Broken Garage Door Spring Replacement, Torsion and Extension

It usually announces itself with a single loud bang from the garage, often at night, with nobody near the door. The next morning the opener strains, lifts the door a few inches, and gives up. That is a torsion spring letting go after its last cycle.

Springs are the one part of a garage door that is guaranteed to fail eventually. A standard residential torsion spring is commonly rated around 10,000 cycles, and a family that uses the garage as the front door can burn through that in a handful of years. Bennett Garage Doors replaces torsion and extension springs on residential and commercial doors, and sizes the new springs to the actual weight of the door rather than guessing from the old part.

Please do not try to lift the door by hand or run the opener again. With the spring gone, the opener is lifting dead weight it was never built to carry, and the door can come down fast.

Signs you need this service

• A loud bang or crack from the garage, followed by a door that will not go up.
• A visible gap of an inch or two in the coil of the spring above the door.
• The opener lifts the door six to twelve inches, then stops or reverses.
• The door is far heavier than before when the opener is released.
• Cables have gone slack or jumped off the drums on one or both sides.
• The top section of the door is bent where the opener arm attaches, from the opener trying to force a dead door.
• On extension-spring doors, one side rises faster than the other and the door hangs crooked.
• The door drifts down on its own after you stop it partway up.

What the service covers

Garage door springs counterbalance the door so that a few hundred pounds of steel feels like a few pounds at the handle. Torsion springs mount on a steel shaft above the door and twist to store energy; cables wound on drums at each end of the shaft lift the door as the spring unwinds. Extension springs run alongside the horizontal tracks and stretch as the door closes. Torsion systems are standard on newer doors and on anything wide or heavy; extension systems still turn up on older single-car doors and low-headroom garages.

Replacement means removing the broken spring under controlled conditions, installing a spring of the correct wire size, inside diameter, and length for the door's weight, winding it to the right number of turns, and resetting the cables and drums so both sides lift evenly. On a two-spring door, both springs are replaced together; they have the same cycle count on them, and the second one is usually close behind.

What the visit typically involves

Repair or replace?

Springs are not repaired; a broken spring is replaced. The real decision is whether to replace one spring or both on a two-spring door, and whether to move to a higher-cycle spring while the door is apart.

Replacing both springs at once is almost always the right call. They were installed together, have the same wear, and the labor is already being done. High-cycle springs (rated for several times the standard count) cost more up front but make sense for busy households and for commercial doors that open dozens of times a day. If the door panels are rusted out or the door has no wind rating, a technician may suggest putting the spring money toward a new door instead.

What affects the scope and price

Bennett quotes after looking at the door. These are the factors that move a job from simple to involved:

• One spring or two. Doors over roughly eight feet wide usually run two torsion springs, and replacing both at once is standard practice.
• Spring size. Heavier insulated doors, wood doors, and commercial doors need larger-diameter, longer springs.
• Cycle rating. Standard springs are commonly rated around 10,000 cycles; higher-cycle springs are a step up.
• Torsion versus extension. Extension-spring jobs include safety cables and often a pulley check; torsion jobs may include new end bearings and a center bearing.
• Collateral parts. Cables that frayed when the spring let go, or a top section bent by the opener, add to the job.
• Conversion. Some owners choose to convert an extension-spring door to torsion springs at the same time for smoother, safer operation.

Frequently asked questions

Where we do this work

Bennett travels to the customer from Riviera Beach. A few of the communities we cover for this service: