Garage Door Opener Broke

[jimparson]

Hello,

When we tried to open our garage door this morning, it seems that the metal bracket holding it on ripped out of the door (Wayne Dalton). Pictures attached. Usually, you can pull the string and lift the door, but it seems that it is very hard to lift. Does anyone know what I need to do to repair this, or have someone repair it for me? What will I expect to pay for the repair? What should I do?

Thanks in advance for you advice.
JM

[HayZee518]

looks like the bracket was just screwed in with sheet metal screws. get some 1/4-20 bolts and nuts and lockwashers and BOLT on the bracket. Reason your door was so hard to lift is the tension spring isn't adjusted properly. Reason for the spring is to counter balance for the weight of the door. That long thing above the door is the counter balance spring. on both ends there is a pin and a ratchet that is adjusted with another longer pin. you ratchet the catch on the end, remove the small pin, move the ratchet and re-insert the pin. do this on both sides. be careful, there's a lot of pressure on it. don't let go of the bar or you're bound to lose some theeth.

[gdoorpro]

This is not a door I am too familiar with, but let me discuss some basics.

If the door is too hard to lift, their is something wrong with the spring mechanism, which i am guessing is inside the steel shaft above the door. I had someone tell me their is no spring with these doors, but I don't think he knew what he was talking about not being a garage door professional. If their is not any spring, it would be hard to lift a door that can weigh anywhere from 100 - 250 lbs. I would call and ask your local wayne dalton dealer, if they can repair the spring on your door.

just out of curiosity, how old is this door, It can't be too old. My company tries to sell doors that get a minimum of 30,000 cycles before a spring breaks, unless you are lifting the door a lot every day, it should last longer than it appears to have.

ps, please do not drill through the section with bolts to reattach the operator plate that pulled off of the door, you will void any warranty and destroy the door sooner than later. a few sheet metal screws should do the trick, even better a better quality door may be in order.

Ryan

[jeffkellen]

broken spring

As I am sure you found out, the spring was probably broken. This is a normal part of owning a garage door, but if you dont notice it, you can damage the door by continuing to use the opener. The garage door brackets are not meant to withstand forces that are equal to the weight of the door. without the help of the spring to lift the door (because its broken) the opener lifts the entire door's weight at a single point which causes the failure you see in the picture. One way to avoid this is to decrease the "upward force settings" on the opener. on the opener/motor there should be 2 dials that are usually numbered. most people have this set too high. anyway- I am sure you figured it out by now, but wanted to comment in case someone else had the same problem.

[stampdoorparts]

Is it just me or do you NOT have any springs on your torsion tube? If you do no have springs on the tube helping lift the door those results are typical.

I am assuming you took the springs off or have something other than the torsion spring setup with the springs on the tube near the header....

Based on the picture I dont see any.

If you have a slide latch/lock engaged this type of thing can happen.

You will need to replace the top section obviously. Have them build a brace out of punched angle to distribute the weight better over a larger area.

Mike
Stamps Garage Doors
Garage Door Parts