I have an 8ft.wide up and over garage door which has devoloped a problem.When opening the door the left hand cable goes very slack when the door is about halfway open,therefore when i close it the wire tangles up on the feed cone(not sure if that is the correct term for the reel the wire goes round). I can only avoid getting the wire tangled by hand feeding the wire onto the reel untill the slack is taken up. Can anyone say why this has happened and can it be repaired without to much expense.?

I have been inspecting the door mechanism and think I have found the answer,but question is can i do the adjustment.I hope you can see photo on here

Comparing the cone with the other side I can see that when the door is closed the good side still has one full turn of wire on the cone but the one in the picture is fully expanded.It is attached to the narrow rod which attaches to a larger rod upon which the main tension spring is fitted.
Question...If I loosen the grub screws which tighten the narrow rod to the larger one can I then turn it to take up the slack on the wire.
Hope this makes sense.


Pic attached to post. Mod 2

Cannot tell from the picture but if it has a balancing spring you have to be really careful messing with these as they are wound up to a significant tension and any tool on it will fly off with huge risk to you.

Can you post a pic of the detail of the spring part and clamp?
DWD

Cheers Dewalt,
Pics added to post. Mod 2

I would suggest that the spring has not moved. That yellow spiral painted on it would be out of step if it had slipped so I would not touch the setting if possible. You need to determine the make of your door and find the fitting instructions. This site might be of help http://www.garagedoor-spares.com/ Have a look at the fixing guides. You might want to contact the guy for advice and there is a link for that.

Do not tinker as it is easy to release the spring tension which is dangerous so get familiar with the procedure for your door.

Sorry I cannot help further mate

DWD

If a turn has slipped off the spool (most likely what has happened by the sound of it) rather than the spring has become weak with age or is binding on something - its self or the frame then you need to close the door, clamp the spring or spool at the loose end to stop the spool turning (there is often a hole in the shaft that you can stick a screw driver or 6" nail or similar through to stop it turning) and lift the door up (open it part way) until there is enough slack that you can pop an extra turn back on the spool. You will need a second person to help lift the door or to hold it up or a prop to prop the door as the spring will not be helping as normal so you will be lifting the full weight of the door. DO NOT LOOSEN ANYTHING. The spring can be wound up tighter by undoing the right bolt and turning with a spanner etc. but do not attempt unless you are quite sure what you are doing. As stated there is A LOT of tension in that spring, enough to break a wrist or worse if you undo the wrong bolt at the wrong time.

Once its all sorted out spray or dribble some oil on the spring coils and into the pivots and door runners. It always amazes me when I see dry rusty old springs on these doors and people having to put quite a lot of effort into lifting them. All it takes is a good dribble of oil and more often than not the door is back to virtually flying up on its own like when it was new.

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Mike

Thanks for your replies.
Mikew, what you say is correct but how it has managed to slip 1 turn without the right hand bar and spool turning more than the left main spring bar i dont know. I have tried what you suggested but the only way i can wrap the wire around to take up the slack is to disconnect one end of the wire and feed it around the spool and that doesn't look possible.You will notice that the bracket the spool is in stops me from looping any slack.

Sorry sent it before i had finished.

if the grub screws were loosened would that enable me to turn the thin bar to take up slack,or are the screws doing more than just holding the bar tight? it does look independent to the main tension spring bar.

Its hard to see from the pictures you have posted. If it is impossible to put an extra loop on the spool without disconnecting one end of the cable then it must be impossible to loose a loop unless one end has been disconnected at some point.
The springs and brackets are different on different models of door. I can't really see that the mechanism would 'slip' one turn then grip again in any other way. All I can really add is to lift the door up and down several times studying exactly what is turning and in what direction and what is not and to be VERY aware of the ammount of tention in that spring and be very careful.

Often the bar you refer to as left hand spring bar and right hand spring bar is in fact a single solid bar that passes right through the centre of the spring. The spring is then anchored to the frame bracket at one end and the rotating bar at the other. As I say lift the door up and down and study the mechanism moving to understand what is happening and be sure what the effects of undoing a bolt or grub screw will be before undoing it.

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Mike

Cheers Mike.