Prison break! I freed my two cars from their unfortunate detention.
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| Eastern State Penitentiary. photo source: wikiprdia |
Today, I shored up, braced, and reinforced the garage door hinge.
Important safety notice!!!!!
One piece wooden garage doors are very heavy. Many people have been seriously injured when they have fallen on them. It is very important to constantly assess the integrity of the hinge/spring assemblies while doing any work on, or around them. It is also important to minimize the amount of time spent standing under the open door, even when the garage door is in good operating condition. When the door is closed, it poses minimal danger. In my case the right side hinge was still attached securely, and the middle of the door was still attached to the opener. There was still a hazard presented by the springs, which were in an extended position with the door closed. I used a tie down strap wrapped around the springs and attached it to a garage shelving unit to restrain the springs. Just in case.
Needless to say, doing this kind of work can be dangerous. But so can all kinds of work, like crawling under a car to replace a transmission. I don't recommend that everyone/anyone do these types of repairs, It's important to use the proper safety equipment, take your time, and re-evaluate the situation as things progress. It may be best to hire a "professional," but that just shifts the risk onto a worker, and off of the homeowner. "Someone" still has to do the actual work. At this point in my life, I still often choose for that person to be me, but I'm a lot more cautious than I used to be!
I was working on the hinge with the door in the safer, closed position.
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| This was what I had to deal with. |
When I was finished, I opened the door for the "final" time and freed my two imprisoned cars.
Of course there were unexpected problems during this process.
I knew that I could move my "park under" table back a bit, then move the Mustang up, which would give me enough room behind the car to work on the door jamb. Unfortunately for me, the battery was completely dead. It was really dead, to make things even worse, I couldn't open up the hood to attach a charger, as it was covered by the table! That meant that I couldn't even take the transmission out of park and roll the car back.
I shoved the table all the way against the refrigerator, and there was only a fraction of an inch of clearance to open the hood, but it made it!
I put my new charger on recondition and left it connected for almost an hour. I got back from my walk and read the indicator that stated: Battery failure! Not a good sign,
So I crawled over the engine compartment and hooked up my jump box. I cranked the engine and it eventually fired up. With the hood up, I had enough clearance to move it even further forward. I turned off the engine but left it in neutral and applied the parking brake.
I knew that the battery was getting old and the lack of use over the past three months, had hastened it's death. However, I had other more important matters to deal with at the moment.
Now I had enough room behind the car to work on the garage door hinge.
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| This shot shows how I had wrapped the springs |
My plan was to remove the springs, and reattach the hinge to the jamb. Even after I backed off the spring tension completely, the springs were still in a bit of extension. I had wrapped the springs with a tie down strap and now I wrapped an old blanket around them also. Springs are designed to be removed from the hinge while the door is in the open position, they are at minimal extension in that position. I backed off the bottom spring tensioner, as far as I could, leaving a single nut still attached. Then, wearing eye protection, and turning my head, I loosened the final nut. The springs popped off the tensioner with a bit of a bang, but it was pretty anticlimactic.
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| You can see cracking in the wood door jamb behind the hinge mounting plate. |
The bottom of the three bolts holding the hinge was still attached pretty securely. I retightened it and left it in place. I had used a long, four inch lag bolt in the center position. I then removed the bottom spring mount, and the photo cell, then I mocked up the seven foot long angle iron industrial shelf support that was going to clamp the hinge to the jamb. This would spread the force over a longer area, and ultimately act as my fail safe. I ran the long bolt through the iron and hinge bracket, and into the jamb, using a new position. Then I secured the iron to the jamb with six additional lag bolts.
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| I moved the position of the long bolt and reattached it, through the reinforcing steel and over the hinge. |
It looked pretty good, and even if it didn't work perfectly, I was confident that the long steel support would transfer the weight of the door along the length of the jamb, and that the hinge couldn't break free. Though it might shift a bit.
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| Six new lag bolts and washers hold the reinforcement in place. |
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| You can see that the reinforcement runs almost to the floor. |
There was no way that the garage door opener could lift the door minus the springs on one side, so I would have to do it manually. These doors are quite heavy and it's important that I did not stand underneath it while trying to open the door! I put my back against the door from inside, and using my legs pushed the door until it swung up about three feet, then I propped it up in that position, then I visually checked the integrity of the hinges. Everything looked secure. I had several lengths of 2x4s, and a couple of adjustable steel braces, already prepared and in position, to brace the door open as I progressively raised it. I went outside the garage to finish lifting it from there. This way I would not be directly under the door if something went wrong.
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| Now it was open and I could remove the cars. |
It was pretty heavy, but I lifted it in two stages, finally propping a seven foot brace under it to hold it completely open. Success!
I didn't want to walk under the door, even though it looked secure, and the hinge had not shifted during this process.
I moved the two vehicles from the driveway and parked them down the street, to give me space to park the cars that were in the garage. I went back into the garage through the house entry door and started up the Riviera and backed it into the driveway. Now I had plenty of room to hook up the jump box and fire up the Mustang and back it into the driveway.
My operation had been a success, and my cars were free and the garage was now empty.
Now all of my five cars were outside the garage. ( I had sold my '96 Mustang a few days after Christmas.) It really became apparent that I've got a lot of cars. I hate to take up too much curb parking. Though my neighbors have never complained, at least directly to me, I hate to be that guy!
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These events took place after Christmas and the garage was filled with empty Christmas decoration boxes for weeks after the holidays.
I had two cars parked in the driveway, one parked alongside the driveway in the dirt/lawn area, and two parked in the street in front of my house. It appears, even to me, that I've got a lot of cars. This situation lasted through the month of January into February.
Then I bought another car and brought it home! So I had to park another car on the street, a situation that I found untenable.
I thought that I could park one car back in the garage, as long as I wasn't raising the door on a daily basis. So I reattached the springs on the right side hinge. I found that the door was now easy to lift, just as it was supposed to be. I feel confident in using the door infrequently, and you can be assured that I'm keeping a very close eye on the integrity of the whole set up!
The blue Mustang went back in the garage. My intention is to keep it there until I sell the Riviera. However there is a bit of a problem with the Riviera.
Nothing is ever as simple as we would like it to be!
Two steps forward, one step back.
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