Garage door questions, answered

Yes, $89, and we say it on the phone before you agree to anything. It covers the visit, the diagnosis, the balance test and the safety reverse test, whether or not you go ahead with a repair. A free call-out is never free; it just gets filed somewhere else on the bill.

Almost never. Six inches and stop is usually one of two things, and neither is a dead opener. Either the up-travel limit is set wrong, so the opener believes the door is open, or the door is binding in the first few inches and the opener is reversing off the resistance. That is the safety system doing its job. We tell the two apart with the opener disconnected and the door checked by hand, so please don’t turn the force up to push through it.

That is nearly always the photo-eyes near the floor. Something is in the beam, one has been knocked out of line, a lens is dirty, or low sun is shining straight into one. Wipe both lenses and check each one points at the other. What we never do is disconnect the eyes to make the door close.

That is range, and it is usually the antenna wire hanging from the opener (it should hang straight down, not be tied up) or radio noise from a cheap LED bulb in the opener. On most units a weak receiver is a part, not a new opener.

No. It’s the one thing we are rigid about. A torsion spring holds the whole weight of the door as wound steel, and winding it takes proper winding bars. Screwdrivers and rebar slip, and when one slips the cone unwinds through whatever is in front of it. We would rather drive out, and if we can’t get to you soon enough, we’ll say so.

A torsion spring is rated in cycles, and one cycle is one open and one close. A standard spring is around 10,000 cycles; a high-cycle spring is 25,000 or more. A household that uses the door four times a day runs about 1,500 cycles a year, so that is roughly seven years against sixteen. We fit high-cycle by default, and a standard spring if you ask. The rating goes on your ticket either way.

Torsion springs sit on a shaft above the opening and wind up as the door comes down. Extension springs run along the tracks on each side and stretch. Extension springs are still common on older, lighter doors, and they must have a safety cable run through the middle, so a spring that breaks stays threaded on the wire instead of flying across the garage.

On a standard home door with the spring on the truck, about forty-five minutes to an hour, including balancing the door and running both safety tests. What adds time is a cable or drum damaged when the spring let go, which is why we look at both before we price the job.

Only if the spring above the door is whole. Lay a flat 1½-inch board under the middle of the opening (a roll of paper towels on its side is close enough) and close the door with the opener. The moment it touches, it must stop and go back up. Then start it closing and wave a broom handle through the beam near the floor; it must reverse for that too. Do both once a month. If either fails, stop using the opener and call.

Usually not. The noise almost always comes from worn steel rollers, hinges worn at the pin, and a loose chain. Ten nylon rollers and a set of hinges quiet most doors for a fraction of the cost of anything else. A single bang or a crack is different: that is a spring, a cable or a section, and worth a look.

Stop using the door, keep clear of it, and leave it where it is. A cable has almost certainly come off its drum. Don’t run the opener to try to straighten it; that usually pulls the other cable off too. It needs the door clamped and supported and both cables set to the same mark.

Sometimes. If the garage is attached, has a room above it, or doubles as a workshop or gym, an insulated door makes a real difference in August. It is also stiffer and quieter. If the garage is detached with gaps under the eaves, you would be paying to insulate the outdoors, and we’ll tell you so.

Yes: rolling steel, sectional dock doors and jackshaft operators. Those doors cycle dozens of times a day, so the sensible approach is a service schedule rather than a phone call at eight on a Monday.