Garage door sensor repair when your door won't close
A garage door that won't close, or drops and pops back up, usually has a sensor problem: dirty lens, bumped bracket, pinched wire or low sun. We find which one and fix it.
Usual visit: About 1 hour
What a sensor problem looks like from the driveway
- The door goes down a foot or two, then reverses back up.
- The opener's light flashes a pattern and the door stays open.
- It closes fine in the morning but fails on sunny afternoons.
- It closes only if your finger stays on the wall control the whole time.
- One of the little lights on the sensors is blinking or dark.
- A bike, a trash can or the car bumped one of the sensors.
How the safety sensors work
A pair of small eyes is bolted to the tracks a few inches up, one left and one right. The first shines an invisible beam across the opening; the second looks for it. Break that beam during a close, and the opener halts and reverses.
Federal safety rules require openers to reverse before they trap anyone, and the sensors are a big part of that. Many openers flash their bulb when the beam is blocked. Many also allow a close while you keep pressing the wall control. That's a backup for emergencies, not a repair.
What we check, and what we fix
- Alignment. Bikes, bins and bumpers bend the brackets. We straighten or replace them and line the eyes up until both lights hold steady.
- Lenses and housings. Dust, cobwebs and cracked covers. A cracked housing lets water in, and wet sensors act up.
- Wiring. The thin wire from each eye to the opener runs along the wall and the ceiling. A staple driven too hard, a shelf screwed through it or a rodent can cut the signal. We trace it end to end and replace damaged runs.
- Dead sensors. When an eye fails, we replace the pair with sensors made for your opener.
Then we test two ways: the door must reverse when an object interrupts the beam, and when it meets an object on the floor. If the sensors check out and the door still won't close, the cause is somewhere else; the troubleshooting guide covers the other suspects.
Why your garage door won't close in the sun
Low sun can shine straight into the receiving eye and drown out the beam, so the opener thinks something is in the way. It tends to hit garages that face west in the late afternoon, and it can come and go over the year as the sun's angle shifts. The fix is simple: shade the receiving eye, or swap the two eyes so the receiver faces away from the sun.
Questions about doors that won't come down
Most of the time, the safety sensors think something is in the way. Check for dirt on the lenses, an object near the tracks and a blinking sensor light. If all three look fine, the opener's force or travel setting may be off, and that's a job for us.
Low afternoon sun hitting the receiving eye can blind it, so the opener reads the beam as blocked. Shading that eye or swapping the two sides usually ends the problem.
Holding the control works as a stopgap, but you have to watch the door all the way down, because the sensors aren't protecting anyone while you do it. Get them fixed soon.
Sensors have to match your opener, and ones made for a different opener may not work with it. We fit sensors made for your unit, then test that the door reverses.
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.