Garage door won't open on an icy morning? Freeze-thaw, freezing rain and salt

Check the springs before anything else

Look up at the steel bar above the top of the door. A broken torsion spring shows an open split in the coil, and it usually announces itself with a loud bang. Older doors may have extension springs running beside the side tracks instead.

If a spring is broken:

• Stop pressing the opener. It can't lift the full weight of the door.
• Don't lift the door by hand, and don't pull the release with the door partly open. Chamberlain warns that a door with weak or broken springs may fall rapidly and without warning (Chamberlain).
• Don't touch the spring, the cables or the bottom brackets. They are all under heavy tension.

What to look for and why springs go is in garage door spring broken. Springs intact? Carry on.

Has the bottom seal frozen to the slab?

This is the Halifax pattern. Wet snow falls off the car or blows under the door, a mild spell turns it to water along the threshold, and the overnight freeze bonds the rubber seal to the concrete. In the morning the opener hums, lifts the door an inch, and stops or reverses.

Garaga, a Canadian door maker, says not to run an electric opener on a door stuck in ice, because it can seriously damage the motor (Garaga). Instead:

1. Make sure the door is fully closed, then pull the red release cord to disconnect the opener.
2. Unlock the inside slide lock, if the door has one.
3. Tap along the bottom of the door with a hammer against a piece of 2x4. The wood spreads the blow so the ice cracks and the panel doesn't dent.
4. Scrape the remaining ice off the floor with a plastic scraper, working along the concrete rather than at the rubber.
5. Dry the threshold so nothing is left to refreeze tonight.

Keep the shovel and the ice chopper away from the seal. A torn seal lets more water in, and more water means more frozen mornings.

Did freezing rain glaze the door or tracks?

Freezing rain is the other Halifax special. It coats whatever it lands on, and a garage door can end up sealed along its edges, with ice in the gaps between sections and along the parts of the track nearest the opening.

• Look before you press. If the door and frame are visibly glazed, don't let the opener fight it.
• Clear the edges where the door meets the frame and the gaps between sections by hand, gently, with a plastic scraper.
• Check the lower track sections for ice that would stop a roller.
• Don't strike the panels hard. Steel skins dent, and a dented section can bind in the track afterwards.

Once the edges and tracks are clear, lift the door by hand with the opener released. If it moves freely, reconnect the opener as your manual describes.

Are the rollers and hinges stiff or rusted?

Two things stiffen a door over a coastal winter. Grease thickens in the cold, and salt air and road salt corrode rollers, bearings and hinges until they drag. A door with both problems feels heavy and jerky by hand, or squeals and shudders as it runs.

LiftMaster's guidance is to lubricate the rollers, bearings and hinges with white lithium grease and to leave the tracks ungreased. Choose a garage door lubricant rated for cold, and do it in the fall rather than mid-January. If a roller is rusted solid or a hinge is cracked, lubricant won't save it; those parts get replaced. The fall routine is in how to winterize a garage door.

Is the power out after the storm?

Nor'easters and ice storms take down power lines, and without power the opener can't move the door, frozen or not. If the springs are intact and the door is fully closed, the manual release lets you lift it by hand; the safe steps are in garage door manual release. If the door is iced to the floor as well, free the seal first, as above.

When the power returns, the door stays disconnected until you reconnect it, which is why so many openers seem dead the day after a storm.

A word on carbon monoxide. If you're waiting out a cold morning, don't start the car in the garage to warm up. Health Canada advises against idling a vehicle in a garage even with the door open, because carbon monoxide builds up and can get into the house (Health Canada). Wait inside, and run the car only once it's out on the driveway.

Does the opener stop or reverse partway?

Openers sense how hard they're working. A door made stiffer by cold grease, rust or a dragging seal can push past that limit, so the opener stops or reverses as if it hit something.

Resist the urge to turn the force up. LiftMaster says never to use the force adjustment to make up for a binding or sticking door, and never to set it beyond the minimum needed to close the door (LiftMaster). Extra force means the door can crush something before it reverses.

The order is: free the door, lubricate it, check that it balances by hand, and only then look at the opener. After any change, test the safety reverse: the door must reverse when it closes on a 1-1/2 inch object or a 2x4 laid flat.

If only the remote or the outside keypad has stopped working while the wall button still runs the door, see garage door opener not working; a cold battery or the lock button is the usual answer.

How do I keep it from freezing shut again?

• Keep the threshold dry. Garaga suggests clearing snow from in front of the door as it falls and knocking snow off the car before you drive in.
• Treat the bottom seal. Garaga recommends a silicone-based lubricant on the bottom weatherseal so it doesn't stick to cold ground.
• Watch the forecast for freezing rain and run the door once before the ice arrives, then again in the morning before you need it.
• Wipe salt and grime off the lower door, rollers and tracks on mild days through the winter.
• Keep the door closed when you can. The industry's technical sheet on spring life advises keeping doors closed in places with frequent precipitation or near a saline coast (DASMA TDS-190).
• Replace a cracked or flattened seal in the fall, not after it has frozen down twice.

If the seal is free and the door still won't move, the springs look wrong, or the opener keeps reversing on a door that lifts easily by hand, that's when to call. Garage doors are a 24/7 service: see garage door repair.