A garage is more than just a place to keep your car safe and to store some tools and other supplies. In most homes, the garage is another vital entry point into the house, and therefore must remain secured at all time. This is why problems with the garage door should never be left till later. Also, if the problem is severe, it should be taken care of by a professional.

When their garage doors jam or break, some people simply make temporary repairs like boarding up the broken areas. They think that as long as their doors look normal, no thief would ever think about testing their garages. However, this is where they're wrong as most thieves consider garages as good places to break into. A weakened door or unsecured hinges can turn your garage into a haven for intruders.

Partner up with a garage door repair service that has wide availability hours. If you can, get one with 24 hour service. Your doors can give way at any time and you're in for a load of trouble if you suddenly have a garage door that won't close at 1 am. While emergency repair services are more expensive, it's a small price to pay in exchange for your security and safety.

Consider upgrading your garage doors as a whole. If you find yourself calling your repair service provider, it might mean that your door parts have reached the end of their lifespan. Instead of burying yourself in frequent repair bills, consider a complete overhaul of your garage. It's an investment worth making, because there's nothing more important than your peace of mind. With everything in top shape, you won't have to worry about it breaking in the most inconvenient of times.

Inspections can help improve your garage door quality. Material incompatibility is a common reason for seeking garage door repair. While most people don't see the need for inspections, it can help you determine some areas for concern before they become full-blown problems. Material incompatibility can be detected from inspecting your doors. Some materials like metal or hardwood can be quite heavy, so you will need strong hinges to match. Sometimes, the hinges are of low quality and may not be able to take the strain of the door opening and closing. Your friendly technician will give you advise on part replacements. Having a technician check on your garage doors every once in a while might seem like a waste of money, but remember that a broken door will set you back even more.

Maintenance work doesn't take a lot of effort. Performing maintenance on the doors in your garage can be as simple as oiling the tracks and hinges every now and then, especially during the wintertime. Take care of them and make sure to open or close them gently. These might not seem much, but these will lengthen its lifespan and put off a visit from your local repair service for as long as possible.

Garage Door Repair for Different Materials

If your door is in need of repair, the first step is figuring out what is broken. This problem varies depending on the type of material that your is made out of and in what fashion that material was crafted. Generally, your door is probably made out of steel, wood, aluminum, wood composite, or fiberglass. Each kind of material comes with its own set of common problems and by deducing which one applies to you, the repair can go a lot quicker.

Insulation

Not all are insulated, and there are many different kinds of insulation. If your insulation needs repairing, you could be wasting energy as well as letting sound and other annoyances into your garage and home. Insulation seals the door away from the outside. Many people store things in their garage. If your insulation has deteriorated, everything in your garage could be at risk from the elements outside. Determine the type of insulation that you have before you get quotes on repairing it.

Mounting Bracket, Roller, and Hinge

These components are relatively easy to fix and generally less expensive than other parts. The mounting bracket holds the track to the wall. Occasionally, your repair might be as simple as tightening the bolts that hold the mounting bracket. The hinge is the part that bends when the door rolls up along the track. The rollers are set into the track and roll back, pulling the door up onto the ceiling of the garage. The rollers and the hinge are a bit more difficult to repair on your own. There are springs involved in these parts that hold a great deal of pressure. It can be dangerous to try, and fix on your own. If this is the problem, it is definitely better to call on the help of a professional.

Garage Doors - A Brief Tutorial on Garage Door Safety and Installation

As a door expert witness, I am called upon many times a year to evaluate garage door injuries. Garage doors come in many shapes and sizes. Their functions range from basic security of an area to cosmetic concealment. Most doors can be broken down into a few basic styles or categories. Typical modern garage doors for residential applications tend to be predominantly of the overhead sectional variety. That style of door comes in many configurations, materials, levels of insulation, and a wide range of appearance possibilities. They are available as a prefabricated kit, or built as a custom design to complement the dacor of any building. Commercial warehouse type installations often dictate higher security requirements. A good choice for this security type of door is the "roll-up" style that resembles a roll top desk type of door. This door can be manufactured with a variety of materials that can be as strong as the adjacent walls, making forced entry through this opening very difficult. Other common commercial installations include light weight aluminum single or sectional panel doors. These doors function more for closing off an already secured area than for assuring point security.

In the past, the biggest concern with operating an overhead garage door was the potential risks associated with the springs used for balancing the door weight. Pre mid 1960's garage door installations typically relied upon a pair of stretched (tensioned) springs to assist the operation of the garage door pivoting hinges. These springs became loaded (tensioned) as the door was moved into the closed position. Unloading (releasing) of the stored spring energy occurred as the door was opened to the horizontal overhead position. One of the most dangerous aspects of these spring systems was that after a period of time, often without any maintenance or inspection, the points of attachment of these springs would rust or become weak. This weakening of the springs or points of attachment would often lead to an inadvertent explosive failure flinging the broken spring components across the garage, embedding the spring or steel components into the garage walls, cars or other items in the path of travel. Unfortunately, sometimes people were in the path of travel of these explosive occurrences. As these springs failed, as an attempted safeguard, some manufacturers devised a "caging" system for the springs. These cages were retrofitted onto the stretched springs in an attempt to capture the parts that would release if a failure occurred. While these caging devices were helpful, they were not completely effective. Some of these spring devices are still in use today. Whenever this condition exists or the quality of garage components are questionable, a qualified professional service technician should be consulted.

In response to the inherently dangerous old style garage spring issues as above, a newer and safer system for opening the overhead garage door was created. The idea was to transfer the load or weight of the door via a cable and pulley system to a vertical rod now equipped with a torsion (twisted) spring. This type of spring is installed with specialty hardware and bolts to a fixed plate at one end, while the entire spring is installed around a horizontal pipe. This load balancing device is normally installed directly over the header of the garage opening. Using appropriate cables, connectors and pulleys, the weight of the garage door is transferred into the torsion spring system. The difference between the old style stretched spring and the newer torsion spring is the way that the spring energy is stored. With the old style stretched spring, the energy is stored and released by pulling on the spring or returning the spring to its un-stretched condition. With a torsion type of spring, the energy is imparted or removed by rotating the spring clockwise or counter clockwise depending upon the direction of usage. With professional installation, the complete loading of the torsion spring is controlled by the garage installer, and is determined by the weight and size of the garage door that it is operating. When this type of torsion spring fails, it remains attached and intact to the location on the horizontal control rod where it was mounted. I have not heard of or seen any torsion spring fly across a garage, creating injury from failed components as with the stretched older style garage door springs. This is not to say that injuries have not occurred with the torsion style spring. The installation of this type of spring is generally safe when left to a trained garage door installation professional. Severe and serious injuries have occurred when untrained, unqualified individuals have attempted to install or service this type of spring. In most installations, a warning tag is left attached adjacent to the torsion spring when the garage door is installed. This tag warns of the danger associated with the stored energy of this spring, and alerts untrained individuals to not attempt any repair, adjustment or to even touch the spring and associated hardware. When the label that should be attached to this spring becomes damaged, is removed or tampered with, it is important that a new warning label be reattached immediately to show the dangers of this spring tension

Garage doors can be operated manually (by hand), as well as automatically (by power assisted motor). In both cases, the proper operation of the garage door is determined by the proper balancing of the garage door weight, springs and related component hardware. An automatic power assisted motor cannot overcome an improperly balanced garage door. The weight of all garage doors is normally deceptive. Due to the fact that a properly functioning door appears easy to open and close, many users do not realize the combined overall weight until springs fail to assist the door in its operation. In all cases, regardless of the type of garage door, the entire system of hinges, track, hardware, and door opener work as a team. Problems with misalignment, shifting, or jamming can lead to problematic operation of a door. Counter forces imparted to a garage door, not engineered into the components, can lead to injury. Inappropriate maintenance or complete lack of maintenance has lead to severe bodily injuries. Forcing the operation of a garage door, when one or more components have become damaged or broken has lead to serious bodily injuries. In all cases, maintenance is a crucial and important aspect of proper operation of all door systems.

In contrast to an overhead type of garage door, be it sectional or single panel, roll up doors have a totally different type of operating system. When these doors are used, they can be concealed in an overhead or under mounted trough. These doors operate similarly to a roll top desk door except for how they are stored when not in the closed position. They normally coil as they are retracted, and require significant gear trains to reduce the effort required to move these doors up and down into position. Often the forces needed to move these roll up doors require a reduction type of transmission that allows a very heavy door to be operated effortlessly. These doors can be chain driven either manually, or can be automated using electric motors. Roll up doors require more frequent evaluation and servicing than a standard overhead garage door. The tracks that are mounted vertically on both sides of the garage opening need maintenance and cleaning more frequently, and are often blocked by foreign obstructions or damaged by collision of some type. These roll up doors are often held open by some type of ratcheting action. Proper balancing of these doors is often more important than an overhead type of door, as the weight of these type of doors is normally much greater than an overhead door.