Fixing and Maintaining Garage Doors

Garage doors normally open and close more than a dozen times every day. Routine maintenance is needed for continued proper functioning. Here's a Checklist for garage door maintenance and simple repairs every handy homeowner can perform without difficulty.

These procedures are recommended 3 or 4 times every year:

Wash the surface of the door with a stiff brush and mild detergent. Repaint or touch up peeling, chipped or cracked paint, especially when there is exposed wood.

Make use of a vinyl cleaner on weather stripping around the bottom and frame. Lubricate with a silicone product to help keep stripping flexible.

Inspect rollers for damage. New rollers may be purchased from garage door dealers or at do it yourself centers. Broken or worn rollers are easy to remove. First, use a socket wrench to loosen the bolts holding the roller hinge set up and remove damaged rollers. Insert replacement rollers and fasten hinge bolts.

Check door tracks with an even to make certain they're aligned. Or even, simply loosen, but don't remove, the bolts/screws that hold the track to the wall and adjust the track. Recheck alignment with the level. Once the track is straight, refasten the bolts/screws. How to tune up garage doors

Check mounting brackets that hold the tracks to the walls. If they're loose, tighten the bolts/screws. With the door closed, check in the garage to see if you can find dents, flat spots or crimping in the tracks. These can be pounded out with a plastic mallet, or hammer and block of wood; avoid utilizing a metal hammer that could easily cause further damage. Badly damaged tracks must be replaced with a professional garage door installer.

Check for loose hardware and tighten where needed. Check swing-up doors for loose screws on plates where in actuality the spring is mounted. Check roll-up doors for loose screws on hinges that hold chapters of the door together.  Sagging of the door on one side may be corrected by securing hinges with new screws; filling enlarged holes with wood filler and longer screws where necessary.

Check springs and adjust tension on swing-up doors by moving the spring hook to another location hole. Tension on roll-up door springs which have a pulley may be adjusted by pulling the cable through the plate at the the top of door. Re-knot by the end to keep tension.

Caution: A roll-up door that's just one torsion spring at the biggest market of the door cannot be repaired by the typical homeowner. The strain on the spring is very good enough to cause serious injury. Doors with this sort spring must be repaired with a professional garage repairman.

Make use of a heavy-duty, concentrated household cleaner to get rid of grease and dirt from tracks and rollers; dry thoroughly.

Lubricate all moving parts with 10W30 motor oil. Apply oil to a rag and lubricate tracks paying special awareness of sections that curve. Next utilize the oily rag to lubricate the springs.  Wipe excess oil off springs with a clean rag.

Routine maintenance and simple garage door repairs are within the realm of the handy homeowner. Major repairs and installations are performed best by trained and experienced professionals.