Garage door spring repair and replacement, Dunwoody
Broken garage door spring repair in Dunwoody, GA
A bang from the garage, then a door that will not budge or lifts a few inches and drops. That is a spring, and it is the most common repair in Dunwoody: both springs replaced, the door rebalanced, about an hour on site.
Say if a car is stuck inside.
How you know it is the spring
The door was fine last night. This morning the opener hums or strains and the door stays down, or it rises a few inches, hangs crooked, and settles. Look up at the shaft above the door: a torsion spring that has snapped shows a clean gap in the coil, usually a couple of inches wide. On an older door with springs running along the tracks, one of them will be hanging loose or lying on the floor. Either way, stop pressing the button. The opener is not built to lift a door's full weight and the next thing to fail is its gear.
What a spring job in a Dunwoody house involves
The pro measures the broken spring's wire size, inside diameter and length, and matches the pair to the door's actual weight rather than pulling a generic spring off a truck. Both springs come off, both go on, and the new pair is wound with steel winding bars against a closed door. Then the cables are set at the drums, the door is balanced so it holds still halfway up with the opener disconnected, and the opener is reconnected and its force settings checked. The old springs are shown to you before they leave.
On the 16-foot doubles in Wynterhall, Redfield and the Branches the difference between a matched pair and a stock pair shows up in a year: a mismatched spring overworks the opener and the door starts drifting on its own. Cycle rating matters too. A standard spring is rated around 10,000 cycles, which is seven to ten years of a two-car family using the door as the front door. A high-cycle pair costs more and roughly doubles that.
The 1970s extension-spring door
Most of the ranches and split-levels in Dunwoody Club Forest, Kingsley, Mill Glen and Village Mill were built with extension springs, the long springs that stretch along each horizontal track. They still work, and they can be replaced in kind with safety cables threaded through them so a break cannot send the spring across the garage. The better long-term fix, if the door itself is sound, is a conversion to a torsion spring over the header: one shaft, one or two springs, a quieter door that balances properly. It costs more than an extension pair and it is the right call on a door you intend to keep another ten years.
What it costs here
A torsion pair on a two-car door runs $260 to $460 installed, a single spring or an extension pair $180 to $300, and the extension-to-torsion conversion $450 to $750. Cables are usually replaced in the same visit if they are frayed at the bottom bracket, where Georgia humidity gets them first. The full breakdown, and what moves each number, is on the page about what garage door repairs cost in Dunwoody.
Spring questions from Dunwoody garages
The spring broke and I need to get the car out. Can I lift the door by hand?
A single 9-foot door, maybe, with two adults and the opener disconnected. A 16-foot double, no. A double door weighs 200 to 300 pounds and the spring was doing all of that lifting. People get hurt trying, and the door usually comes down again mid-lift. Call and say the car is inside; that moves the visit up.
Do both springs get replaced, or just the one that broke?
Both, on a two-spring door. The two springs were installed together and have the same cycles on them; the second one is weeks from breaking. Replacing one leaves the door unbalanced and brings the pro back for a second service call. The one-spring case is a single door that only ever had one.
How long does a spring job take on a Dunwoody two-car door?
About an hour on site. Measure the old springs, wind the new pair with steel bars, set the cables, balance the door so it stays put halfway up, then reconnect and test the opener.
My 1970s door has springs stretched along the tracks, not one over the door. Is that different?
Those are extension springs, standard on the ranches and split-levels from the first build-out. They can be replaced in kind, or the door can be converted to a torsion spring over the header, which is quieter, safer and easier to balance. The conversion costs more than a pair of extension springs and is usually worth it on a door you plan to keep.
Tell us the door size and we will quote the springs
A 9-foot single or a 16-foot double, one spring or two, wood or steel. That is enough for a real price on the phone and a visit the same day when the schedule allows.
- Springs, openers and off-track doors most days, same day when the schedule allows
- New doors measured at the house, priced in writing, installed by appointment
- Prefer to talk? (770) 376-2068 rings straight through