Best Gilbert Garage Door Repair Service

More About Garage Door Repair, Maintenance and Spring Replacement

Your garage door runs up and down with a coordinated mechanical mixture of pulleys, sensors, motors and springs, all operating in harmony with each other. Just like the car in your garage, the door and opening mechanisms are mechanical, requiring occasional repairs and timely maintenance for safe and reliable operation. These services are offered by most nearby garage door repair companies but below are some awesome tips for our do-it-yourself customers.

Garage Door Repair And Maintenance Tips

First and foremost: Protect yourself by unplugging the opener from its power outlet before you begin any garage door repair or maintenance tasks. You don’t want your fingers getting pinched by a door in motion if a household member clicks their garage door opener.

Lubricate Moving Parts:

The life span of your garage door can be maximized by regularly lubricating the moving parts. While many garage door service companies in Gilbert can help you with this, it’s pretty easy to do and requires just 10 minuets once a year.

Lubricate the following parts annually:

• All hinges
• Springs
• Armbar (at the top of the door in the center)
• Roller bearings (nylon rollers don’t require lubrication because they have sealed bearings)
• Chain or screw drive on opener
• Locking mechanism and key hole (if included)
• Bearing plates

Don’t use the wrong lubricant! A lot of the traditional lubricants are prone to getting sludgy as dirt and dust clings to them. For better long term performance try either of these lubricants:

• Blaster Garage Door Lubricant
• WD-40 Specialist Protective White Lithium Grease Spray

Garage Door Spring Replacement and Repair:

Contrary to popular belief, it is the garage door springs that do most of the heavy lifting, not the garage door opener.

When your garage door opener is activated the springs release their coiled up energy to raise the door. Without the springs, the garage door opener would have a difficult time lifting the door.

The following symptoms confirm that a garage door spring repair is needed:

• Garage door stops after going up a few inches
• A visual break in the spring above the door
• The upper panel of your garage door is bent
• Your garage door falls rapidly when shutting
• Your garage door is slanted as it moves up and down

Attention! Doing your own garage door spring replacement presents the risk of serious bodily injury or death. These springs store a tremendous amount of coiled up energy and should not be worked on by inexperienced people. Most nearby garage door repair companies offer same day garage door spring repair services.

Tighten Loose Hardware:

It’s probable that many of the nuts and bolts have become loose since your initial garage door installation. This is normal after years of vibrations from the lifting and lowering motor.

This is how you can permanently keep things tight and avoid other repairs:

• The motor mounting assembly, roller brackets, tracks and hinges should all be tightened down again with a wrench.
• As you’re checking and tightening these nuts and bolts, put a thread locking adhesive on them. Loctite® is what’s commonly used to eliminate loosening caused by vibrations.

Replace Garage Door Rollers:

All rollers have a different life span depending on their material and overall quality.

• Plastic rollers: Lasting around 2 years, these are the low-end option.
• Steel rollers not using ball bearings: These tend to last around 3 years but they are much nosier than plastic rollers.
• Steel rollers that use ball bearings: Good for 10 to 15 years but they need routine lubrication.
• Nylon rollers: With sealed ball bearings there is no need to lubricate them ever. They are the quietest of all the roller types and are good for 15 to 20 years.

Your garage door rollers may show signs of fatigue later or sooner depending on the number of cycles per year. This makes a visual inspection necessary to confirm their actual condition. Lopsided rollers, cracks and flat spot on the rollers are all strong indications that your rollers are wearing out.

You’ll need a socket wrench to replace these as follows:

• Loosen the hinge and take it off the door.
• Strip the stem and roller out of the hinge and put a new one in.
• Refasten the hinge to the garage door and roll-on to the next one.

Warning: On some garage doors it’s hard to see, but the bottom roller bracket on each side is where the lifting cables are attached. If these rollers need to be replaced it best to call a garage door repair company because the cables are under extreme tension. Do not remove the bottom brackets!

Replace Weather Stripping:

The weather stripping on the bottom of your garage door helps keep water, bugs, snakes and such from getting into your garage.

It’s also a barrier that prolongs the need for a garage door replacement. It separates the bottom of the door from moisture on the ground, protecting wooden doors from rotting and metal doors from rusting.

New garage door weather stripping can be purchased at most nearby hardware stores. It’s a fairly simple repair, just follow the manufacture’s directions. This repair is easier still with 2 people.

Most nearby garage door companies in Gilbert, AZ provide this service if you’re not comfortable making this repair.