Off track
Cables, rollers
& off-track doors
The door is hanging at an angle, jammed halfway, or crabbing its way up the tracks with a noise you can hear from the house. Something has left the track it is supposed to be in.
Please read
Stop pressing the button
An off-track door that is forced keeps going: bent track becomes a bent panel, a bent panel becomes a new door. This is a repair that gets four times more expensive over about three attempts, and every one of those attempts takes ten seconds.
What has happened
Three parts, and any of them will do it
A cable has come off the drum
Two steel cables run from the bottom corners of the door up to grooved drums at either end of the spring bar. If one unwinds, jumps its groove or frays through, that corner drops and the door goes diagonal. This is the most common cause and it is usually straightforward.
A roller has left the track
Often after something clipped the door, or because a bottom bracket or hinge has rusted through. Common on doors that have never been serviced.
The track itself is bent or loose
Usually a reversing bumper, a lawnmower, a snow blower, or years of vibration loosening the lag bolts into the framing. Sometimes we can straighten it; sometimes a track section gets replaced. We will show you which and why.
While we are in there
If your door still runs on the steel rollers it came with, this is the moment to change them. A full set of ten nylon sealed-bearing rollers is $185 – $265 and it is the single biggest difference you can make to how loud the door is. On a garage under a bedroom, it is the upgrade people notice most.
If we can straighten it rather than replace it, we will — and we will say so in writing.
Door hanging crooked?
Stop using it and call. The sooner it is looked at, the cheaper it stays.