by Alfred Ardis
Garage doors require annual maintenance to remain in good working order. Here we look at some things you can do to keep your door in tip top shape.
They do require maintenance in order to continue to work properly. While the maintenance does not have to be done frequently there are a few things that you should do roughly once a year to keep trouble at bay. If you have encountered problems in the past then doing maintenance on the door to your garage twice a year is wise.
Construed ... as turf, home just seems a provisional claim, a designation you make upon a place, not one it makes on you. A certain set of buildings, a glimpsed, smudged window-view across a schoolyard, a musty aroma sniffed behind a garage when you were a child, all of which come crowding in upon your latter-day senses—those are pungent things and vivid, even consoling. But to me they are also inert and nostalgic and unlikely to connect you to the real, to that essence art can sometimes achieve, which is permanence.
—Richard Ford (b. 1944)
What then should you do to ensure a garage door that works as well as it did when you first installed it? When you do your garage doors maintenance squirt all of your hinges, latches, rollers and roller tracks with a solvent that penetrates deep such as WD-40, or use a solvent that is citrus-based. Give them all a generous squirt. You should also lubricate all of the pulleys that are on extension-spring openers as well as all of the bearings that are on torsion-spring openers. If the torsion spring has built up some rust and/or if it binds up while in use as a result of the rust then you need to put a little bit of oil on it.
Once you have done these things you then need to wipe all of the items you have sprayed or squirted with a substance until they are clean. Then you will select a light oil such as 3-in-1 lubricant and apply it to all of the parts that you have already treated with other types of solvents. In other words, repeat the process using something different this time around.
If while doing these things you find that any of the hinges or the rollers on your garage doors is stuck then you might want to give them a good soaking with kerosene. In order to make sure that the kerosene penetrates the cracks use a tiny brush or something such as a toothbrush to make sure the kerosene gets in there where it can do what it is supposed to. Let it sit for a few minutes and then get rid of any rust build-up that you see with the help of steel wool. You then must wipe down all of the parts again until they are as clean as they can be. From there apply lubricant to them.
You’re a woman who’s been getting nothing but dirty breaks. Well, we can clean and tighten your brakes, but you’ll have to stay in the garage all night.
—S. J. Perelman, U. S. screenwriter, Arthur Sheekman, Will Johnstone, and Norman Z. McLeod. Groucho Marx, Monkey Business, a wisecrack made while trying to woo Lucille Briggs (Thelma Todd)
This may seem like a laborious and time consuming process but you will be glad at the end of the day that you did it. A lack of maintenance on your garage doors will mean that it will be vulnerable to wear and tear much easier and the likelihood that you will have to replace parts sooner (or replace the entire door much sooner!) is also there.
Many garage doors openers work by way of a chain or a drive screw. If yours is such then the same lubricant you applied to the parts described above should be applied to the door opener. Apply it to the entire length of the door opener.
Weather stripping is an important aspect of the door for your garage. Weather stripping offers protection against the elements. Take a look at the condition of the stripping all around the door. If it shows signs of jamming then fix it. If it needs to be replaced then do not hesitate to do so. Garage doors in Tennessee need maintenance like any other part of your house. Find out more at http://www.garagedoorstn.com/