Garage Door Torsion Spring
The torsion spring is the tightly wound bar mounted horizontally above the door opening, and it carries almost the entire weight of the door. When it breaks you usually hear it: a single loud bang from the garage, often at night or during the first opening of a cold morning. After that the door either will not lift at all or feels impossibly heavy by hand, and the opener strains without moving it. Replacement runs $150 to $350 installed, and it is not a job to attempt yourself.
Covered by Garage Door Spring Replacement · from $150
Nearly all the lifting in a garage door is done by the springs, not by the opener. The opener is a guide that tells a balanced door where to go. A torsion spring stores the energy that makes the door balanced in the first place, which is why a 150 pound door can be raised with one hand when everything is working.
That energy is the reason a broken spring is loud and the reason a wound one is dangerous. A torsion spring under tension holds enough force to break bones, and it releases all of it at once if the winding bars slip. Every year emergency departments see hands and faces from exactly this job.
You can usually confirm the diagnosis from the floor without touching anything. Look at the bar above the door. A whole spring is a continuous coil. A broken one has a visible gap of two or three inches where the break is, and the two halves have separated along the bar.
How to tell this part has failed
- A single loud bang from the garage with nothing obviously wrong afterwards
- The door will not open, or lifts a few inches and stops
- The opener motor runs and strains but the door does not move
- The door is extremely heavy to lift by hand after pulling the manual release
- A visible two to three inch gap in the coil on the bar above the door
- The door drops fast instead of staying put when you stop it halfway
Why it fails in Florida
Springs are rated in cycles rather than years. A standard spring is around 10,000 cycles, and one cycle is one open and one close. A household that comes and goes four times a day reaches that in about seven years, which is why so many break with no warning at roughly the same age.
Florida humidity and coastal salt air corrode the steel from the outside in. A pitted coil concentrates stress at the pit and breaks earlier than its cycle rating, and garages within a few miles of the water see this plainly.
Heat matters too. A garage that reaches 110 degrees through a Florida summer expands and contracts the steel daily, and metal fatigue is cumulative.
Can you do this yourself
No, do not attempt this
This is the one job on this site we tell people flatly not to do. A wound torsion spring stores enough energy to break an arm or worse, the winding bars have to be the right diameter and fully seated, and a spring that is even slightly mismatched to the door weight leaves you with a door that will not stay put. If your only concern is the money, the honest comparison is $150 to $350 for the job done properly against an emergency room visit.
Starting prices for a standard single door. Your final price depends on the door, the model, the wind rating a replacement needs and what we find. You get a written quote before any work starts.
Have a technician bring this part
Leave your details and we call you back to confirm the part, the price and a time. The technician arrives with it on the truck.
Garage Door Torsion Spring
Not sold separately. Price shown is fitted, by a technician who brings the part.
(561) 897-9930Frequently Asked Questions
One spring broke. Do I have to replace both?
On a two spring door, yes, and this is worth understanding rather than taking on trust. Both springs are the same age and have taken the same number of cycles, so the second one is not far behind. Replacing one means paying a second call-out within a year or two, and it also leaves the door pulling unevenly in the meantime, which wears the cables and the rollers on one side. We quote both and we say why.
Can I open the door with a broken spring?
You can, using the manual release, but be careful and get help. Without the spring you are lifting the full weight of the door, which is 130 to 350 pounds depending on the size and material. Prop it open with something solid rather than trusting it to stay, because with no spring it will come down as fast as gravity allows.
How do I know if I have torsion or extension springs?
Look at where they sit. Torsion springs mount on a horizontal bar above the door opening. Extension springs run along the horizontal tracks on either side of the door, parallel to the ceiling. Most Florida garages built since the eighties use torsion, which is the stronger and safer arrangement of the two.
