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Both Garage Door Springs Broke Again

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
Ugh. This is like the 5th time in 10 years that we've had to get garage door work done. Just insane. Our house is situated in such a way that it's an l-shaped house with a garage on one side of the L and that is the way that we get in and out of the house 90% of the time. Cars, going to the park, just want to go outside and see if its raining... We go outside through the garage door. So I don't really know if its four sets of springs are five sets of springs but this is crazy, so I'm going with a new company this time and I'll be out here in the next 15 minutes and hopefully they can get these the springs replaced and when I can have a problem again for a few years.
 

tbplus10

Moderator
Staff member
1000 Posts
Community Leader
What are you buying cheap chineese parts?
Thats way to many sets of springs.
My house still has the original springs from 1985.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
We go in and out all the time as really the main way into the house. From what I've been reading on door websites they should be good for 10,000 up/down cycles.

Since the house is laid out where we use the door so much it probably cycles 10 or more times per day.

That level of activity puts it at 3600+ actually.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
Ok, so lesson learned. I had called a guy in the past who came out and seemed to be very smart and was a nice guy to boot. He explained everything about how the doors worked, almost too well though, very academic and he was well studied.

However, the springs keep failing. He was supposed to have put on high-cycle heavy duty springs last time, but that was 2+ years ago and he was out 4 years ago and then at least one or two other times over the past 10 years.

So I called someone else, they came out with the new springs with a 2 year warranty no-questions-asked if they fail in that time frame. They offered high-cycle springs for an extra $50/side but they couldn't get them by yesterday and they offered a 5-year warranty with that, but I needed the door fixed yesterday so I just went with what the guy had on his truck.

He was very fast, very professional, didn't try to upsell me and at first told me that the track runner sometimes get stripped out on these, but he looked at it and said it looked great (which it did because I replace it myself 2 years ago) ... anyhow, the door has NEVER been this quiet in the entire time we've lived in the house.

So, lesson learned. When something keeps failing over and over ... yes we do use it a lot, but it's also possible that we didn't have a good fit between our needs and what the vendor had to offer.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
Ugh. This is like the 5th time in 10 years that we've had to get garage door work done. Just insane. Our house is situated in such a way that it's an l-shaped house with a garage on one side of the L and that is the way that we get in and out of the house 90% of the time. Cars, going to the park, just want to go outside and see if its raining... We go outside through the garage door. So I don't really know if its four sets of springs are five sets of springs but this is crazy, so I'm going with a new company this time and I'll be out here in the next 15 minutes and hopefully they can get these the springs replaced and when I can have a problem again for a few years.
Another spring broke. Glad this one is under warranty.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
Had them replaced but now the garage door is not working, the door is SUPER light to lift, I think the guy made the springs too tight. He left with the door up and it never worked at all. Honestly, that's not cool but they did cover it under warranty even though I didn't have the receipt handy.

I guess I'll go try to find a deal on a new garage door opener and see if that will do the trick.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
Here's the finished opener. I've got video of it but my phone keeps overheating so it's a bit of a bummer.

20160712_084939.jpg
20160709_174806.jpg
 

tibadoe

Moderator
Staff member
1000 Posts
Community Leader
Nice job. Never had to install one - how difficult to replace one?
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
If you follow directions properly, granted that the directions are written properly, probably about 90 minutes total time.
 

toyotafan

Toyota Truck Club Founder
Staff member
1000 Posts
The battery backup is what makes this so sweet. As this is the main entry into the house, when the power goes out during one of these spring storms we get every year or the 1 in 5 years that we get hit hard with a snow/ice storm with power outages ... it's nice to have power to get the door up and down.
 

kennythewelder

Super Moderator
Staff member
100 Posts
I hear you. We bought a generator some time back for those storm situations. Although it almost never snows here, we do have the occasional, hurricane. I bought the gen after one and wired it into the breaker in my shop that powers my welding mech. I just trip the main feed breaker in the house, unplug the welder, in the shop, and plug the gen there.Crank her up and we have power. I have a 8.5 KW so it will run everything except the AC unit, but I have a window unit for the living room for that. We close the back of the house off, and we are good to go. Lol we just sleep in the living room and all is well. We are about 35 miles from the Gulf cost and not in a flood zone, so trees are the only real issue. We have been as long as a week or so before with out power. The gen is nice to have. You just need to be sure to have enough gas to run it.
 
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