Garage doors are an everyday necessity that we take for granted until they eventually break down. One way to ensure that a breakdown never actually happens is to brush up on some of the warning signs of a garage door that’s in need of maintenance or repair. Here are some professional tips on preventing a garage door breakdown in your future.
Three Signs that your Garage Door Needs Repair
- Unwarranted Noise: Garage doors can sometimes get noisy when opening or closing, that’s normal. But overly excessive noise which is out of place with normal operation is a sure sign that there may be something wrong. Unwarranted creaking sounds or out of the ordinary straining mechanism noises is a tell-tale sign that there could be a problem with your door opener, its brackets, or the door springs. This would be the time to call a professional and schedule a preventive maintenance inspection in order to catch a needed repair before a full breakdown happens.
- Sagging Door Sections: This can be a warning sign that you might have a problem with your tension spring. To test for this, you must first make sure that your garage door is already fully closed, turn off your automatic garage door opener, and then carefully open up the garage door only half-way-up while holding it – Let go and watch out for your feet, just in case – if the door holds in place, it’s most likely not your tension spring. Now if the door slides up or down after letting go, then once again it is time to call a professional garage door repair service.
- Door is Stuck Open or Closed: This problem is of course, what most people are trying to avoid in the first place – A full breakdown. The trouble is, at this point there can be many different reasons why your door won’t mechanically or electronically open or close. This can be as simple as dead or faulty batteries or loose connections. Or, it can be a major costly repair such as a new automatic garage door opener or a broken spring. This is why we strongly recommend that owners set up an ongoing scheduled maintenance and repair plan through an established, well referenced, local contractor.
Three Most Common Garage Door Issues
- Remote Control Doesn’t Work: Your garage door remote control is a very handy little device – Unless it stops working! The remote sends a beam of infrared light to the opener sensor which triggers the switch. To troubleshoot the problem, number one, check to make sure nothing is blocking the door opener sensor. Second, check the batteries and their contacts. Third, clean the “eyes” on both the remote and the opener sensor. Lastly, reset both your remote and the receiving unit by removing their power source for 30 seconds. (Remove batteries and unplug receiver). If your remote still does not work, your only option is to replace it.
- Unreliability: There is practically nothing more frustrating than having an automatic garage door that starts to open or close, but then stops and retracts back instead. This is not only irritating when trying to leave to or return from work, it can be potentially dangerous as well. This is a warning sign of a frayed or sticking cable, or a warped or lose track. Once again, this would be the best time to call a licensed and bonded garage door technician.
- Continuous Repairs and Breakdowns: This is going to be an ongoing problem with older garage doors, no matter what. Time wears away at everything on earth eventually, and your garage door is certainly no exception. Older doors become hard to find parts for and even the most expensive and well-made garage doors have their own manufacturer’s lifetime expectancy and limited warranties. That’s why we suggest installing a new garage door to replace the old slowly deteriorating one; it’s a much more cost effective choice in the long-run than constantly paying for ongoing repairs.
Three Ways to Extend the Life of your Garage Door
As we have stated above, garage doors have lifespans just like everything else. Lack of proper regular maintenance and repair drastically shortens its lifespan.
Below are three easy ways to extend the life of a garage door:
- Manage Your Use: This is one of the simple ways to help extend the life of your garage door. Because of the doors weight, and the incredible tension on springs and track frames every single time the garage door is opened, everyday use adds significantly to wear and tear. If you can safely park in your driveway on a nice day, do so rather than park inside.
- Lubricate the Springs: Make sure the garage door springs are properly lubricated at all times, but also make sure that the lubricant used is specially designed for garage doors. If you’re not sure of the proper lubricant to use, or can’t find it easily, contact a local garage door maintenance and repair contractor.
- Keep Your Door Clean and Well Maintained: This is something that you can do which doesn’t absolutely require a contracting service. Wind pushes dirt and debris into the smallest crevices and works its way into important working garage door mechanisms and electronics. Make sure that if you use a pressure washer to clean the outside of your garage door that you use the lower setting so as not to accidentally cause damage.
Throughout this article we have stressed the need to employ a licensed and bonded established specialist in which to help you properly maintain your garage door. Standard maintenance contractors that are not garage door specialists tend to cause more damage than they are worth, tinkering around with complicated and potentially dangerous garage doors. This is one of the main reasons that we recommend certified professionals. Garage door “Tune-Ups” are an annual necessity in keeping your door safely working on a daily basis. A good rule of thumb for scheduling an assessment and some general maintenance is yearly at minimum. The summer’s heat can adversely affect sensors and opener wiring. Winter and its cold weather, ice and snow, destroys proper spring lubrication. Prolonged neglect of these seasonal issues adds up quickly, year after year, multiplying the chances of a garage door breakdown. By following the simple tips that we listed above, a breakdown becomes far less likely to ever happen.
Get in touch with New York Gates today at 718-614-0616, they’re the top professional gate and garage door manufacturers, installers, and repair specialists in the five boroughs. E-mail them at info@nygates.com with your project specifics and NYG will reply back to you with the detailed answers to your questions.
