What to do when a Garage Door Remote Fails

Is your garage door remote misbehaving? Sooner or later, garage door remote failure could happen to you. Today we’re going to talk about some of the reasons your garage door won’t open or close. The day may come when you roll up to your garage, hit the remote, and nothing happens. If that occurs, we hope someone else is home or that you still have a key to your front door. Today, we’re going to give you some tips on troubleshooting a non-working remote.

WHEN THE DOOR WON’T OPEN

If your usual remote fails, and you have a second remote, try to use that and see if it works. If it doesn’t, there are a couple of other things to try.

• If you don’t live alone, check the power plug on the ceiling to see if someone unplugged the remote. We think it never happens, except when it does, and checking it is just a matter of looking up.

• Then check the control pad. If it’s locked, the garage door won’t open. Unlock it and see if that fixes the problem.

• If it’s only one of the remotes which has failed, it could be one of two problems. First, try to replace the battery. If that doesn’t work or apply, try reprogramming it.

• In some cases LED lights in the garage will cause a remote not to work or make it perform poorly. They can interfere with the remote signal to the antenna. In that case, you may need to switch the bulbs to CFL. Or, you can try Genie LED bulbs, which are made to work without causing garage door remote interference.

If neither remote works, give us a call. Your garage door opener needs to be repaired.

WHEN THE REMOTE WON’T CLOSE THE DOOR

If your remote control won’t close the door, but the wall control will, it could be a problem with your eye sensors. If they’re clean and lined up correctly, their lights will be glowing but not blinking.

If the door closes but then goes right back up, it could be one of several things. The first is that there is something in the way of the door closing.  Another possibility is that the open and close limits are incorrectly set. When the door hits the ground, it’s convinced it hit a foreign object. Your owner’s manual might be of some help with calibrating it correctly.

THE GHOST

When a garage door opens and closes by itself, you might be convinced that you have a ghost in your garage, that someone in your neighborhood has the same remote frequency as you do, or that thieves have hacked your garage door. But, it’s usually something much less exciting: a short in the wires. While it’s not as scintillating as the other options, it’s the most likely culprit.

If your garage door remote isn’t working, or if the door isn’t working, see if one of our suggestions helps. If not, give us a call. We can help!

Call Quick Response Garage Door Service:  we are your Arizona garage door service specialists.
602-274-3667 (Phoenix) or 520-219-3667 (Tucson)