Video: A Common Cause of Garage Door Problems

HAYWARD — Host, Sarah Rutan: If your garage door won’t open or close, you might think there’s a major malfunction, but in many cases, the solution is quite simple. Today we’re in Fremont with Diamond Certified Expert Contributors Pat and Amie Prendergast to learn more.

Diamond Certified Expert Contributor, Pat Prendergast: Today we want to give you a tip on how to potentially fix your own garage door problem, which may be just the censor eyes, which you can line up yourself. If your door won’t go down, then it’s possible that it’s just the sensor eyes and you can fix it yourself. If your door won’t go up, you probably need a professional to come out and help you fix your door.

But you can see here there’s a green light and it’s solid, and if they’re both solid on either side, that means the two lights are meeting each other and it’s safe for the door to go down. Often people think that both lights have to be green, that’s not true. They both have to be solid, generally, depending upon the opener and the sensor eyes used.

So if something’s in the way, you can see that the light will go out, because it thinks that there is something in the way and therefore the door should not go down as a safety precaution. As I take my hand away, you can see the solid green light comes off. Lots of things can cause the safety eyes to not see each other. Sometimes people will inadvertently hit them, and therefore they won’t be lined up.

Sometimes there’s cobwebs or dirt that grows over time so it thinks that there’s something in the way, or sometimes there actually is something in the way, as you can see when I put this in the way of the sensor eye it turns off.

Diamond Certified Expert Contributor, Amie Prendergast: Another way to check to see if it’s your sensor eyes that are the issue is to try closing your garage door. If the light is blinking and it’s making a clicking noise, it most likely is your sensor eyes. So you can save yourself some time and money by checking your sensor eyes before calling us.

Host, Sarah Rutan: To learn more from local top-rated companies, visit our Diamond Certified Expert Reports at experts.diamondcertified.org.