If you’re finding it difficult to move your roll up garage door, you need to start by loosening the bolt that attaches your garage door to the wall. After doing so, you’ll have enough space to slide your garage door track back in place and also reattach the bolt after you’re done realigning the track. Afterward, use a mallet or even a hammer to realign the garage door track back in place.
Table of Contents
ToggleAt this point, the garage door is fully adjusted, and you should be able to open and close it effortlessly. Remember, having an unadjusted roll up garage door can put extra strain on your garage door opener. Therefore, you want to keep it fully adjusted to avoid spending on some expensive repairs later on.
How to Quickly Adjust Roll Up Garage Doors
Are you finding it hard to open or close your roll up garage door? This problem is usually related to needing to adjust your tension spring. Having your roll up garage door fully adjusted is a very important part of its maintenance, and it will help increase its lifespan in the process.
Here are some of the important steps you need to follow when adjusting your roll up garage door:
Gauging Your Roll Up Garage Door Tension
Generally, if you find it hard to open your roll up garage, it might mean that you need more spring tension. On the other hand, if you find your roll up garage door difficult to close, it means that you probably need to reduce tension. Even though most of the garage doors in the market today are designed to be very easy to access and maintain, it’s in your best interests to contact a professional technician for installation purposes or for any repairs you need to be done.
For the purpose of adjusting your roll up garage door, you’ll need a 5/16’’ Allen wrench or an electric variable speed drill fitted with a 5/16’’ Allen socket. You’ll also need to ensure that your roll up garage door is fully open and wrap the curtains around the drums for additional safety.
Adjust Tension and Keep Your Roll Up Garage Door Lubricated
After you’ve fully opened your roll up garage door and wrapped the curtains around the drums, you can now insert a 5/16’’ Allen wrench into the exposed drive. If you’d like to increase tension, turn the wrench in an anti-clockwise direction.
Remember, if the garage door needs more tension, you need to pull it about six inches down. On the other hand, if you want to reduce tension, turn the wrench in a clockwise direction in small increments. If you’re using an electric drill to adjust your roll up garage door, always set it at low speed.
Also, you need to check the tension before you go to ensure that you’ve not over-tightened or under-tightened the spring. After you’ve verified that the garage door has enough tension, you want to keep the springs lubricated with lithium-based grease in order to maintain efficiency and prevent rust.
It’s also important to note that lubricating these springs will keep them free of dirt for a very long time; hence they’ll keep working better.
Adjusting the Side-Mounted Springs
Step 1
Before you start your work on the side-mounted springs, you need to release the tension. You can do this by opening your roll up garage door until it hits the stop bolt and can’t open any wider. On the other hand, if your garage door is automatic, you can always unplug the opener and shift the door into manual mode before you start opening the roll up door.
Use a c-clamp or vice grip below your garage door’s bottom roller. This will hold your roll up garage door until complete the adjustments.
Step 2
You need to attach the spring to the track hangar using a large that keeps everything in place. At the point when you no longer have tension on the side-mounted spring, you should be able to remove it safely. Remember, moving it upward will increase the tension, while moving it down will reduce the tension.
Step 3
The next step is to adjust one hole at a time and ensure that you adjust both side-mounted springs equally. If your roll up garage door isn’t closing fully, you can fix this by moving the spring down one hole on the hangar. On the other hand, if your roll up garage door is opening and closing quickly, you can fix this problem by moving the hook to a higher-up hole.
Additionally, if your garage door is crooked, ensure that you only adjust the side having problems. For example, you move the side-mounted spring down one hole to close the gap. Eventually, once everything is in the right place, you can now put the nut back on the spring hook and tighten it all over again.
Step 4
For this step, you need to unclamp your roll up garage door and test multiple positions. If the problem has been fixed, the door will be able to hold its weight. If this is not the case, you need to keep increasing or decreasing the tension until your garage door is functioning properly.
Step 5
For this step, you need to start making some minor adjustments, especially if you’re close to balancing your garage door. Since the cable inside the spring will be connected to the hook or track, you can always adjust it by tightening or loosening the knot or clamp until your find the best balance possible.
However, if you have an S-hook, all you need to do is to move the hook either lower or higher on the track. You can also shorten the cable in case you need to increase tension. On the other hand, you can increase the length if you need to reduce the tension.
Step 6
At this point, test the door again. If you find a great balance for the door, you don’t need to make any further adjustments. But, if the roll up garage door isn’t balanced yet, keep making more adjustments until it is in equilibrium.
Adjusting the Torsion Springs
Step 1
Start by closing the garage door. If you have an automatic garage door, you can always unplug the opener. Before you start adjusting the torsion springs, there are some things you need to prepare.
For example, you should have sufficient lighting inside the garage, you need to assemble all your working tools inside the garage, and you should also have an alternative way out in case something should happen inside.
Step 2
Using a C-clamp or a pair of locking pliers, secure your roll up garage door just above the bottom roller. This is meant to prevent your garage door from popping open once you start adjusting the torsion springs.
Step 3
For this step, you need to locate the winding cone. You can always use your eyes to follow the torsion spring out to where it ends. At the far end, you’ll find a winding cone which is keeping the spring in place. These winding cones usually have four holes that are evenly spread around them. There is also an additional set of screws used to lock the torsion spring in place on the center shaft.
Therefore, in order to alter the tension on the torsion spring, you need to adjust the winding cone by simply inserting the winding bars into the holes and rotating the winding cone in one direction or another.
Step 4
At this point, insert the winding cone into the bottom hole on the winding collar and then hold it in place with the bar until the set screws are loosened. Ensure that you check the shaft to identify any depressed or flattened areas where the set of screws are meant to be set.
If there are any depressed areas, you need to ensure that you replace the set of screws in these flats when you’re finished with adjusting the torsion springs in order for them to hold more securely.
Step 5
Now insert the bars into the successive holes in the cone. It is very important that you position yourself strategically so that your head and body won’t be in the way in the event that the torsion spring breaks. While working on the adjustments, you should always be ready to move out of the way quickly.
Step 6
If your roll up garage door is opening and closing too quickly, you need to increase the tension. You can do this by winding the cone in the same direction as your garage door goes through the pulley. On the other hand, if you’re finding it difficult to open or close your roll up garage door, you need to reduce the tension by winding the cone in the opposite direction.
Unless you know for sure the exact amount of adjustments you need to make, it’s best to work in ¼ turns until you achieve the best tension possible.
Step 7
By keeping the bottom-most winding bar in place, you need to remove the second bar. You also need to measure about ¼ inches from one end of the winding cone and then mark it using a piece of masking tape or marker.
With the winding bar still in the bottom hole, pull toward the ceiling on the bar and in the direction of the center plate. Do this until you stretch the spring just enough to meet the mark you made on the shaft.
Step 8
Once the torsion springs are all stretched, it’s time to tighten the set of screws. If there were any screws on the shaft, ensure that you replace them with their flats.
Step 9
Repeat step 8 on the other side to ensure balance.
Step 10
Now remove the pair of pliers or clamps you’ve used to secure your garage door and test it to ensure that it has been adjusted properly. If not, ensure that you repeat steps 4 to 10 until you reach the right amount of tension. Once you’re done with adjustments, you can now plug back the opener if you have an automatic garage door.
The Most Common Roll Up Garage Door Problems and How You Can Fix Them
Loss of Power
One of the most common problems that face roll up garage doors is loss of power. Since your roll up door is powered by your home’s electrical system, when there is no power supply, you won’t be able to open or close the roll up door.
The only remedy to this problem is to have a backup power supply for your roll up door. This will provide battery power to your automatic roll up door, making it easier for you to close or open the door regardless of loss of power outage.
Presence of Obstructions
Another common problem facing roll up doors is the presence of obstructions inside the track. These obstructions include physical objects such as brooms and shovels or even particles of dust and dirt. The best way to fix such a problem is by identifying the object or even the particles causing the obstruction and then removing them.
Worn-Out or Broken Parts of the Roll Up Door
With time, components of your roll up door will begin to wear out or even break, which will make it very hard to open or close your roll up garage door. To fix such a problem, you’ll need to get some of these components repaired or replaced. Bearings and torsions springs are some of the roll up door components that are likely to wear out easily.
The Components of Your Roll Up Door Are Misaligned
Another common problem you need to look out for with your roll up door is that of misaligned components. When hoods, tracks, or fascias are misaligned, they will make your roll up garage door scrape against guides. This problem affects both the performance of your roll up garage door and its aesthetics.
A Faulty Motor
If you realize that the motor has started making some unusual sounds and struggles to move your roll up door along its tracks, it might be because it is faulty or simply out-of-sync with the door. You might need to contact a service tech to look into the motor or simply replace it with a new one.
The Spring Tension Is Too High
Sometimes you might find that the spring is over-tensioned more than the manufacturer recommends. This makes the roll up door much harder to control, and in some cases, the spring could end breaking. The best way to fix this problem is by reducing the spring tension.
Adjusting your roll up garage door from time to time is a very important part of its maintenance. This is because it allows you to troubleshoot other minor issues before they turn into expensive repairs. By doing so, you’ll be to increase the overall lifespan of your roll up garage door.