Garage doors are built to protect your garage and anything inside it, that’s why they are made with heavy materials to provide enough protection to your property.
Moving garage doors on your own is a difficult task to do and most importantly, puts you in severe danger should the door fall on you.
As such, springs are added to the garage door system to take on the door’s weight.
Opening and closing garage doors are now easier to do because the springs are there to relieve most of the heavy load for you.
And one of the most widely used garage door springs is the Torsion Springs, which can withstand a lot of weight.
However, like any tool that you use liberally, the torsion springs would eventually suffer from damages and break.
And for a garage owner like you, a broken spring and an immovable garage door are another stress and inconvenience to your already busy schedule.
Hence, you need to know how to repair a broken garage door torsion spring.
Here’s what you need to know:
What You Need To Know About Torsion Springs
It’s quite easy to identify if your garage door has a torsion spring.
They are found right above closed garage doors, running parallel to the top edge of the door.
The shaft above the doors holds them in place, together with the cable drums attached to both ends of the shaft.
Torsion springs work by being wound up, so they store more energy in the coils.
When they are released, torsion springs are utilizing the bottled-up energy for lifting a big portion of the door’s weight which then makes it lighter for you or the automatic opener to move it.
With this in mind, the springs have a standard lifetime of 10000 cycles.
One cycle is defined as one instance of the door opening then closing.
Hence, you can open and close the garage door about 10000 times before the garage spring breaks.
This may seem like much until you factor in how many times your garage door is used per day.
An average of 4 cycles a day, puts your springs at a mere 6-9 years of working life.
And if you use your garage door more frequently than that, its working life is lessened, more so if you neglect its maintenance.
Steps to Repair Broken Torsion Springs
If you plan on handling the repairs yourself, you should know that torsion springs are one of the more dangerous components to handle.
D.I.Y. repairs may be a more attractive option with how cheap it is but with how risky spring repair is, that saved money is more likely to go on your hospital bill.
So don’t hesitate to call professional garage door technicians to fix these problems for you, if you’re not experienced enough to deal with it yourself.
Here are the tools you’ll need to repair the broken torsion spring.
- A pair of winding bars for removing tension from the spring,
- Vice Grips to keep the shaft in place,
- Clamps to secure the door, and
- Wrenches, particularly in 9/16, 7/16, and 1/2 sizes
Before you proceed with the repairs, secure these safety precautions first.
- Wear protective equipment, such as safety goggles and gloves.
- Unplug and disengage your automatic opener, if your garage doors have one.
- Make sure the door is closed and clamp it in place to ensure it won’t move up as you wind the spring.
For a step-by-step demonstration on how to repair a broken garage door torsion spring, check out this informative video.
Call for Professional Help
A torsion spring repair is a dangerous operation and should be left to people with advanced knowledge and experience with garage door repairs.
That’s why we at Overhead Door Repair Pros in Edmonton are the right experts for your torsion spring problems.
We are available 24/7, and you can count on us to respond to your overhead garage door problems in no time.
While we believe that you, as a homeowner, should know how to repair a broken garage door torsion spring, knowledge is not enough to replace experience and mitigate the risks on the job.
Our team of highly experienced technicians will fix your torsion spring problem on your behalf while also making sure that the springs are now safe and secure.
Acquire our professional service now and call us at (587) 804-2072.