Buffalo Grove, IL · Same-day service
Cable Repair on Buffalo Grove's Two-Car Doors
A lift cable is a thin steel rope running from the bottom corner of the door up to a drum at the top of the track. There are two of them, one each side, and they only do their job as a pair.
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When one lets go, the door climbs on the good side and stays put on the other. It wedges in the opening at an angle, one cable takes everything the pair was sharing, and the door is now hanging off half the hardware it was built to use.
Look at the Bottom Six Inches With a Torch
Cables nearly always begin to fail at the bottom, where they loop onto the bracket at the base of the door. That is where meltwater off the car sits on the concrete through a Chicagoland winter, and where road salt gets carried in on tyres and left to dry.
Take a torch and look at the last stretch of cable above each bottom bracket. One that has started to go looks fuzzy, with individual strands broken and standing proud of the twist. Rust staining and a flattened section are the other two things worth spotting. Any of the three and the door should be left alone until it is replaced, because once a cable starts unwinding it finishes quickly.
When the Door Comes Down on Something
The other way cables fail here has nothing to do with age. A two-car garage holds two cars, bins, bikes and a shelf of paint tins, and sooner or later the door comes down on a roof box, a ladder or an open tailgate. The door stops, the opener keeps paying out for a moment, and the slack cable jumps clean off its drum.
That leaves the cable sitting in the wrong groove or wrapped over itself, and the next cycle drags the door out of square. The cable itself may look perfectly sound. It is still the same job, because the drum has to come loose, the cable be seated properly and both sides brought back to equal tension.
Both Cables, Both Drums, One Setting
Cables get replaced in pairs. The survivor is the same age, has lifted the same door the same number of times and has sat in the same damp corner, so changing one is buying a second appointment.
With the tension safely off, the drums are loosened on the shaft, the new cables seated and wound, and both drums set to the same number of turns. Set them unevenly and the door runs crooked no matter how good the new cable is. Springs, bottom brackets, rollers and the bottom seal all get a look while everything is apart, because whatever took the cable out normally left its mark somewhere else too.
Other work we do in Buffalo Grove
- Torsion Springs
- Extension Springs
- Roller Repair
- Panel Replacement
- Smart Openers
- Commercial
- Custom Doors
- Maintenance
- Safety Inspection
- Lubrication
- Spring Replacement
- Opener Repair
- Installation
- Emergency Service
- Track Repair
Cable Repair in nearby towns
More on garage door cable repair, or everything we cover in Buffalo Grove.
Questions
Buffalo Grove questions about this job
How do I tell a cable problem from a broken spring?
Look at the shape of the door. A cable failure leaves it crooked, one bottom corner low and the door skewed in the opening. A spring failure usually leaves the door square but far too heavy to lift, and there will be a visible gap in the coil on the shaft above the opening.
Can I keep using the door until someone can get out?
No. On one cable the load is doubled on the side still working and the door is free to twist in the track. Running it that way is how a cable job becomes a cable, roller, track and section job. Park outside, use the side door, and leave it where it is.
The cable came off the drum but did not snap. Does it still need changing?
Not automatically. If the wire is clean and undamaged it can be re-seated and re-tensioned. If it has been kinked, crushed against the drum flange or has broken strands where it was pinched, it gets replaced, because a damaged cable will fail at that point later.
Why the warning about undoing the bottom bracket bolts?
That bracket is the anchor point for the cable, which means the full lifting force of the springs is sitting on it whenever the door is down. Undoing it without releasing the tension first is one of the ways people end up in hospital over a garage door.
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