A garage door check before June 1, and another after a storm
Hurricane season opens June 1, a couple of weeks after the rainy season starts. An hour with the door before then finds the tired spring, the dry roller and the split seal while they're still small jobs.
- On site: About 1 hour
- License CGC15***68
When a check makes sense
- June 1 is coming, and nobody has looked at the door since last season.
- After a storm there's sand, silt or a crust of salt along the door's bottom edge.
- Daylight, water or the odd lizard gets in under the bottom seal.
- The door sounds louder or moves in jerks; worn rollers are a common cause.
- A tenant is moving out, and the codes should change too: see remotes and keypads.
What the hour covers
- We disconnect the opener and lift the door by hand to feel its balance.
- Springs: rust, gaps in the coil, tension matched to the door.
- Cables, the drums they wind on, and the bottom brackets, which sit closest to the wet floor.
- Rollers, hinges and bearings, oiled with a spray made for garage doors.
- Tracks cleaned of sand and silt, and every bolt tightened.
- Bottom and side seals checked for splits, gaps and nests.
- The opener: force, travel, auto-reverse and the sensors, plus its backup battery if it has one.
- A photo of the Florida Product Approval label for your records, if the door has one.
At the end you get it in writing: parts in good shape, parts wearing out, and anything that shouldn't wait.
After a storm: salt, silt and seals
Wind-driven rain throws salt spray against the door, and water in the garage leaves sediment in the tracks and along the bottom seal. Once the weather clears, rinse the lower sections and the tracks with fresh water and let them dry. If the door looks bent or has left its tracks, don't run the opener; that's an off-track repair. If water reached the opener's outlet, have an electrician look at it before you plug the opener back in.
Storms are hard on the bottom seal. A split or flattened seal lets in rain, sand and the occasional snake, and it can be changed during the same visit.
Questions about maintenance & tune-ups
Before June 1, when hurricane season starts; by then the rainy season has been under way since mid-May. A quick check after a storm also makes sense if salt spray or flood water reached the door.
Close it all the way and leave it closed until the storm has passed. If the door has a slide lock, engage it and pull the opener's plug, so the motor can't be run against the lock; unplugged, the opener is also safe from surges on the power line. Bring bins, bikes and anything loose inside, clear of the tracks.
Yes. Book the visit for move-out day and we can erase the old remotes and set a new keypad code in the same trip, so the next tenant starts with a checked door and new codes.
Yes. During the visit we look for the Florida Product Approval label, note the approval number and tell you whether the rating fits your house's wind band and exposure. You can look up the permit record yourself from our permits page.
Tell us what the door is doing
A person answers, day or night. Describe the door or text a photo, and you'll hear what it probably is, how long the fix takes and when a truck can get to you.