header. He can't have everything either!!!!