Even 007 would have to troubleshoot the keypad if the garage door to MI6 won’t open

Thirty years ago, a keypad at the door was something you expected to see a secret agent use when entering their inner sanctum. Now, when entering your North Chicago garage, you use that keypad with hardly a thought. It’s second nature.

The day may come, however, when you’ll enter your secret code into the keypad, push the button to raise the door, and nothing will happen.

After a pause while you wait for your North Chicago garage door to do its thing, you suddenly realize it’s not responding. So you enter your passcode again, press the button, again, and wait, again. And, again, nothing happens.

How many times will you enter your passcode into your garage door keypad before you accept the reality that it’s not working and not going to work? That probably depends on the individual. Some will stubbornly try half a dozen times. Others, after three or four tries, will accept reality.

Accepting reality, however, doesn’t mean regressing back to the Dark Ages before keypads (or when keypads were used to keep people out of top-secret facilities). It means that the keypad needs to be fixed so that it will work again. That means troubleshooting to figure out what the problem is.

Troubleshooting goes beyond trying your passcode again and again. It includes the following steps:

• Replace the battery in the keypad. This is the first place to start and the easiest solution. Put a new battery in and give it a try. If that works, easy-peasy.
• Check the wiring inside the keypad. Are all the wires connected? Are they in good condition? If not, a fairly simple repair should have your keypad back in working order before you know it.
• Clean the keypad. Blow some compressed air inside the keypad. Consider cleaning the connections where the wires are secured. Wipe down the numbers on the keypad.
• Reset the PIN number on your keypad (if you punched your numbers in too many times, the garage door may have stopped working because you’ve done so too often).
• Reboot your garage door opener. This is a bit like starting over. You’re giving yourself a clean slate.

If none of these solutions have worked, it’s possible that you need a new keypad. If you can handle the installation yourself, you can pick up a new keypad at a box store. However, if you want a better quality keypad, you may want to go to a garage door supplier or bring in a garage door technician. 

That garage door technician can also help with troubleshooting, if you need their assistance. In any case, you’ll have that James Bond confidence back again the next time you use your keypad to open your North Chicago garage door.