Garage Door Repair for Family Safety
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Garage door repair doesn’t usually rank very high on a list of daily concerns. After all, it’s just a door. It’s incidental to your entering or exiting your home. But your garage door is a very complex mechanism and when it’s not in perfect working order, it can be dangerous.

A typical garage door can weigh upwards of 300 to 400 pounds. If it were to come down on a vehicle, it could cause extensive damage. And, if it were to close on a person or animal, it is capable of causing serious injury, or worse.

There are safety protection devices built in to your garage door system to minimize the chance of a mishap. But, as with anything mechanical, things eventually wear out or get out of adjustment. It is important to have the safety protection system periodically checked for proper calibration and operation by a qualified garage door repair technician.

While it is tempting for many homeowners to do all the repairs on their home themselves, this is one area where the services of a competent garage door repair person would be the wiser choice. A technician who works extensively with garage door systems will know, in detail, all of the items that affect the operation and safety of your door. He will also be familiar with which things tend to be the weak spots and more prone to wear and failure.

Don’t take the chance of compromising the safety of your family or your property. Schedule an annual visit now for a preventive maintenance and safety inspection of your garage door system.

Garage Door Repair: What You Can Do, and What You Shouldn’t
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Every part of your home will need some type of maintenance sooner or later, and you will be faced with a garage door repair at some point. Just as with the rest of your home, there are some types of maintenance that you can perform yourself if you are the do-it yourself type. On the other hand, unless you have special training and experience, there are some kinds of repairs that you should not attempt to do.

You can perform minor maintenance and cleaning of your air conditioning system and major appliances, but without the proper knowledge and training, it would not be safe to attempt to repair a refrigeration problem or to get involved with electrical repairs. The same is true when it comes to garage door repair.

So, what kinds of garage door repair are safe for the average homeowner to do? Well, preparing for and applying a fresh coat of paint or replacing a broken pane of glass is easy enough. You can also check that the tracks are clean and lubricate the rollers (don’t lubricate nylon rollers). If you have detailed instructions, you can check the alignment of the tracks, verify the correct adjustment of the safety switches, and check the balance of the door. These last items are approaching the border between the “highly qualified do-it-yourself” homeowner, and the “it’s-time-to-call-a-professional” homeowner.

Keep in mind that your garage door weighs hundreds of pounds. If a safety switch is not set and operating properly, serious damage or injury could result. If the tracks are not aligned correctly, or the balance is incorrect, the door could jam or the door opener could be overloaded. One specific caution: never attempt to adjust or replace torsion springs. They are pre-tensioned to enormous pressure that could easily break a wrist or even be lethal. You definitely need to call a professional garage door repair technician for this.

Garage Door Repair Can Be Avoided With Proper Maintenance
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Do you follow the fire department’s recommendation to replace the batteries in your smoke alarms when you adjust your clocks for daylight savings time? How often do you perform, or arrange for preventive maintenance to be done on your garage door?

Your garage door and the garage door opener have certain inspection, testing, and maintenance requirements that should be addressed a few times a year. This is required for safety and to reduce the chance of needing an expensive garage door repair.

Most of the moving parts such as rollers (except nylon rollers), hinges, springs, chains, and jack screws need lubrication. The alignment of the tracks should be checked, and the security of all nuts and bolts should be ensured.

The operation of the safety features should also be checked. The auto-reverse feature should cause the door to immediately stop and reverse direction if the bottom of the door comes into contact with anything during the closing cycle. The same thing should occur when anything passes across the path of the photo-electric eye .sensor beam. You will also want to be sure that the manual release mechanism will disconnect the door from the opener.

At first glance, garage doors seem to be a fairly simple mechanism, but in reality they are one of the more complex systems in a home. Because of this, and potential safety concerns, periodic maintenance inspections by a trained garage door repair technician is recommended. With proper maintenance, you can expect to get many years of trouble free service from your garage door.

Always Secure Your Garage Door for Home Safety
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News like the following are among the scariest experiences any of us can go through. Earlier this week, KSTP reported:

The New Brighton Department of Public Safety says a home was burglarized after the resident left a garage door open overnight.

The burglary was reported around 11 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 11, on the 1200 block of Robin Lane. The victim says the overhead garage door was accidentally left open and several items were taken overnight.

Law enforcement officials are reminding community members to double-check doors at night and look out for neighbors if they accidentally leave their doors open.

The Premium Garage Door Service team has seen many news reports this summer detailing how homes were burglarized or broken into, and the entry point was an open or unlocked garage door. While garage doors are a wonderful convenience to have, it’s important it’s properly secured or it can be utilized in ways it shouldn’t be. Make sure this doesn’t happen to your home by always following these tips:

  • NEVER give out your garage door access code to strangers
  • ALWAYS close your garage door when you’re not home or you’re away from the garage
  • MAKE sure your garage door is locked at all times that it’s not open
  • IF you have windows on your garage door, cover them with curtains
  • DON’T leave your garage door opener in plain view
Some Final Garage Door Safety Tips
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Tomorrow is the last day of June, which also means it’s the last day of National Garage Door Safety Month. Before we head off into July, we’d like to offer up a few garage door safety tips so that you, as well as those you care about, are as safe as possible around your garage door, the largest moving object in your home.

  • Keep the garage door out of the reach of any small children.
  • Also remind small children that they shouldn’t place fingers near any cracks or crevices in the garage door.
  • Establish a rule with older children — the garage door remote is not a toy.
  • Visually inspect the garage door yourself every month for anything out of the ordinary, and call a St Paul Garage Door repair specialist if you find something wrong.
  • Always keep your garage door either completely open or completely closed. Don’t leave the door partially open.
  • When on vacation, be sure to unplug your automatic garage door opener so that no one can use a stolen remote to gain unauthorized entry to your garage.

We hope you’ve had a great month in June, and a safe month with your garage door. We’ll see you in July!