Off-track garage door and cable repair in Plantation and Davie
Door hanging crooked or out of its tracks? First we lower it safely and track down why it jumped: usually a snapped cable, a bent track or a knock from a car bumper.
Usual visit: 1 to 2 hours
How a door looks when it's off track
- The door sits crooked, with one end lower.
- A cable snapped, or it hangs slack at a bottom corner.
- On one side, the rollers have jumped out of their channel.
- The track is dented where a car or a bike hit it.
- The door jammed halfway and the opener kept running.
- There's a wedge of daylight under one side when it's closed.
Why a door comes off track on one side
A garage door hangs from two cables, one at each bottom corner. When one cable breaks or unwinds from its drum, that corner has nothing holding it up, so it sags. Its rollers pop out, and the whole door twists.
Other common causes: a car or a mower bumping the track, brackets that worked loose, worn rollers, something left under one side as the door came down, or a broken spring that let a cable go slack.
Cable snapped: what the repair involves
- We lock the door in place with clamps and unwind the springs.
- We replace both cables. They wore together, and the second one is rarely far behind.
- We check the drums, the bearings and the springs. A weak spring can let a cable jump its drum.
- We set the rollers back in the track and line up both tracks.
- We wind the springs, confirm by hand that the door balances, then test the opener's limits and its safety reverse.
Track brackets on a door rated for wind
On a door rated for Broward, the track is part of the approved design. The approved drawing sets the type of bracket, how many there are and how far apart the screws go.
So when a track is bent past saving, we replace it with track and brackets that match your door's approved drawing. A heavier track or a longer roller can be part of what an approval requires.
Bent track: straighten or swap?
A shallow dent in the horizontal track can sometimes be worked back into shape. A track that is kinked, twisted or torn at a bracket gets replaced, because the rollers will catch on it again. We show you the bend and tell you which one it is before we start.
Need a new door instead? Both cities require a permit, and we file it under our license.
Cables and tracks: common questions
Rehanging a garage door yourself is reasonable only with the door down, both cables intact, and a single roller slipped loose. A door hanging crooked from a snapped cable is still under spring tension and can drop when moved. Leave that one to us.
Most cables snap from wear and rust where they wrap around the bottom bracket. A broken spring, a worn drum, or a door that ran out of balance for months can also do it.
An off-track door can wait until tomorrow if it rests on the floor and nobody goes near it. Unplug the opener, clear the area, and call if the house can't be locked. Our emergency garage door repair page explains what counts as urgent.
We replace both cables. They went in together and share the load equally, so the other one has worn just as much.
Related services
Start with the symptom
Call or text with what you see and hear, plus your ZIP code. Home visits Monday to Saturday. If your door won't close, we come any day to secure it.