When the broken spring was the wrong spring for the door
Was the spring that broke the right spring for the garage door?
Often nobody knows until it breaks. The 16 by 7 doors on the two-story traditionals in Wynterhall, Redfield, the Branches, Chesnut and Dunwoody North have torsion springs on their second cycle life, so the set that let go was usually put up by whoever came before. Broken spring repair in Dunwoody starts from the door, and the old springs are measured as evidence, never copied as the spec.
A house built in the early 1980s has had time for its door to change under its springs. Some of these houses are on their original door, some on a steel replacement from the 1990s, and a spring set copied off the shaft shows the pro what was there without saying whether it was ever right. If the door labored, slammed or would not sit down on the slab for years before the break, say so on the phone.
How does a garage door act when its springs are too strong or too weak?
A door on the wrong springs shows it every day, seen from the floor while the opener runs or as the door sits closed. Springs too weak leave the opener carrying weight the springs should carry, and the door lands heavy. Springs too strong hold the door up off the slab, so it never quite settles. What that looks like:
- The opener strains and slows as the door climbs, and sounds louder than it used to.
- On the way down the door picks up speed near the slab and lands with a thump.
- Once closed it never quite sits down, and a line of daylight shows under the bottom seal.
- One side comes up a beat behind the other, which on a two-spring door can mean an old spring and a new one mixed on the shaft (why both springs get replaced together).
- Partway down, the opener stops and backs the door up although nothing is under it. If that went away after the opener’s force setting was turned up at some point, the springs behind it are still the same ones.
An opener can cover a mismatch for years while the door looks normal. It pays for it in the drive gear. So when the spring finally breaks, the gear may be worn as well, and the slow climb and the hard landing that came on over years all get noticed the same week.
Where does a wrong garage door spring come from?
None of the usual sources takes anyone doing careless work. A stock pair off a truck went on because it was close and the door was down that morning, instead of a pair sized to the door. The door changed after its springs were set, with a replacement door hung on the old pair, or windows or insulation added to the door that was there, so the weight on the shaft is no longer what the springs were set for. Or a set was copied faithfully from the set before it, which was already wrong, and the mistake repeats with every spring matched to the one that came off.
What does sizing a new pair to a 16-foot door involve?
The pro reads the door as it hangs today: its weight, its height, and how many times a day it goes up and down. The old pair is a check against that reading rather than the starting point. A double door weighs 200 to 300 pounds, and the new pair is matched to where this one sits in that range, with its windows, its insulation and its hardware on it.
The work after that is about an hour. Both springs are wound new against the closed door, the cables are set at the drums, and the door is balanced before the opener is reconnected. If the opener’s force was turned up years ago to push past the old springs, the pro puts it back to its normal setting as part of the job.
A high-cycle pair is an option when the garage is the way everyone comes and goes. A torsion pair on a two-car door runs $260 to $460 installed here, with the $79 to $129 service call applied to the repair, and the price page shows what a spring pair costs here next to the other repairs.
On a pair sized to it, the door settles flat on the slab and stops drifting, and the opener goes back to steering a door the springs are carrying.
When it is time to call: spring repair in Dunwoody, sized to the door.