Garage Door Won't Open

7 Common Reasons Your Garage Door Won’t Open (and What to Do About It!)

88% of Americans owned at least one car in the year 2015. Today, there could be at least 1.88 vehicles per household. In some cases, some families own as many as three cars per house. 

Managing the car porting needs for this growing number of personal cars can be a challenge. It’s worse when your garage door keeps developing faults now and then. 

Are you sick and tired of your garage door refusing to open and close, as it should? Most garage doors tend to develop technical issues with time due to wear. When your garage door won’t open, the issue could be minor or severe depending on certain factors. 

In this article, we reflect on the common reasons why your garage door won’t open and some of the possible fixes when this happens. 

1. Issues With the Photo-Eye

The photo-eye sensor plays a critical role in controlling the movement of the door garage. When the garage door won’t open or close, the issue is mostly with the photo-eye. Sometimes the photo-eye may be blocked. 

In other cases, your garage door’s photo eye may be experiencing misalignment. The other common issue is the possibility of the eye having an accumulation of dirt. In all these instances, the photo-eye may face obstructions, which affects the ability to detect movements. 

When the photo-eye has such obstructions, the condition is mild and may cause a jammed garage door. In such cases, all you need is to remove the obstructions; if this doesn’t help, you may consider service calling a specialist to deal with the issue. 

2. No Power on the Receiver 

Another common issue that often causes your garage door not to open is the garage receiver’s problem. When the operator has no power, the garage door may have issues opening and closing. Before panicking, your first instinct should be to check the power supply. 

Sometimes, the issue could be an unplugged power supply. If this isn’t the issue, consider checking the wires connected to the receiver to confirm that the issue isn’t faulty wiring. However, the other, more serious issue could be a blown-up fuse.

Once you confirm that the issue isn’t with the power supply or the fuse, your next guess should be circuit breakers. At times, the circuit breakers blow off, especially if your garage is older. In such cases, the best solution is to call in the experts to reset the fuses or to replace the circuit breakers.  

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3. Dead Transmitter Batteries 

 The frustration when trying to open your garage door without any success can be overwhelming. Sometimes, the issue could be dead transmitter batteries. When your garage door won’t open, all you need is to check whether the transmitter batteries may have expired. 

Have you been using the transmitter batteries for a while? The chances are that the batteries could be approaching the end of their useful life. If the cause for the garage door not opening is dead batteries, the first step should be to replace them. 

As long as replacing the batteries solves the problem for you, then you are good to go. If the issue persists after replacing the batteries, a second opinion from an expert may be useful. 

4. Broken Torsions and Extension Springs

A common issue with garage doors is the eventual wear and tear of garage torsions and springs. When this happens, your garage door won’t open. 

Broken springs often result from the gradual wear and tear around the coils. The broken spring can lead to sudden tension on the garage torsion and springs. 

Broken torsions are a severe issue that may require urgent attention to address the fault. If the issue is with broken torsions and extensions, the only solution is to consider replacing the springs. Garage doors have springs that shouldn’t operate beyond a given cycle. 

The more your garage door ages, the more the end of the life-cycle nears. In such cases, replacement is inevitable. 

5. Remote Signal Blocked

Have you encountered situations where your garage door won’t open? Often the cause of this concern could be an issue with the remote control. If the remote control has issues related to blockage, then the system might have garage door problems. 

The first thing to do is to ensure that you are back in range. This simple tune-up doesn’t need technical support.  All you need to do is to get your signal back in range. 

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Another common issue is a concern with bad inputs. The level of severity in such cases could be medium range. Even so, you need to call repair experts to try to adjust the settings on the remote control. 

In other instances, the issue could be broken antennae. If this is the issue, you might need to consider an urgent replacement. 

6. Misaligned Door Tracks 

Your garage door tracks are at times susceptible to misalignment. Ordinarily, a garage door is designed to open up by causing tension on the cables, forcing the lift to open the doors. If this mechanism fails, then the tracks end up remaining ajar. 

Such misalignment often causes the garage doors to resist the lifting force. If faulty racks are causing the garage door not to open, the cause could be wear and tear or pressure. This issue is significant and may require replacement for the tracks. 

Calling in a repair service in such cases could help you solve the underlying issues. 

7. Disconnected Motor 

When your garage door won’t open, the issue could also be with the motor. This means that the garage door is okay, but the motor is either deactivated or faulty. The first place to check when this happens is if the motor may be disconnected. 

Most times, the underlying issue could be a disconnected motor. The cause, in most cases, is a slight human error leading to the fault. This issue only requires a reconnection of the motor, and the system will resume back to normal functionality. 

This Is What To Do When Garage Door Won’t Open

Garage doors often develop issues, especially in homes where there are multiple cars. As your garage doors experience wear and tear following years of serving you, you might begin to have trouble opening and closing your carport. 

Some causes of this fault are minor and only require DIY interventions. Even so, when the garage door won’t open, it could also be a major functionality issue. Calling in repair services in such cases would help. 

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