Our garage door opener motor runs but the door does not move, what is wrong?

expert EXPERT October 17, 2007

There could be a number of things happening.

First check that the door has not come unhooked from the lift mechanism. Look for a red rope hanging down from a trolley mechanism as shown in the image below. The rope is hooked to a manual release mechanism on the trolley to allow opening of the door by hand if needed. The trolley is how the garage door opener attaches to the garage door itself so the two need to be connected. If the trolley is moving when the opener motor is, but your door is not opening then the two might have come disconnected, check that your door moves freely when lifted by hand and then clip the door arm back into the trolley.

Your Manage My Home profile did not include any model information so I am not certain if this is a screw drive or belt drive or chain drive but a problem with any one of those systems could also prevent the motor from lifting the door. If you have a belt or chain drive you should be able to see those moving as the motor turns, a screw drive may be more difficult to see, but keep checking until you see the point where components stop turning as the motor turns and that will be the source of your problem.

Your Owner's Manual will have more details and information that should help and I have also included a link below with more tests and checks that may help locate the problem.