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  Feb. 15, 2011 9:08 p.m. Strizzo SuperDork

  come home this evening, pull into the driveway and hit the button, garage door goes up about a foot and a half and stops. i put it back down, get out of the truck and help the door up as i hit the remote. what i saw confirmed my suspicion, broken torsion spring.
  

  i know someone on here replaced one not too long ago, looking to find out what a reasonable price to have both springs replaced would be. i know i need to replace both springs since i've dealt with this before at a place i was renting. i've already been quoted $260 to do both springs and he could be out tomorrow morning any time. what says GRM?

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  Feb. 15, 2011 9:14 p.m. RexSeven Dork

  I think I remember that thread, and the one thing I got out of it is that this is one of those rare jobs that's better left to the professionals, lest you be killed by a flying torsion spring.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 9:22 p.m. Datsun1500 Dork

  This ^^^ You can get killed, quickly.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 9:59 p.m. Strizzo SuperDork

  yeah, i know that this is best left to the professionals, that is why i'm looking for guidance on what is a reasonable price to pay to have both springs replaced and the rest of the system checked out. so far i've been quoted 260 from one company and a range of 180 to 220 with galvanized springs that are supposed to last longer from another.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 10:00 p.m. SVreX SuperDork

  Those sound fair to me.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 10:09 p.m. carguy123 SuperDork

  I did mine with no hassles whatsoever. You are just winding a spring up. They give you a bar to stick in a hole and you just wind it. Don't let go of the bar or let it slip out of the hole, but it's actually quite easy.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 10:27 p.m. nocones HalfDork

  I replaced 4 of them on the 4 doors in my house when I put up new doors. Unwound the old ones and wound the new ones. To my knowledge I am not deceased. I suppose could be living in an alternate plane of existence enabling me to witness and possibly even influence events happening back in the living world and yet be completely un-aware..

  It wasn't hard to do, and I was not uncomfortable. I was more woried about being on the step ladder than the springs. That said if you are uncofortable by all means pay to have it done. My springs where $50 a door. I put new cables on at the same time.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 11:08 p.m. mattmacklind SuperDork

  As soon as I read the title of this thread, my first thought was "what broke"? Ugh.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 11:10 p.m. Strizzo SuperDork

  nocones wrote:

  I replaced 4 of them on the 4 doors in my house when I put up new doors. Unwound the old ones and wound the new ones. To my knowledge I am not deceased. I suppose could be living in an alternate plane of existence enabling me to witness and possibly even influence events happening back in the living world and yet be completely un-aware..

  It wasn't hard to do, and I was not uncomfortable. I was more woried about being on the step ladder than the springs. That said if you are uncofortable by all means pay to have it done. My springs where $50 a door. I put new cables on at the same time.

  where did you get the springs from? one of the guys i talked to said there are 4 different weight classes of doors and you have to get the right spring

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  Feb. 15, 2011 11:14 p.m. 16vCorey SuperDork

  carguy123 wrote:

  I did mine with no hassles whatsoever. You are just winding a spring up. They give you a bar to stick in a hole and you just wind it. Don't let go of the bar or let it slip out of the hole, but it's actually quite easy.

  Truth. I helped my dad do a set on our new garage doors when I was about 12, and we're both still alive.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 11:23 p.m. nocones HalfDork

  I got my springs from menards. There are lots of places however that you can order them online. You weigh your door with a bathroom scale and that tells you the weight (unless you know the model number). You the either buy 1 spring or 2 oposite wound ones depending on your wieght.

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  Feb. 15, 2011 11:39 p.m. DoctorBlade HalfDork

  I called someone to get it done, paid about $130 for one spring. Guy had it done in 30 minutes, from open to shut. Sure, I could have puzzled it out given time and money, but it was almost worth the money to see the pro go at it.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 12:06 a.m. Lesley SuperDork

  OMG, pay someone else to do it. A guy I worked with thought he'd tackle it himself... and had rods and screws holding his hand together after multiple operations. What a mess.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 12:07 a.m. carguy123 SuperDork

  Lesley wrote:

  OMG, pay someone else to do it. A guy I worked with thought he'd tackle it himself... and had rods and screws holding his hand together after multiple operations. What a mess.

  Please don't drive either, my daughter broke her arm and has a number of titanium pins in her wrist and arm. You're better off walking.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 5:07 a.m. Ignorant SuperDork

  garage door opener? in texas? What are your arms broken?

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  Feb. 16, 2011 7:35 a.m. Datsun1500 Dork

  It sounds like it will cost $50 a spring to buy them yourself and you have quotes of $200 to get it done by someone else. What is your time worth? $100 to do it myself vs $200 to not worry about it is an easy decision for me, most likely because I have never done it before. I think most here would do the work on their car to save the $$$, but we are car guys....

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  Feb. 16, 2011 7:48 a.m. alfadriver SuperDork

  Datsun1500 wrote:

  It sounds like it will cost $50 a spring to buy them yourself and you have quotes of $200 to get it done by someone else. What is your time worth? $100 to do it myself vs $200 to not worry about it is an easy decision for me, most likely because I have never done it before. I think most here would do the work on their car to save the $$$, but we are car guys....

  that's kind of how I saw it, too. Although, my garage opener was strong enough to rip out the mount in the upper door, too. oops. So it was good money to have them swap the door tops of my two doors.

  Springs make me nervous, sure. But so did suspenion work, and welding, etc. With the right precautions, it's not too hard to do.
  

  I actually try not to work on my Miata for the same reason. Time vs. money.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 7:49 a.m. Strizzo SuperDork

  Datsun1500 wrote:

  It sounds like it will cost $50 a spring to buy them yourself and you have quotes of $200 to get it done by someone else. What is your time worth? $100 to do it myself vs $200 to not worry about it is an easy decision for me, most likely because I have never done it before. I think most here would do the work on their car to save the $$$, but we are car guys....

  this is where i'm at as well. i learned the hard way that the $79 opener installation is well worth the money on a fresh door install. seems like that's the way it is with garage doors.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 8:04 a.m. pinchvalve SuperDork

  The remote keypad for my garage door crapped out this week. Is this a conspiracy? Are garage door going on strike?

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  Feb. 16, 2011 8:31 a.m. stuart in mn SuperDork

  DoctorBlade wrote:

  I called someone to get it done, paid about $130 for one spring. Guy had it done in 30 minutes, from open to shut. Sure, I could have puzzled it out given time and money, but it was almost worth the money to see the pro go at it.

  This is what I did. I installed the garage door in the first place myself without any problems, but when one of the springs finally broke I called a repairman.

  Mainly, I hired someone to do the work because it was 15 below zero that day. He replaced both springs in about 20 minutes, I figured it was worth the money.

  There's a point - if one spring broke, go ahead and replace them both. They have a limited life span, and the other one will probably break soon anyway, so you may as well take care of it now.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 10:44 a.m. benzbaron HalfDork

  When the spring broke on mine it only lost about 1-2in of spring. I cut off the broken part off the lift shaft. I had a hell of a time trying to get the spring wound and ended up spending 75$ to have a garage door guy wind the springs, while I watched. The biggest difficulty in winding the springs is keeping tension on the wire to the lift drums. What you do is use a vice grip to keep tension on one drum while you wind the other side. This keeps the wire from losing tension and coming out of the lift drum. It isn't really that difficult of a job once you understand what is happening. I don't know if it is worth doing yourself though. It took the garage door master like 20min to fix everything and he mentioned the garage door opener is crapping out.
  

  The garage door guy also said to lube the springs and all the linkages up.

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  Feb. 16, 2011 12:13 p.m. Strizzo SuperDork

  well, ended up spending the morning watching the garage door guy replace both springs in a little under an hour. the r&r ended up costing 195 and i went ahead and had them replace the rollers and hinges since the rollers were wearing out and were not designed for a 16' door, causing the hinges to start cracking.

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