Garage doors need regular upkeep to ensure safety, efficiency, and durability. Key tasks include lubrication, tightening parts, inspection of belts/cables, checking balance, and replacing worn components. Preventative maintenance saves money and extends lifespan. For expert help, rely on Hilton Head Garage Doors’ trusted, professional service.
- Lubricate rollers, hinges, and tracks to reduce friction and wear.
- Tighten screws, nuts, and bolts to maintain structural integrity.
- Inspect belts, cables, and pulleys for cracks or frays.
- Check door balance for gaps, air leaks, or uneven closing.
- Replace worn parts and weatherstripping as needed.
Your garage door is an investment for your home. It keeps things flowing naturally as you come and go. It keeps the elements out. And it offers an aesthetic curb appeal to your home.
But as one of the highest impact elements of your home, a garage door comes with an innate need for regular garage door maintenance. Anything less and you risk longer-lasting and harder-to-fix issues with your garage door.
So, let’s start with an answer to a likely obvious question. If you’re wondering “do I need to have my garage door serviced regularly,” the answer is yes.
Keeping your garage door working just as it did upon installation may not be rocket science, but it is important. With that in mind, here are some of the top garage door maintenance tasks any homeowner know. Conduct these throughout the years to keep everything moving properly.
What maintenance does a garage door require? Read on to find out!
1. Lubrication
Your garage door is likely mostly made of metal. This can be seen in, for instance, your door roller and the track it’s on. And when two metal parts come together, they can form an immense amount of friction.
Adding lubrication to your garage door’s moving parts will keep the squeaks at bay and will keep it moving smoothly. Adding grease to a garage door will also help prevent unwanted wear and tear to the moving metal parts.
The lubrication maintenance task involves adding grease to the garage door track. We recommend products made from silicone, or others designed for long life and weather resistance.
We also recommend adding grease to a garage door’s moving parts, including the hinges, rollers, and more. This will ensure seamless flow and longer shelf life of your door’s more vulnerable components.
2. Tightening
Though your garage door was likely professionally installed, components loosening over time is simply par for the course. The vibrations it undergoes while opening or closing help exacerbate loosening on all of its tightened components.
For this maintenance step, we recommend tightening all screws, nuts, bolts, and other fixtures keeping your door together. However, we don’t recommend too much elbow grease, as you might risk breakage. Instead, a simple twist of the wrist is all it takes to keep everything plumb and tight.
3. Inspection
One of the more workhorse elements of your garage door is the belt it uses to open or close. This is a high-tension component that can be made of rubber, wire, or another material. That material undergoes an immense amount of strain as it tightens to pull your garage door up the track. And that strain can lead to breakage without you even noticing (until it’s too late).
When inspecting your belt mechanism, consider your material. If your belt is rubber, ensure the belt is evenly thick and crack-free. Look for a straight, track-aligned belt that is uniform in color. Anything other than symmetrical is an indication your belt needs maintenance.
If your lift mechanism uses a cable and pulley style, inspect the wire for fraying wire material. If your cable has any sprung wires that stick out, it may be an indication it needs to be replaced.
4. Balancing
Your garage is likely not as balanced as it was the day it was installed. Why? Because heavy structures like homes and garages tend to settle over time. And this may mean you have a garage door that closes slightly higher on one side of the door than the other.
When inspecting for balance issues, look for air or moisture infiltration along the garage’s bottom edge when closed. You may also see unwanted gaps along the sides or top of the door when closed.
5. Component Replacement
If any of the elements above have issues, they may need new components to help them work properly. After it’s been in use for a few seasons, your door also may require an update to its weatherstripping.
In cases in which maintenance is simply too difficult, there’s hope. It often helps to work with a trusted garage door maintenance provider with a catalog of replacement parts on-hand.
Trust in Hilton Head Garage Doors
How often should garage doors be maintained depends on style, frequency of use, climate, and more. But eventually, all garage doors will need some kind of maintenance.
When your garage door needs expert maintenance from a service provider who knows it inside and out, who you choose matters. Hilton Head Garage Doors is South Carolina’s trusted garage door partner. We offer prompt service and affordable prices for customers in Hilton Head, the Lowcountry, and beyond.
Our team is equipped to provide the regular maintenance your garage door needs to keep it functioning as it did on day one. And we maintain a robust parts catalog to ensure element replacements are quick and timely.
Rely on our team and get your garage door functioning again. Learn more about our garage door maintenance and repair services here.
