With your home’s garage door as the primary entrance you use every day to leave and enter your house, you’ve likely experienced that stressful and inconvenient moment when your garage door suddenly won’t open or close — leaving you stuck inside of your garage wondering how to get out or stranded outside in the driveway. When your garage door opener is malfunctioning, there are several potential causes you can explore that can either quickly and easily be fixed or will need attention from a professional to ensure safe and complete repairs.
When you use garage door every day to go to work or run errands, you’re likely operating your garage door at least 1,500 times per year. With such frequent use, it’s probable that parts or settings on your garage door and opener will have occasional problems. Many homeowners experience issues with their garage door openers and end up asking the following questions.
Why Isn’t My Garage Door Opener Remote Working?
Many garage door opener remotes are finicky, and they could be malfunctioning for many reasons — the batteries could be weak or dead, the remote could be out of range of the garage door opener or the remote could simply need to be reprogrammed.
Before poking at the wiring in your garage door opener or taking the time to reprogram your remote, try standing closer to the door or replacing the batteries. Many garage door openers don’t have a long-distance range, and you may be trying to open your door from too far away. From far off, the signal between the remote and the opener may be interrupted, in which case the door won’t open.
If you’re standing near the door, but pushing the remote button still won’t work, try testing the battery. As the batteries weaken and eventually die, they’ll work inconsistently, which will make it seem as though there’s something wrong with the garage door or opener. You can easily replace the batteries in your remote by popping the back off and putting a fresh battery in the compartment.
If your remote still won’t work, try reprogramming it to the garage door opener — locate the brightly colored, square “learn” button on the back of your garage door opener.
Why Won’t the Garage Door Wall Switch Work?
When your wall switch doesn’t work as it should, you could have an issue with the wiring, or the door may be accidentally locked. To troubleshoot your wall-mounted opener, you can try reprogramming the pad or check that the locked-mode wasn’t triggered. Like the manual lock on the garage door, your opener also has a lock mechanism that can be engaged by a separate lock button or by holding the opener button for an extended period.
If your door hasn’t been locked and you’ve tried reprogramming the pad, call a professional to investigate and determine whether there’s a wiring malfunction.
My Garage Door Opener Still Isn’t Working, What’s Wrong With It?
After testing your garage door mobile and wall-mounted remotes, if you’re still experiencing problems, your garage door opener may have a blocked power source, have disconnected wires, be set to inappropriate sensitivity levels or have stripped gears. Inspect your garage door opener machine and surroundings to check if any of these issues have affected your system.
In addition to your garage door opener, your door may not be opening due to the following problems:
- The door has been disengaged from the opener
- The track is misaligned
- The photo eye sensors are blocked or out of alignment
- The garage door cables or springs are broken
- Something is blocking the door
When You Need Help With Your Garage Door Opener, Reach out to AE Door & Window
If you ever experience garage door opener problems, trust the knowledgeable and trained experts at AE Door & Window to help you find the issue and make efficient and lasting repairs. Our company has over 30 years of experience repairing garage doors for the residents of Northern Kentucky as well as Cincinnati and Eastgate, OH. For our customers’ convenience, we provide free service estimates, same-day services and 24/7 emergency response.
Schedule garage door opener repair services today by filling out our online request form or calling us at 513-742-1984 to speak to a team member.