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Anyone know anything about garage door openers?

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stickybones

What?
Joined
Dec 27, 2001
Messages
1,069
I have a Craftsman 1/2hp model 139.53975SRT1 opener that has recently stopped working correctly. The trouble shooting in the manual is of no help. :rolleyes: I checked the sensor "eyes" for obstructions and misalignment, but they seem good. The door rides smoothly with no binding and the door springs are still good. No difference in performance between the remote and wall button. The date of manufacture is 11/02 (my wife bought it for me for Christmas 2002) so it's only 3 years old.

Out of the blue, the door stopped functioning correctly. I pressed the wall button to open the door (to take the GN out of course) and the door only moved off the floor and inch or so and stopped. To get it all the way up I had to repeatedly hit the button and move the door a few inches at a time. Once up, it wouldn't move down no matter what I did. Since then, I've disconnected the door to operate it manually. Even with no door load, the trolly still won't move (well sometimes it'll move a few inches). You can hear something click/jerk in motor housing unit and the lights flash 10 times.

Called Sears and they say a garage door opener can only be serviced at home (it's the law whatever the heck that means). Mininum $65 charge. I'm pissed cause the thing is only 3 years old and it's already SNAFU. :mad:

Anyone know of common door opener problems I can investigate? I can't see paying Sears $65 to come to my house, tell me a $35 part needs replacing with a $50 labor charge when I can just buy a new opener for that total.

Again...damn junk that these big name companies sell with a lame 90 day warranty. :mad:
 
Ive seen several garage doors not work for several reasons. Genie screwdrive has a nylon bushing that breaks just outside the motor, sort of a relief valve. The roll pins need to be lubed with something like lithium grease, lube all the pins, not track. Follow the carrier, does it get stuck, or hop and release the door, sometimes the spring stretches. Did anyone mess with the force control that determines how hard it will pull up or push down?
 
For the first few months my Craftsman remote would open my door from around 150 feet away.Then all of a sudden I had to be right in front of the door,sometimes I have to press the button about 10 times before the door opens.I changed the battery,no help.Bought a new remote for $40,no help. :mad: The remote works fine from inside the garage. :tongue: My parents have an old Craftsman garage door opener and theirs still works good.Mine is a pos. :mad:
 
VADER said:
Ive seen several garage doors not work for several reasons. Genie screwdrive has a nylon bushing that breaks just outside the motor, sort of a relief valve. The roll pins need to be lubed with something like lithium grease, lube all the pins, not track. Follow the carrier, does it get stuck, or hop and release the door, sometimes the spring stretches. Did anyone mess with the force control that determines how hard it will pull up or push down?

Mines a chain drive

No the carrier doesn't get stuck anywhere. It's a smooth travel. The force controls were not touched since I first set them upon installation 3 years ago.
 
Joe Cancer said:
For the first few months my Craftsman remote would open my door from around 150 feet away.Then all of a sudden I had to be right in front of the door,sometimes I have to press the button about 10 times before the door opens.I changed the battery,no help.Bought a new remote for $40,no help. :mad: The remote works fine from inside the garage. :tongue: My parents have an old Craftsman garage door opener and theirs still works good.Mine is a pos. :mad:

I hear ya. Evidently, my "new" Craftsman is also a POS. The Stanley opener on my other garage door (2 car garage) was there when I bought the house nearly 9 years ago and it still works fine. :eek:
 
Damn....... I just installed the same GDO in my garage and it works great. From the sounds of your problem, it is related to the safety switch at he bottom of the door. When I tested the sensor, the door stops and the lite flashes a bunch of times. You may want to really take a close look at the sensors, maybe a dead bug in there somewhere or something hanging off the bottom of the door breaking the lite beam.....
 
Release the disconnect and see if the motor operates as normal. If so, the drive is binding. Adjust the sensitivity screw by the light on the back. If it does the same thing when disconnected and adjusted, the holding circuit is bad on the board.
 
Well externally the "eyes" seem OK. They're clean and there's nothing blocking the beam. I even went so far as to remove them and reinstall. I wish I could figure out a way to override them to see if that would cure the problem, but it seems like the control unit must have a signal from the sensors to operate. There's got to be a way to test it though????

As for the releasing the load on the drive, it didn't help. As indicated in my first post, it won't even move the trolly alone without flipping out.

I did some internet research and it seems like a logical problem based on my symptoms and diagnosis would be the circuit board. However, I'd hate to buy a new one, replace it and find that that's not the problem.

I'm stilled ticked off that this thing junked out in only 3 years.
 
I had a similar problem with my 3 yo Stanley just last year. No obstructions, alignment dead on, etc.

I had a friend who used to be an installer come by and he removed the cover to access the circuit board. He checked all of the connections on the circuit board and tapped lightly on one of the relay modules. It turned out that one of the relays was sticking. We closed it back up, reset the tension pots and the door has been fine ever since.

It really sucks having to open & close a garage door. :o :D

Good luck!
 
I took the "eyes" for mine and taped them together and mounted them on top of the unit. I will not have that problem. I have the same unit, about the same age. I had a similar problem earlier this summer. I had to re-adjust the force settings. I found that a brown out in the area caused my problem. Kinda freaked the unit out a little. No problems since, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
 
ours just died too, its a 1/2 hp craftsman about 12 years old. its was the plastic gears inside the unit stripped , no binding , just old. bought the new gears from sears and did it myself, not too hard.
 
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