No, you shouldn’t use the old garage door tracks with your new garage door

It's about time to replace this garage door.
It would be a mistake to use the same
tracks with the new garage door.

You may think you’ll save some time and money by using your old garage door tracks when you install a new garage door but don’t do it. It’s not a good idea.

Garage door tracks are designed to fit the garage door they come with. They are not universal.

You may think that one set of garage door tracks is the same as another. This is because, from a casual perspective, they look the same. The differences are subtle but important. In fact, the differences could make installing a new garage door with old garage door tracks dangerous.

It’s a matter of adjustments and crucial dimensions. The spacing between the tracks matters and won’t necessarily be the same that is required with your new garage door. The spacing is also crucial in terms of the offset between the tracks and the garage door jambs.

If these dimensions are not precise, the door may get hung up as it travels up or down. The door could come off the tracks and fall on your car, or even on you.

Garage door installation requires a qualified technician to ensure that everything is set according to specifications. Garage doors weigh more than you might think. The springs required to reduce the strain of that weight on you or a garage door opener are significant. The springs are loaded to a degree that they could seriously maim or kill someone if they come loose.

There are some projects around the house that qualify as DIYers. Installing, repairing or maintaining a garage door is not one of them.

All those moving parts – care for your garage door to keep it working longer

It’s a door. What’s the big deal? Actually, a garage door is made up of multiple moving parts. Anything mechanical can break and the same holds true with a garage door. The way to avoid problems with your Richmond garage door is to maintain it properly.

Consider that a garage door and garage door opener generally include the following parts.

• Four door panels – some can have windows and they are generally made of wood, steel, aluminum, vinyl, and other materials
• 12 or more hinges
• 10 rollers with 10-ball bearings
• Horizontal and Vertical tracks with 90-degree radius sections between them
• Brackets to mount the tracks and other parts
• Safety photo eyes
• A torsion spring
• Winding cones
• A shaft that runs through the torsion spring
• Cable drums on either end of the shaft through the torsion spring 
• Extension springs
• Pulleys/Sheaves
• Cable
• Locks and Handles
• Rail components
• Quick disconnect door arm
• A garage door opener
• Garage door bottom fixtures
• Weatherstripping

All the parts above that are in bold are moving parts. The door at the front of your house probably has three hinges, which, essentially, accounts for all of its moving parts. A garage door includes at least 30 or more moving parts.

Moving parts wear. Over time, they can break. The enemies of moving parts are friction, heat, and rust. The defenders of moving parts are oil and grease placed, in proper quantities, in the right spots, and in the appropriate frequency.

Grease and oil can reduce friction and heat and ward off rust. When your garage door was installed, it had appropriate applications of oil and grease. But, over time, the oil, and grease wears away and breaks down losing their lubricating capacity.

You’d be surprised how many garage doors have never had reapplications of grease and oil. The same garages were probably never checked or adjusted to ensure they operate properly. These are the first garage doors to break down. The lesson is clear – care for your garage

Broken garage door spring is a repair for a professional

Garage door spring replacement is not for the faint of heart or for the amateur

When the spring of your garage door breaks, you've got a problem and it's a problem that can get worse. The garage door spring is an essential part of your garage door and garage door opener. Most garage doors weigh in at between 150 and 250 pounds. The garage door spring takes the weight off so you, or your garage door opener, can easily open the garage door.

But, if the spring breaks, all that weight is on you. Or, all that weight is on your garage door opener. If it's on you, better eat your Wheaties before you go to open the garage door. If you're relying on your garage door opener to open the garage, without the assistance of that spring, all that weight is bearing down on the mechanisms of the garage door opener and outcome is bleak.

Parts will break. Garage door opener motors will quickly expire. It's not a pretty picture. In fact, you're better off disconnecting the garage door opener and opening the garage door by hand until the broken spring is replaced. And, considering the weight of the garage door, if you don't have the garage door spring to help, well, you've got a workout opening the door and you need to be careful when it comes flying back down.

You can get hurt trying to catch the garage door as it plummets downward. But, you can also get hurt if you try to replace the garage door spring yourself.

Replacing a garage door spring can be fatal

That's not an exaggeration. A garage door spring can take a finger off. It can take your arm off. It can take your head off. That's how much tension there is on a garage door spring.

Even if you are handy around the house, this is not the job for you. The process of installing a garage door spring has to be done correctly. And, if someone gets the doo together, if the spring isn't installed correctly, the garage door can still cause serious injury or death.

Fortunately, garage door repair technicians know the proper way to install a garage door spring. They can do the job efficiently and without injury to themselves or to you.

Why is the garage door opener in your Island Lake garage beeping, squeaking or making a racket?

If your Island Lake garage door opener is making noise,
you may want to have a professional check it out.

Garage doors are seldom absolutely quiet, as it went up and down, but you may notice that your Island Lake garage door is making more noise than it used to make. The garage door opener may beep. The garage door, itself, may make more noise while going up and down. Why is this? Should you be worried? Should you do anything at all?

Beeping: If your garage door opener is beeping, depending on what brand of garage door opener you have, it can mean several things, such as:

1. The garage door opener has a battery backup and, if it beeps every 2 seconds, the garage door opener is operating on battery power. If it beeps every 30 seconds and has a flashing orange LED light, it means the battery is low and requires replacement. 
2. Your garage door has Wi-Fi, in which case a single beep means it’s going into Wi-Fi mode while a single continuous beep means that the unit is trying to connect to the router. Two beeps mean it's trying to connect to the server, three slow beeps mean the garage door opener is connecting to the network and three fast beeps are confirmation that you’ve erased the opener from Wi-Fi. Ultimately, you should ask your garage door technician and/or check your Owners Manual.

Squeaking: With a garage door that squeaks as it goes up and down, the problem is usually insufficient lubrication. The sound isn’t the only problem. If it’s squeaking, it means the door is putting more drag on the opener and parts of the garage door. Things will wear out faster.

Grinding: This is a metal-to-metal sound that could indicate a problem with the chain or belt drive. They may require adjustment or replacement. Once again, you should take care of this problem before it spreads and causes other problems.

Clinking: If you hear a clinking as the door is raised or lowered, this often indicates that you have a problem with your springs. It could also be a problem with the rollers.

Whatever the noise, you shouldn’t ignore the problem. Your Island Lake garage door is trying to tell you something and you should have the problem looked at before it gets worse. However, you don’t have to wait for your garage door to make noise. Bring in a qualified garage door technician for annual maintenance and you may never hear your garage door, or garage door opener, making unwanted beeps, squeaks or a racket.

It’s not too late to turn your garage into a Haunted Garage

Tomorrow is Halloween and, if you’re like most people, you’ve put some spooky decorations out in the front yard and you’ve got a bowl of candy by the front door. Some folks, however, have found a way to add some extra scary to the occasion while getting into the spirit of the event. Some folks have turned their garage into a small haunted house and Trick-or-Treat station.

Instead of waiting for the doorbell to ring, they’re out in the garage, the garage door wide open, participating with the Trick or Treaters as they come by for treats.

The garage is rich in potential when you’re preparing for the arrival of little ghouls, princesses and any of a number of super heroes. And, the great thing is that it’s so easy to convert your garage for the ghostly season that you can easily do so if you start now.

You can start by taking a broom out to the garage and cleaning a little – but not too much. Ghosts and goblins don’t want things too clean. Rather, you can move some of the items that won’t fit with your Haunted Garage to the back of the garage. Then, hang a curtain or sheet (a black sheet, if you’ve got one) to cover up the things in the garage that you wouldn’t see in your Haunted Garage.

On the other hand, you could expand on the theme of a Haunted Garage and mix the spooky with the normal – the things you expect to see in a garage. Just be careful that there’s nothing around that would hurt any of the little Tricksters who will come by for treats. If you opt for the garage themed Haunted Garage, you can add ghosts, skeletons and other frightening decorations in among the items usually found in a garage.

You may, however, opt for a Haunted Garage where the garage is merely the stage for your spooky themed presentation. You may choose a setting from one of your favorite scary movies. But, keep in mind that many of the little monsters coming by your Haunted Garage will be a bit young for some of the scarier movies that are out these days. Your neighbors won’t appreciate it if you keep their children up with nightmares, especially when you’re already helping to keep them up with candy.

Still, even little children expect to see some spiders, ghosts and skeletal characters. Just don’t over do it. Make sure your Haunted Garage is age appropriate.

One nice thing about a Haunted Garage is that, unless you have a finished ceiling in the garage, it’s very easy to suspend monsters and such from the rafters. With a little ingenuity, you can probably rig up a monster on a string that you can let down and pull up when Trick or Treaters arrive.

If you have access, or time to get one, a good technique is to use a fog machine in the garage. Remember that black is the prevalent color for Halloween, along with minimal lighting.

Get yourself a low-wattage light or, better yet, a black light bulb. Then, get creative. Without too much work you’ll have a Haunted Garage the little monsters will look forward to year after year and with no more work required than you want to put into it.

How’s the weather stripping around your Gurnee garage door?

There’s a great-big opening at the front of your Gurnee garage. There’s a hinged assembly that opens and closes in that opening. It’s called your garage door. As winter approaches, the hope is that, when it’s closed, the garage door will provide a reasonable seal.

That’s quite a job for a garage door. Consider that a common garage door size is 16’ X 7’-8”. The outside circumference of that garage door is 47’-4”. You’ll usually find the garage door is made of four sets of panels with three sets of hinges. That’s another 48’ of joint that needs to seal. Together, that’s 95’-4” of area the garage door needs to seal.

Fortunately, the hinged panels are engineered to seal well. If the hinged joints are not sealed, you’ll need to tighten the hinges. If that doesn’t work, you may need to replace the garage door.

The real issue with sealing you Gurnee garage door is around the circumference. The solution to a windy closure of the garage door at the top and the sides are rubberized weather stripping attached to the door frame. The seal needs to be attached properly so that, while it doesn’t get in the way while the door is opening and closing, it’s close enough to seal when the garage door is closed.

At the bottom of the garage door, the rubber seal is attached to the garage door. Now, the garage door needs to be adjusted properly so that it closes tightly while taking into account the rubber at the bottom of the door.

Most garage doors come with rubber weather strip on the bottom. However, as with rubber weather stripping around the sides, the rubber will grow hard over time. This means that, even if you have weather stripping around your garage door, you may want to check the condition of the rubber. Look for cracks in the rubber. Feel the rubber to see if it’s reasonably supple yet.

Good quality weather stripping around your Gurnee garage door, properly installed, will make a world of difference sealing outside air from getting in, as well as rain and snow. With worn, improperly installed or missing weather stripping, the wind, and those other elements will come right in.

Does your Huntley garage door look crooked?

“Honey, is it me or does the garage door look a little crooked?”

If you’re asking your spouse that question about your Huntley garage door, and if the answer is yes, you have a problem with your garage door. As a rule, garage doors shouldn’t sit crooked in the garage door opening. They’re specifically designed to not sit crooked.

Any garage door installer who is worth his salt will install your garage door level. If, following the installation, you notice that the garage door is crooked, don’t let the garage door technician leave until he or she fixes the issue. Or, maybe you should insist that they leave and call a qualified garage door technician who knows how to do the job right.

Fortunately, it’s highly unlikely you’ll find a garage door technician that incompetent. From time to time you’ll run into a garage door technician working in the Huntley area who isn’t as qualified with the technical aspects of garage door installation. The process generally sorts out those who should consider other professions.

Assuming, therefore, that the garage door was installed properly to begin with, if your garage door is crooked, that’s probably a recent development.

Why would your garage door be crooked?

The problem with a crooked garage door almost always comes down to one or two problems: a spring is broken or damaged, and/or a cable is malfunctioning.

The malfunctioning cable is probably the most common culprit. The cable may have jumped off of the cable drum. This could happen because the garage door struck something on the way up or down.

If left unattended, the problem could result in the garage door falling out of the opening onto your car, yourself or someone you love. In other words, this is a problem you want fixed promptly.

The weight of a garage door is surprising to most people because the springs take up most of the weight. That means that the springs have to be strong. It makes for a dangerous combination when working on your garage door. Garage door springs can seriously injure, or even kill, someone who doesn’t know their way around garage doors. This is why, if your Huntley garage door is crooked, it’s best that you call a qualified garage door technician to fix the problem.