Garage Door Maintenance Alpharetta GA<\/p>\n
The advent of automatic garage doors has made having to get out of the car to open the door a thing of the distant and almost forgotten past, but to keep the door working properly routine maintenance is necessary. While most do-it-yourselfers are capable of taking care of normal maintenance, a service professional should be called if major repairs are needed. As a word of caution, in order to avoid possible injury and damage to the door, let everyone in the house know you will be preforming maintenance on the garage door, so no one will try to open it while you are working on it.
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Perform a monthly inspection. While standing inside the garage with the door closed inspect the garage-door springs, pulleys, cables, rollers, hinges and all mounting hardware for any signs of wear or damage. Make note of frayed cables, bent springs or damaged tracks. Open and close the door and make note of anything that doesn\u2019t sound or look right as the door moves along the tracks.<\/p>\n
Perform a monthly balance test by closing the door and disconnecting the automatic opener. Lift the door by hand to check that the door opens smoothly, without much resistance, and remains in place when fully open. If the door is difficult to open, or doesn\u2019t remain open, the door might be out of balance. In this case the door should be serviced by a qualified service technician.<\/p>\n
Perform a monthly test of the reversing mechanism. Under federal law, all garage doors with automatic openers made after January 1, 1993 are required to have some type of mechanism that will automatically stop and reverse the direction of the door to prevent injury or entrapment. With the door in the fully-open position, place a piece of wood or brick on the floor in line with the door tracks. Push the button on the door opener to close the door. When the door makes contact with the object the door should reverse direction automatically; if the door doesn\u2019t reverse automatically it should be serviced by a technician.<\/p>\n
Perform a monthly test of the photo-eye sensor. The 1993 law also requires automatic door openers to have a photo eye or edge sensor that will also reverse the direction of the door. With the door in the fully-open position activate the door\u2019s transmitter and wave a broom in front of the door sensor to break the beam. If the door doesn\u2019t reverse direction pull the broomstick out from under the door. After the door closes, gently clean the sensor\u2019s eyes with window cleaner and a soft cloth. Don\u2019t use paper towels as the paper is abrasive and can scratch the lens on the sensors. While the door is still closed, carefully check and adjust the sensors by hand if needed. Try the broomstick test again and if the door still fails to reverse have the sensor checked by a Garage Door Maintenance Alpharetta GA technician.<\/p>\n
Perform a monthly force-setting test. With the door in the fully-open position, activate the garage-door transmitter. With the door traveling downward hold your arm outstretched with your palms facing upward. Allow the bottom of the door to make contact with your palms while attempting to push the door back up with both hands. If the door doesn\u2019t reverse, but continues to close, immediately pull your hands out of the way. This indicates excessive closing force and the door opener should be serviced by a technician.
\nAll garage doors should be lubricated semiannual by applying a small amount of grease-based lubricant to the door rollers, tracks and hinges.<\/p>\n