During the summer, you probably spend a lot of time getting things like bikes and lawn mowers out of the garage. With all this activity, your garage door probably opens and shuts a lot more than normal during the summer months. All that extra use leads to wear and tear on your garage door opener. That’s why the end of the summer is the perfect time to do maintenance on your garage door. These tips can help.
Remove Any Rust
Rust may not be a big deal in its early stages, but if allowed to progress, rust will eat through the gears in your garage door opener. Fortunately, rust is something you can remove. Use sandpaper to sand down any rusty parts in the gears of your garage door opener. After doing this, make an effort to protect these parts of your garage door from moisture, as moisture is what really causes rust to spread.
Lubricate the Parts
Without lubrication, the moveable parts of your garage door would be stiff, hard to move and probably squeaky. Lubricating the moving parts of your garage door opener, particularly the garage door opener chain and gears, can help prevent your system from seizing up or becoming loud. Many people are tempted to use standard lubricants like WD40. However, a much better lubricant for your garage door is white lithium grease or silicone spray. Spray down the various moving parts of your garage door opener to ensure that these moving parts will continue to work fluidly.
Test the Safety Features
If your garage door was manufactured after 1990, it should have an automatic reverse function that kicks in when someone or something is in the path of the closing garage door. There are many ways to test this function. Start by placing a 2×4 beam of wood in the path of the garage door, then push the close button. When the door touches the beam of wood, it should reverse course.
Next, hit the “door close” button on your garage door opener, then wave a stick in the path of the closing garage door. Wave the stick close to the ground, so that it interrupts the beam that is transmitted from the photoelectric eye near the bottom of the door. When you do this, the door should reverse course. If the door does not reverse course as you would expect, contact a garage door repair person to inspect your garage door safety system.
Get a Tune Up
The end of the summer is a good time to get a tune up from a garage door professional. To do this, contact the Overhead Door Company of Oklahoma City™. Your garage door repair person can inspect your garage door, test all of its functions, clean any of the gears and the garage door chain and restore your garage door opener to good working order.
