Just like a car needs maintenance, a garage door does too.  You know when something doesn’t sound right or feel right with your car, but do you know when that’s the case with your garage door?  If you want to get the most life out of your garage door and make sure it’s operating safely then you definitely need to read the article below.  It describes what to look and listen for to determine if your door needs service.  There are things you can repair on your own and others that you can call us for.  Continue reading and then go check you garage door.

Caring for Your Garage Doors

Contributed by Rick Menard of Keene Door LLC Oct 12, 2017

Putting off projects like servicing your furnace, fixing your broken garage door or opener and swapping your summer tires for snow tires will usually come back to cost you more in the long run. Losing heat on a frigid morning, having to leave your car outside during a blizzard, or slipping off the road during the first snow storm all can be avoided with a little planning.

Procrastination only benefits businesses, as emergency calls are much more expensive than routine maintenance.

When it comes to where you park your car, there are a few simple things you can do to keep your garage doors and openers running smoothly. The first thing you should do is run your door up and down and look and listen for problems that are obvious. Does the door come down and land level? Are there sounds of metal rubbing against metal as the door moves?

Lack of lubrication is the biggest cause of mechanical breakdowns. Using a good garage door lubricant, spray all of your rollers, pulleys, hinges, tracks and springs. Also spray the rail on your opener. Move your car outside while you do this and wear eye protection as you spray overhead to avoid getting any lubricant in your eyes.

Secondly, look for any loose or missing nuts and bolts and tighten or replace them. How does the weather seal look? Bottom seal worn? Now would be a good time to replace those to save energy. Speaking of bottom seal, clean and apply a cooking spray to reduce the chance of your door freezing to the ground.

More than 70 percent of us now use our garage as the main entrance into our homes. Now is the time to make sure that your opener is prepared for the weather heading our way. Sometimes the simplest things are the ones we ignore the most.

Does your light go on when you open your door? If not, replace the bulb. When was the last time you changed the battery in your remotes? Does your entry keypad still work? Are you keeping the trash containers, rakes and shovels away from the photo eyes at the bottom of your tracks?

How do you know when it is time to call in a professional? When it comes to safety, a trained garage door technician can adjust springs, replace pulleys and cables, remove hinges, etc. Garage doors are under a tremendous amount of tension and if improperly handled can cause severe injury or death.

Are the bearings in the rollers or pulleys worn out? Springs showing separation from age? If so, they should be replaced by an installer who knows how to repair these safely.

Do you have safety cables inside of the extension springs in the event the springs break? These safety cables will keep the springs from flying all over the place, possibly hitting someone walking by or denting that new car or motorcycle parked inside of the garage.

Winter is fast approaching. Before you are one of the unlucky callers who end up with a car stuck inside of your garage just as you are leaving on an important trip, service your garage doors and openers early.

Put the money you saved on an emergency repair bill toward something more fun.

Source: http://www.sentinelsource.com/home_and_hearth/caring-for-your-garage-doors/article_9c46fce2-af5e-11e7-ab52-dfc8f3f2ef24.html