Three common causes of malfunctioning garage doors
Having a garage door that won’t close properly can be a huge hassle. You may find yourself wasting time trying to coax the door shut after every use, or you may be unable to move the door at all. A garage door that almost closes all the way but leaves a gap at the bottom can be unsightly as well as unsettling due to security concerns. There are many possible causes of a garage door that won’t close right, and the best way to determine the exact cause of your particular garage door’s problem is to contact a garage door repair company such as Carroll Garage Doors. However, if you do want to try a bit of troubleshooting on your own, consider the following three common causes of malfunctioning garage doors.
Malfunctioning Photo Eye Sensors
Any modern garage door opener system will come equipped with photo eye sensors as a safety feature. These sensors are designed to prevent the door from closing whenever an object is in the door’s path. Unfortunately, it is quite easy for the photo eye sensors to malfunction. They may get knocked out of alignment or they may become so covered in dust and debris that they can no longer “see” one another. Fortunately, it is relatively easy to realign your sensors and/or clean them. Try these steps as a first resort when your garage door won’t close.
Lockout Activated
If nothing happens when you push the button on your garage door opener remote, it’s possible that the lockout feature of your garage door opener has been inadvertently activated and is blocking all signals from your remote. Some openers offer this feature as a protection against someone stealing one of your garage door openers and using it to enter your home. However, most people don’t use this feature regularly and can easily get taken by surprise by it. If your garage door remote has a good battery but you still can’t close the garage door, try pushing other buttons on the opener base station to turn off the lockout feature.
Warped Tracks or Panels
If your garage door has a jerky, jittery, or uneven motion and sometimes doesn’t close all the way, the problem could involve the way the opener tracks and the door align with one another. Opener tracks often get dinged or bent by vehicles entering and exiting the garage, which makes it difficult for the door to move along them. A warped panel in a wood garage door or a severely dented steel or fiberglass panel could also cause the door to fail to close properly. These types of problems are best left to a professional garage door repair service.
