When it comes to the garages in our homes or businesses, many of us are only familiar with automatic opening formats. A huge percentage of modern garages come with electric access systems, generally including garage remotes we keep in our cars or other vehicles, and many of us have never even seen a garage that operates in any other way.

At Crawford Door Sales, we have a wide variety of garage door operators available to make your garage experience simple and convenient. We’re also here to remind you, however, that it’s important to know what to do in cases where electronic assists are unavailable. Some of these situations might be unavoidable, such as if the power goes out or the garage opener becomes broken. Here are some basic steps for properly opening and then resetting the garage if this happens to you. 

Interior of a Garage

Basic Rope Pull and Cautions

All garage doors will come with a rope with a red or similarly colored handle on the end at the opening area. When you pull on this rope, you will disengage the trolley from the section where it attaches to the rail of the door. Once this happens, you’ve moved you garage from automatic operation into manual opening. 

You should only pull this handle when the garage door is down. This is for safety reasons – if you try to pull the handle while the door is up or partway up, it could come crashing down as you disengage the automatic system. Also be careful of pinch points, or sections where the garage door comes together as it opens or closes; some people get their fingers caught in here if they aren’t exercising caution. 

Resetting Automatic Mode

Once you’ve put your garage into manual opening mode, you can open and close it this way for as long as your power is out or another need requires it. But it’s also important to know how to return your garage to automatic mode once you’re able to. There are two methods available here:

  • First, try to pull down on the release rope again – only this time, pull it toward the garage door to guide the trolley back onto its track. For most garages where the original move to manual mode was done correctly, this should return the garage to automatic.

  • If the above doesn’t work, there should be a button on the remote opener that automatically pulls the attachment back to the right place. 

Garage Opener Issues

In some cases, the issue won’t be power – it will be the opener itself, which may either be defective or may have run out of battery. Both can be remedied by buying simple replacements, which should be done immediately to avoid any risks. 

For more on how to manually open the garage if needed, or to learn about any of our garage door products or services, speak to the pros at Crawford Door Sales today. 

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