Starting on January 1, 1993 all new electronic garage door openers were required to be equipped with electronic safety eyes. These safety eyes protect entrapment underneath a garage door as it closes.

The requirements state that safety eyes should be mounted no higher than 6 inches above the ground or floor of the garage and the beam must cover the entire width of the garage door.

We receive many calls involving the safety eyes preventing the garage door from closing due to the safety eyes malfunctioning or simply being out of alignment. If your garage door opens fine, but will not close using the wall console, then this could be a safety eye issue. If the opener light flashes and/or the motor makes a clicking sound, this is a warning that you have a safety eye issue. You can begin by looking at the safety eyes themselves. You should see a steady light on both of the safety eyes. If one of the lights is flashing then you may just need to simply align the eyes properly. This is done by physically moving/adjusting the safety eyes until you have both safety eyes with a solid light showing.

If both safety eyes are showing a solid light, then you may have malfunctioning safety eyes.

A simple test is to press and hold the wall console to close the door. If the garage door closes while holding the wall console button, then you probably have a safety eye issue. 

Safety eyes can be replaced very easily

Just be sure you are using safety eyes that are compatible with the brand and model garage door opener you have.

Safety eyes are required for all garage door openers manufactured since January 1, 1993 and the garage door opener will not work without the safety eyes attached and functioning properly. We have customers who ask us to mount the safety eyes on top of the opener, or in a manner that by passes the entrapment protection the safety eyes provide. We can not bypass the safety eye sensors in any way. Again, the regulations say safety eyes sensors must be mounted no more than 6 inches from the ground or floor of the garage and span the width of the garage door to prevent entrapment injuries and possible death caused from being entrapped under a closing garage door.

If your garage door opener was manufactured prior to January 1, 1993 and was not equipped with safety eye sensors, then there is no way to retrofit safety eye sensors to your garage door opener. 

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We offer a full line of commercial garage door openers to fit the needs of the customer. For smaller commercial sectional garage doors we recommend using the Liftmaster 8900W these operators are rated for 14 feet maximum height and 300lbs total weight. For rolling steel doors we recommend the 8950W for doors up to 12 feet maximum height and maximum weight of 850lbs.

For large sectional commercial doors we recommend the Liftmaster J or H. These are equipped with MyQ for automated opener control and are equipped with a soft start/stop feature.

The Liftmaster J, jackshaft opener is available in ⅓, ½, ¾ and 1 horse power. The horse power needed is based on the total square footage of the sectional door it will be installed on.

The liftmaster H, hoist opener is available in ⅓, ½, ¾ and 1 horse power. The horse power needed is based on the total square footage of the sectional door it will be installed on.

The Liftmaster MJ is another option, but it does have some limitations that should be considered. The MJ is not MyQ ready so it can not be controlled through a cell phone, tablet or computer. The Mj is not equipped with the soft start/stop feature which can create problems in the future. These problems include chain stretch because when activated in open or close mode the motor is pushing or pulling with full force throughout the cycle. This can cause premature chain stretch and it can bend the spring bar and damage the sprocket over the course of normal use.

There are other options for larger commercial doors like the Liftmaster ATS. The ATS is a commercial opener that is ceiling mounted and utilizes a rail system, but can only be used on standard lift sectional doors. The ATS is a light duty commercial opener.

For commercial sectional doors that are high lift or full vertical, a jackshaft or hoist type door opener must be used, a ceiling mounted opener with a rail will not work for high lift or full vertical doors.

There are other commercial opener options, but this information will point you in the proper direction for the type of opener you will need. When considering commercial openers for your sectional door, it is important to estimate the number of times the door is opened and closed throughout the day and then you can better select the opener that will best fit your commercial door opener needs. Commercial openers are rated for a certain number of open and close cycles per day so it is important that this is at least considered when selecting the proper opener.

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Rollup doors up to 10×10 can usually be installed by two people, without the use of a lift. Anything larger will require a lift and minimum two people to install.

Track and stop repairs are fairly simple and straightforward, however caution must be used as the door and curtain can spin out of control and cause serious injuries if it is not properly secured during the process. In most instances the tracks are attached using some type of tech screw or masonary screw, if it is welded it presents a more difficult scenario as the welds must be ground off and the new tracks re-welded. 

Spring replacement requires removing the door from the opening and lowering it to the ground. The door curtain must then be unwound from the spool. The end cap(s) of the spool must then be removed by drilling out the rivets to access and remove and replace the spring(s). The end cap(s) must then be riveted back onto the spools, tech screws can not be used as they will not allow the curtain to wind around the spool properly. The curtain must be rewound to the spool and secured to control the curtain. The door/spool unit must then be lifted into place and the spring loaded by turning the entire curtain/spool unit the proper number of times. The curtain is then inserted back into the guide tracks and stops installed. While the replacement springs are reasonably priced, the equipment needed and the labor and manpower involved make the labor prices go up significantly. 

On some of the rolling steel doors it is possible to replace the curtain or a damaged section of the curtain, but again the labor involved and the price of the replacement curtain drives the price up, and this would be more appropriate for the large and expensive rolling steel doors.

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Needed Framing for New Garage Door Opening

1. Width of garage door opening – Standard widths are 8’, 9’-10’-12’-14’-16’-17’ and 18’

2. Height of the garage door opening- Standard residential heights are 7’-7’6’’-8’

3. Header- the header is ideally a minimum 12’ wide micro-laminated beam that spans the width of the garage door opening.

• Header requirement #2- At minimum the header should be 12’ wide with doubled 2×4 at opening and ceiling running the width of the door with a 2×4 in the center of the opening for the center bracket to attach to. Headers should be a minimum of 12’ wide.

4. Doubled 2×4’s, at minimum, should be at each edge of the garage door to allow for the mounting of the tracks and jamb brackets. These doubled 2×4’s should extend to the ceiling on both sides to allow for the mounting of the end bearings and brackets.

5. Side clearance should be a minimum of 6’ on each side to allow for track mounting.

6. Doubled 2×4’s, at minimum, should be at the top of the header

7. If sheetrock or other wall covering is being used, this must be done prior to installing the garage door.

8. Vinyl Trim- required for all new construction or if a new door opening is being created.

Disclaimer

• This diagram is not intended as designs for building a new garage  , it shows the minimum framing needs for the installation of an overhead style garage door. It is the owner and or the owners contractor to prepare the opening for the garage door. If the opening is not constructed to the proper size and with the proper support structures, Veteran Garage Door accepts no responsibility. Veteran Garage Door is only responsible for the actual installation of the garage door and hardware for the installation of the garage door.

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LiftMaster offers 2 residential Jackshaft/Wall-Mount garage door openers, the 8500 and the 8500W. We will compare the 2 openers to help you select the best option for yourself.

The 8500 automatic garage door opener is a Jackshaft/Wall-Mount opener. What exactly is a Jackshaft/Wall-Mount garage door opener and why would it be a good choice for me?

The Jackshaft/Wall-Mount design removes the need for the garage door opener rail, thus clearing the head space the rail takes away. The Jackshaft/Wall-Mount opener mounts on the header wall beside the garage door. The opener attaches directly to the spring bar on the outside of the end bearings. When the opener is activated, the motor, attached to the spring bar, actually turns the spring bar that in turn opens and closes the garage door. This design uses fewer moving parts, so there are less parts to wear out or break.

The 8500 is the base model for residential Jackshaft/Wall-Mount garage doors made by LiftMaster. The 8500 uses a quiet DC motor that is rated to lift a door up to 650 pounds with sizes up to 14 feet tall by 18 feet wide. The 8500 is MyQ enabled, but requires the use of an internet gateway that is sold separately. Available accessories include battery backup, remote light and the automatic garage door lock that are all sold separately. The 8500 opens and closes at 7.6 inches per second. For security the 8500 utilizes the Security +2.0. The Warranty for the 8500 is lifetime on the motor, 5 years on the parts and 1 year on accessories.

The 8500W is the newest residential Jackshaft/Wall-Mount opener LiftMaster has released. The 8500W uses a quiet DC motor and can lift garage doors up to 850 pounds and up to 14 feet tall. The 8500W is equipped with built in MyQ technology and does not require the internet gateway. It comes with the remote LED light, battery backup, automatic garage door lock and motion detector for the light. The 8500W opens at 8.4 inches per second and closes at 7.6 inches per second. The 8500W utilizes the Security +2.0 system and has a built in logic board surge protector. The warranty for the 8500W is lifetime on the motor, 5 year on parts and 1 year for accessories and the battery backup.

The 8500 is a good quality opener with upgrades available, requiring additional parts at additional costs. The 8500W is rated for heavier doors and has all of the modern features built in with no additional out of pocket expenses.

Criteria / Opener	8500W	8500
LM Parts Warranty	5 Years	5 Years
VGD Installation Warrant	1 Year	1 Year
Lifting Door weight up to	850 LBS.	650 LBS.
Homelink Compatible
Compact Design
Wifi & Smartphone Connectivity		Not Included
Battery Backup		Not Included
Rating

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If your garage door opener is not working properly there are a number of things that could be wrong. If your logic board has gone bad it can have numerous symptoms. Your opener might not recognize the programmed limits, it might not be sending the signal to open and or close your garage door and it could be a reduced range for your garage door opener remotes. (just to list a few of the symptoms) Logic boards are often damaged during electrical storms and during power surges, the logic board is basically the motherboard for your garage door opener. Logic boards for garage door openers can be replaced depending on the manufacturer and age of the garage door opener.

To determine what logic board is needed, you first need to identify the brand of garage door opener; Liftmaster, Chamberlain, Craftsman, Genie, ect. Next you need to locate the model number for the garage door opener. This could be on the opener housing or could be on a sticker or plate on one of the sides of the opener. Most manufacturers will have a sticker with the product model number, part number and date of manufacture located behind one of the light covers or on the back side of the opener motor housing.

Most logic boards can be ordered through the manufacturer or a garage door service company. Logic boards are plug and play and a fairly easy to install. When a logic board is replaced you will typically need to reprogram limits and all remotes, keypads and vehicles as well as MyQ and other home automation programs if your opener is equipped with that function.

It is critical that the proper logic board is used when replacing the logic board, because as technology changes, so do the garage door opener logic boards. If you install the wrong logic board on your garage door opener, the opener will not work.

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When considering the best option for a heavy wood garage door there are many options on the market. In the past the Liftmaster 3240 screw drive opener was the go to opener for heavy wood doors. LiftMaster has discontinued the screw drive opener, and have replaced it with what I believe are better options with the features like MyQ and battery backup that customers want in today’s market.

The first option I would recommend is the 8550W opener this opener has a ¾ horse power 12V-DC motor and is belt drive. This opener is very quiet and strong. The 8550W comes equipped with a battery backup, for times the power goes out, and is MyQ ready. The MyQ allows for opening and closing the garage door from anywhere you have internet service on your smartphone or tablet. The 8550W is also compatible with an automatic bolt lock , purchased separately, that provides the highest level of security available for garage door openers.

The second option would be the LiftMaster 8500W Jackshaft Opener. The 8500W is a ¾ horse power 24V-DC motor. This opener does not utilize a opener rail as the opener attached directly to the spring bar and mounts on the wall next to the door rather than to the ceiling in the center of the garage. The 8500W comes with the battery backup, MyQ ready, and a remote light you can mount anywhere in the garage. The 8500W is also compatible with the automatic bolt lock that is sold separately. If you choose this option you will need to make sure you have a power source on the wall near the mounting location of the wall mount opener motor.

The final option is the LiftMaster ATS. This is a commercial opener with a ½ horse power 120V single-phase chain drive motor. The ATS is for sectional garage doors from 8 feet tall to 14 feet tall. This is a strong light duty commercial garage door opener. This opener will not be as quiet as the 8550W belt drive or the 8500W jackshaft opener, but will be strong enough to open and close heavy wood doors.

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There are many brands of garage door openers on the market today that offer new features designed to make life easier. In the beginning garage door operators performed one simple function, they allowed you to open and close your garage door with the push of a button. The automatic garage door opener simply replaced the physical action of opening and closing the garage door with a machine that did it for you.

Safety concerns with automatic garage door openers brought about changes to automatic garage door openers and since 1993, all garage door openers must be equipped with safety sensors or eyes to prevent entrapment under a closing door. This same year it became mandatory that door have an auto reversing feature that would cause the door to open if the door closed on an object. For this feature to work properly, the close force for the garage door opener must be set properly and tested regularly.(at least once per year)

Over the course of time, the criminal element of society found ways to defeat the remotes for garage door openers, this is sometimes referred to as cloning. Since the early garage door openers operated on set frequencies, cloning was fairly simple. Todays garage door openers operate on new frequencies and now they operate on some version of rolling codes. What does this mean? If someone were to clone the frequency that just opened or closed your garage door, it would be useless to them because with each push of the remote, the opener and remote roll to a new frequency code and the one just cloned will not work again. This has addressed much of the problem with garage door opener security.

Todays garage door opener market is definitely leaning to whole home automation, with everything in your house, including your garage door opener being controlled by an application from your smartphone or tablet. We recommend LiftMaster products as they provide the highest quality products with all of the conveniences people are looking for with there MyQ applications.

If you are looking for a basic chain drive opener, then the LiftMaster 8165 chain drive opener provides the reliability you need with the built in MyQ feature at a reasonable cost. If you are wanting a quiet opener with even more features the LiftMaster 8550W belt drive opener would be a great choice. The 8550W offers the smooth quiet function of a belt drive opener, MyQ technology built into the opener, battery backup for times the power is out and the added security of automatic bolt lock compatibility. The automatic bolt lock is fairly new to the garage door opener industry. This feature allows you to purchase the automatic bolt lock that works in conjunction with the garage door opener. When installed the automatic bolt lock unlocks automatically when the door is opened using any method of opening, if you use the wall console, remote, keypad or your smartphone or tablet. The automatic lock also locks each time the door is closed when using the automatic opener. The automatic bolt lock is a secondary lock feature that attaches to the garage door track and the bolt locks through the track, above one of the rollers and prevents the door from being opened when the bolt is locked. If security is a priority, this automatic bolt lock makes it very difficult for your garage door opener to be defeated by the criminal element.

The final option we will talk about is the jackshaft opener. These openers allow you to clear up some of the head space in your garage as they take away the need for a opener rail that the garage door attaches to. Jackshaft style automatic openers attached directly to the spring bar and can be mounted to either side of the garage door. Jackshaft openers are very quiet and strong. The problem we encounter with jackshaft openers is the prewire in the garage themselves. Most homes today are prewired for a standard opener with a plug installed in the ceiling of the garage at the location a standard opener would be installed. Many home builders also have prewired the home for garage door safety eyes and the wall console, but again these pre wires are run to the ceiling of the garage where a standard garage door opener would be installed. These prewire issues can be taken care of by simply stapling wires to the garage door ceiling and routing them to the jackshaft opener or having an electrician rerun the wires for the jackshaft opener. Jackshaft openers also require a power source near the garage door header since the opener mounts and attaches to the spring bar. Jackshaft openers have fewer moving parts and are a great choice. The LiftMaster 8500 is the entry level jackshaft opener and requires a MyQ bridge to work with a smartphone application while the 8500W has the MyQ built in along with a battery backup. Both the 8500 and 8500W are compatible with the automatic bolt lock and come with a wireless light that can be mounted anywhere in the garage.

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There have been many times we have gone to a service call where the remotes for the garage door opener are not working or have a very short range. This can be caused by many things like weak batteries in the remote, some appliance causing interference, a bad receiver in the opener and yes even an LED light bulb in the garage or garage door opener.

We recommend standard, not LED, light bulbs for garage door openers. LED light bulbs emit a signal that can interfere with the garage door opener remotes. Both Liftmaster and Genie are now manufacturing LED light bulbs that they recommend that will not emit a signal that interferes with the opener remotes.

When thinking about light bulbs I recall an incident involving LED lights in a customers landscaping that interfered with the garage door opener remotes. This customer garage door would only open using the remotes if you got out of the car and stood right against the garage door, and even then it would only work part of the time. When I noticed a small blue LED light shining from a plug in the garage, I asked the customer what that plug was working. The customer explained it was for their LED landscaping lights. I unplugged the LED landscaping lights and the remotes opened and closed the garage door from about 2 houses away, but with them plugged in the remotes would only work intermittently when standing against the garage door. I share this only to make the point that in some cases LED bulbs drastically interfere with garage door opener remotes. I have also been to several homes that had LED bulbs installed in the garage door opener and everything worked fine and remote range was not effected.

With all this in mind I recommend regular bulbs over LED bulbs, or if you really want to use LED bulbs, use the LED bulbs offered by Liftmaster or Genie that are designed not to interfere with your garage door opener.

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If you are thinking about converting your overhead sectional garage door to a roll up door, yes this can be done, but there are a few things you need to consider.

1. Roll up doors are generally heavier than sectional overhead doors and may require more support in the header above the garage door.
2. Roll up garage doors require more headroom than sectional overhead doors due to the coil of the roll up door.
3. Maintenance and repair costs are typically more for roll up doors. If the spring breaks on a roll up door, you must take the roll up door completely down to replace the spring and then reinstall the door after the spring is replaced. Taking the door down and reinstalling requires the use of a lift that will add to the cost of the repair.
4. Roll up doors will not provide you as many design options and window options as sectional overhead doors.
5. If insulation is a consideration for you, roll up doors do not offer as high an R-value as sectional overhead doors.
6. Roll up doors require the use of jackshaft style openers while sectional overhead doors allow you to use standard openers with a opener rail or jackshaft style openers.

With these things in mind you can consider converting your sectional overhead garage door to a roll up door. Understand if you choose to make this conversion there may be modifications required to the door opening and header to allow for the installation of a rollup garage door.

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