garage door spring repair

A lot is riding on your garage door springs. Not only do they hold the heavy weight of your door, but more importantly, they protect your loved ones from serious injury or bodily harm. Garage doors can break, snap, or twist, and often are just worn out and go unnoticed. Here’s how most springs operate and how to prevent them from causing your door to crash down.

Kinds of Garage Door Springs

Every modern-day garage door needs to use springs, whether they are heavy-duty metal doors for commercial use or wooden carriage doors for old-style homes. Most doors use either extension or torsion springs, depending on the height of the door. Here’s the difference between the two. 

Torsion Springs

Torsion springs are found at the ends of garage doors. They twist around lengthwise and remain stationary at one end while moving around an axis. The other end of the spring that is attached to the garage door itself is usually the part that breaks when someone needs them replaced. 

Torsion springs are made of heavy-duty material because they must lift the entire weight of your door as it opens and closes. Torsion springs also give a counterbalancing effect that will prevent it from stopping or going in the opposite direction. A heavy garage door that is off its springs and unbalanced would require a lot of force to open even if it doesn’t cause any damage or injury, so torsion springs are important.

Extension Springs

Extension springs, as their name suggests, extend upwards towards the door itself to lift it. Extension springs run along tracks above your garage door and utilize a pulley system to hoist the weight of the door. Extension springs contract and release in a vertical direction in order to lift the weight of the whole door and keep it on track and in place.

Why Did My Garage Door Springs Break?

When the garage door springs break for most homeowners, it’s usually due to them being old, worn out and simply fatigued. Owners sometimes don’t take into consideration how their garage door springs can wear down, much like components on a car, and this often leads to unexpected problems with doors. 

Wear and tear and break down of garage door springs usually takes several years, but it can happen in only a few months with doors that are heavily used – especially in commercial settings.

Two telltale signs that your garage door springs could malfunction, snap or break soon is that they make grinding noises or the door doesn’t open and close the way it used to or should. If you notice your door having a hard time closing, making strange noises, or especially if you see your springs are worn, it is definitely time for a replacement.

Should You DIY Or Call the Pros?

If you have an accident with your garage door, hear grinding noises, or it doesn’t close as it should, it could very well be a sign of springs that are about to give out. But this isn’t always the case. Garage door systems use an intricate system that is made up of many components, not just springs. Fixing this yourself could lead to significant injury or property damage.

You can save time, money, and possible injury by calling a trusted garage door repair technician. You can rest assured that the expert techs here at Garage Door in My Area are licensed and experienced in all things garage door repair, including springs, of course. For a risk-free quote, don’t hesitate to call us today!