What should I check first when a garage door won’t open?
Press the wall button once and watch for three seconds. One of three things happens: nothing at all, the opener runs but the door stays down, or the door starts up and quits. Each of those points at a different failure, and two of the three have checks you can do yourself in a few minutes.
Nothing happens at all
Silence means the opener has no power or no instruction is reaching it.
- Check the outlet. Openers plug into a ceiling receptacle, and garage circuits around here often share a GFCI with an outside outlet. Find the reset button, often in the garage or on the patio circuit, and try it.
- Try the wall button instead of the remote. If the wall works and the remote doesn’t, it’s a remote battery or pairing job, not a door job.
- Look for a lock icon on the wall console. Holding the lock button disables every remote, and it gets pressed by accident more than anyone admits.
If the outlet is live and both buttons do nothing, the opener’s board has likely died. Storm surges take a yearly toll on boards in this part of Green Country, and the opener repair page covers what a board swap versus a new unit costs.
The motor runs but the door doesn’t move
This one you can hear: the opener hums or the chain rattles overhead while the door sits still.
- On most units, the trolley has been disconnected. If someone pulled the red release cord, the opener runs without the door. Our power outage guide shows the re-engagement step.
- A grinding hum usually means the drive gear stripped. It’s a nylon gear, it wears out on schedule, and it’s one of the cheaper opener repairs.
There’s a third possibility, and it’s the important one. If the opener strains and the door barely lifts an inch, let go of the button and lift the door by hand a few inches. Heavy like a truck tailgate? The torsion spring is broken and the opener has been trying to lift the whole door alone. Stop cycling it before the strain kills the gear too. That repair lives on the spring repair page, and it’s not a DIY job at any skill level.
The door starts up and stops partway
A door that begins to rise and reverses or freezes is protecting itself.
- Cold mornings stiffen old rollers and dry tracks; the opener reads the resistance as an obstruction and gives up. A silicone-based garage door lube on rollers and hinges (never grease in the tracks) fixes a share of these.
- A door that stops at the same height every time often has a bent track section or a failing roller right at that spot. Look at the track at that height for a dent or a roller hanging crooked.
- If the door moved fine last week and binds today after wind, check the tracks for a new lean. Wind works fasteners loose here, and a track a half-inch out of plumb is enough to bind a door.
A binding door is the one case where continuing to run it makes everything worse: rollers pop out, cables jump, and a $150 problem becomes an off-track rebuild. When the door fights the track, park it and call.
When is a stuck door an emergency?
When it traps a car you need, or when it’s stuck partway open with night coming. Both cases jump the schedule at the emergency page. A door stuck fully closed with the cars outside can usually wait a day without drama; a door stuck open cannot.