Garage door opens more slowly than it used to
This is almost always a rising friction, or an opener losing power. Repair costs $130 to $400 and takes 45 to 90 minutes. Safe to operate: Yes, but book it.
Check this first — it may cost you nothing
Disconnect and lift by hand. If it feels heavy or drags, the door is the problem. If it lifts easily, the opener is losing power and that is a different repair.
Why this happens
Doors do not slow down on their own. Either the door has become harder to move — dry bearings, worn rollers, falling spring tension — or the opener is weakening. The first is far more common.
A slowing door is dragging somewhere — dry hardware, tired springs or a struggling opener. A tune-up finds which before something fails outright.
Less likely, but possible
- Spring tension falling as the springs approach end of life
- Rollers with failed bearings
- A capacitor beginning to fail, which shows first as slow starting
What happens if I ignore it?
Whatever is adding friction keeps adding it, and the opener draws more current every cycle to compensate. This is the early stage of several more expensive failures.
The repair: tune-up
A garage door tune-up costs $100 to $250 and includes balance adjustment, hardware tightening, lubrication, safety-reversal testing and sensor alignment. It is genuinely worth it on a door over five years old, and largely unnecessary on a newer one.
Read the full tune-up guide →Get a tech dispatched
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