If your garage door and opener have stopped working properly and you need to operate the overhead garage door manually then here are some important tips.
Virtually all makes of automatic garage door openers have some type of built in emergency disconnect, or release mechanism that allows you to disengage the automatic opener from the garage door and open it manually.
If you need garage door repair and need to work the overhead door manually you would pull this emergency disconnect on the garage door opener and then lift the garage door by hand. It’s very important to remember that the disconnect is only beneficial if you need a garage door opener repair and not if the garage door is the problem. This scenario would include a power outage at your home or a garage door opener that is malfunctioning.
When the garage door needs repair pulling the disconnect mechanism may serve no purpose at all and could actually cause injury or the need for additional garage door repairs.
If you need to disconnect the door from the opener for manual operation until a garage door repair can be made it’s always best to do so with the overhead garage door in the closed position. The reason being is that the garage door opener might still pull the overhead door open even if the garage door springs are out of balance and the garage door is heavy. Pulling the disconnect with springs out of balance could cause the garage door to crash to the ground. A broken garage door spring may be the cause of your garage door repair and if you are unaware the spring is broken and you pull the emergency release when the garage door is in the open position it will crash to the ground and damage or injure anything or anyone in its path.
If your garage door needs repair visually check for a broken spring before pulling your emergency disconnect!
Blog post provided by Woodstock Garage Door Repair Company
