Spring Cleaning & Maintenance for Garage Doors

Spring is here—time to clean & inspect your garage doors.

Springtime brings many wonderful activities and opportunities. Unfortunately it also brings many spring cleaning chores. You may be tempted to skip some of these chores, but be aware that if you don’t take time to clean and care for your garage door at least once per year, it simply won’t last as long, perform as well, or look as beautiful as it could.

Here are some key spring cleaning and maintenance tasks that will help protect and beautify your garage doors.

Wash the Door

Over time, dust and dirt will definitely accumulate on your garage doors. If your door has windows, these may become streaked or spotted and if your garage door is located too close to sprinklers or shrubbery it may even have mildew spots. Fortunately, you can easily clean your garage door with a scrub brush and some mild soap. If you have a wood garage door, remember not to use a powerwasher because this might damage softer types of wood.

Consider Repainting or Refinishing

Unless your wood garage doors are unfinished, they are going to require repainting or refinishing every few years. Spring cleaning is an excellent opportunity to take a close look at the doors, evaluate the condition of the paint or finish, and decide if this will be the year you redo them. If you have decorative iron hardware on your garage door, check to be sure it is firmly attached and free of rust. If you see any rust, you will want to remove it promptly before it can stain your door.

Inspect the Door for Damage

While you’re spring cleaning, don’t forget to tend to some garage door maintenance tasks too. One important task is to visually inspect the entire door and opener system for wear or damage. Make sure the weather stripping along the bottom of the door is intact as this will help maintain stable temperatures in the garage (which is important to prevent stress on wood garage doors) as well as keep out bugs, mice, and other unwelcome guests.

Run the garage door through a few open and close cycles and watch carefully for any unusual rattles, screeches, or jerky movements that could indicate a problem. You may also want to lubricate your garage door springs, but be sure to keep the WD-40 away from the garage door tracks as you do not want them to attract dirt.

Finally, check the door balance by closing the door and pulling the manual release cord. Open the door about 3 feet and see if it stays in place. If it does not, the balance needs to be professionally adjusted.

Check Safety Features

One final task is to test the safety features on your garage door. This includes the auto reverse feature and the photo eye sensors. You can check the auto reverse by placing a 2×4 in the path of the door. The door should just barely touch the wood before reversing back up. Now try this same test with a taller object in place. The photo eye sensors should detect it and prevent the garage door from closing at all.