I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.

wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one?


Anything is repairable. You have to open it up to see what is broken, then
you have to find out if you can get the parts.

wrote:

I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.


It's probably a motor start capacitor, easily replaceable.

GWE

It the motor hums it could be a capacitor. If the motor runs but the
chain doesn't move its the 41A2817 gear kit that needs replaced.

Doordoc
www.DoorsAndOpeners.com

"Grant Erwin" wrote in message
...
wrote:

I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.


It's probably a motor start capacitor, easily replaceable.

I had the same symptoms. Took it apart, found nothing wrong, put it back
together; it ran for about 2 cycles before not working. Tried it again,
same results. The third time was too much; it never worked again.
Contacted Chamberlin and asked if it was the capacitor. They said, sure,
maybe.
I replaced the capacitor. Didn't help.

Bought a new opener.
I hope you have better luck.

Motor hums, chain does not move.

It all started after trying to open it and it moved a little bit and
made the awfulest racket.

The one time I fixed a garage door opener it was a broken drive belt. Up a
ladder, remove the case screws, and have a look. It was a Sears unit, and
they sold me a new belt for a couple bucks. Replace belt, and we're good to
go.

--

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
www.mormons.com


wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.

Might also be lubrication problems. Read the owners manual, or do some
netsearch. Many times when motors don't turn, they need lubrication. I have
disassembled a lot of electric motors, cleaned them out with solvent, and
relubricated them.

Might also be that something in the gears or chain needs lubrication.

--

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
www.mormons.com


wrote in message
oups.com...
Motor hums, chain does not move.

It all started after trying to open it and it moved a little bit and
made the awfulest racket.

The time this happened to me, it was a stripped plastic worm wheel.
"Anything can be repaired" is correct, but you are in for an interesting
machining task, if that is what it is.

I replaced it with a Genie screw drive, which I like quite a bit better.

Adam Smith
Midland ON
wrote in message
oups.com...
I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.

Can you not just buy a new worm wheel?

Yes, the door works fine by hand.

The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up

Check for worn plastic gears in the unit. Also, confirm whether correct
springs were used for offsetting the weight of the door. With the drive
disconnected via the "pulldown disconnect", very little force should be
required to open the door. Similarly, the unit should see very little
load when operating, otherwise, accelerated wear takes place. Homedepot
(if you're in the US) sells springs if it's necessary to repalce them.

If the gears were stripped, do you think the motor would spin rapidly.
Having no load?

I really don't know, never worked on a device as this. If memory serves the
OP said the motor hummed but didn't turn.

--

Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
www.mormons.com


wrote in message
oups.com...
The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up

Check for worn plastic gears in the unit. Also, confirm whether correct
springs were used for offsetting the weight of the door. With the drive
disconnected via the "pulldown disconnect", very little force should be
required to open the door. Similarly, the unit should see very little
load when operating, otherwise, accelerated wear takes place. Homedepot
(if you're in the US) sells springs if it's necessary to repalce them.

there is thermal shutdown circuit in the motor. If it is
hot, it won't run....

Might be that the pin holding the sprocket to the
gears has broken... The gears would spin,
but the sprocket is loose on the shaft.

Open it and see what the problem is. They
are simple machines.

electronics:
You have 1)R/C circuits (remote control)
2) motor driver
3) limit switches.

mechanics:
motor,
gear box,
sprocket, chain

The limit switches are connected
to the gear box.

Rich

Where can I get the gear if it is that?

I really don't know, never worked on a device as this

The racket he heard was probably the gears coming to a grinding halt as
bits of teeth got in the way of "surviving" teeth.

bart wrote:
On 30 May 2005 18:33:25 -0700, wrote:


I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.


Can you pull the disconnect & move the door by hand?
If not, it may be one of the tension springs that help lift the door,
assuming you have that type of door.
The spring looked OK at first glance, but if you looked closely, it
was broken. Was an interesting process watching &helping the door
repair guy! And no, I would not have attempted to replace one of those
coiled tension springs myself then..but now I might! ;-)

I used to do a lot of work on the roll-up doors on truck trailers..
Those springs are very interesting to wind up.. hammered out a couple of
special tools and it made it a lot easier.

John

I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Very common problem is the plastic worm gear/spur gear combo. These *will*
chew themselves out sooner or later, sooner if your door springs aren't
balanced.

See my page:

http://www.truetex.com/garage.htm

Where can I get the gear if it is that?

See the vendors on my link posted earlier in the thread.

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 31 May 2005 16:25:17 GMT bart
posted:

On 30 May 2005 18:33:25 -0700, wrote:

I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.

Can you pull the disconnect & move the door by hand?
If not, it may be one of the tension springs that help lift the door,
assuming you have that type of door.
The spring looked OK at first glance, but if you looked closely, it
was broken. Was an interesting process watching &helping the door
repair guy! And no, I would not have attempted to replace one of those
coiled tension springs myself then..but now I might! ;-)

I knew a homeowner who tried that. He's only 3 feet tall now.

Meirman
--
If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.
Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

Well, just took it off. The large white plastic gear is chewed up. The
model number opener is 41A5021-1B On the gear it has 81B0045.

How do you tell if it is balanced or not?

How do you tell if it is balanced or not?

Stays put about halfway up. No more than 5 or 10 lbs down force at the
bottom of travel.

In article .com,
wrote:

Well, just took it off. The large white plastic gear is chewed up. The
model number opener is 41A5021-1B On the gear it has 81B0045.

How do you tell if it is balanced or not?


The door is balanced when you can lift or lower it with no "strain". It
goes up... It goes down... The springs are set properly to help you lift
it, but not so tight they make it difficult to close it. When it's
closed, it stays closed without needing to be latched, rather than
rolling itself up any amount. When it's open, it's all the way open, and
doesn't tend to "fall shut".

It's all about getting the spring tension correct.

Replace the gear as it is now, and I promise you that it won't be more
than a few months to a year before you have to do it again.

If you've got torsion type springs, I strongly suggest you *DON'T* try
to mess with them unless you *KNOW* what you're doing - They're usually
wound tight enough to break an arm and/or pitch a person off a ladder,
and I've see a fellow lose one of the tensioning bars, and have the
spring fling it across the garage and through the drywall on the inside,
and the particleboard and aluminum siding on the outside, and come to a
stop stabbed about four inches into the trunk of a tree in the middle of
the back yard. When it went by, it made this weird humming/zinging kind
of noise that was spooky as hell.

--
Don Bruder - - New Email policy in effect as of Feb. 21, 2004.
Short form: I'm trashing EVERY E-mail that doesn't contain a password in the
subject unless it comes from a "whitelisted" (pre-approved by me) address.
See http://www.sonic.net/~dakidd/main/contact.html for full details.

I can lift and lower it with no strain. I think it is balanced. I have
had no problems. This gear lasted 7 years.

Motor hums, chain does not move.

It all started after trying to open it and it moved a little bit and
made the awfulest racket.

Sounds like stripped out plastic gears... probably still available at
your local garage door man's shop.
Ken.

Don Bruder wrote:



If you've got torsion type springs, I strongly suggest you *DON'T* try
to mess with them unless you *KNOW* what you're doing - They're usually
wound tight enough to break an arm and/or pitch a person off a ladder,
and I've see a fellow lose one of the tensioning bars, and have the
spring fling it across the garage and through the drywall on the inside,
and the particleboard and aluminum siding on the outside, and come to a
stop stabbed about four inches into the trunk of a tree in the middle of
the back yard. When it went by, it made this weird humming/zinging kind
of noise that was spooky as hell.


And while those torsion springs can certainly maim someone who doesn't
know what he's doing, the tension type springs can injure an "inncent
bystander" who happens to be under one when it breaks loose and flails
around before coming to a rest, usually dangling down by one end.

I had one bust while I was still in the garage waiting for the garage
door to close before opening the door to the house, a strategy I have to
employ to keep our stupid cat from escaping. The BANG was enough to
rattle my teeth, and as the break was at the back end, the spring flung
forward and knocked a hole in the drywall above the door.

That's when I learned about the safety cables which our builder failed
to take care of having installed. When I replaced the tension springs on
that door I added safety cables through the centers of both springs to
restrain them the next time one breaks. Premade safety cable sets were
so cheap at Sears that I didn't even bother to DIY them myself with wire
cable and clamps.

I heartily encourage taking a peek at those tension springs if your
door(s) use them and adding safety cables if needed. For all I know they
may be code required some places, as I think they should be.

Oh, BTW, a tip which might help someone needing to replace garage door
tension springs themselves. I didn't know what strength springs to buy,
and had to measure the downforce weight of the garage door when nearly
fully closed.

I only had a bathroom scale and it bottomed out when placed under the
door. I grabbed a hunk of 2 by 4, a brick and a yardstick and quickly
set up a 1:3 lever system so the scale received only 1/3 of the force of
the door pressing down on the 2 by 4 at a point 1/3 of the distance from
the brick to the scale. That worked as Archemedies would have predicted,
as did the springs I bought based on multiplying the scale's reading by 3.

I wrote the spring ratings on the inside of the door to save me or the
next owner of the place from having to go through that exercise again. G

--
Jeffry Wisnia

(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)

"Truth exists; only falsehood has to be invented."

On 31 May 2005 18:12:45 -0700, wrote:

I can lift and lower it with no strain. I think it is balanced. I have
had no problems. This gear lasted 7 years.

I replaced the gear and sprocket assembly on my Liftmaster opener over
a year ago. No problems to date. Not a difficult job, though a bit
"fussy." Hardest part was getting the chain back on. Be sure to read
and understand the manual and replacement kit installation and
adjustment instructions.

I ordered the part he http://www.1stdooropeners.com/index.html

--
Luke
__________________________________________________ _________________
"This Republican Party of Lincoln has become a party of theocracy."
-- Christopher Shays (R-CT), March, 2005

On 5/30/2005 9:33 PM US(ET), took fingers to keys,
and typed the following:

I have a 7 year old Chamberland opener. The other day it made a funny
noise and wont move the chain at all to put the door down or up.

Is this repairable? Or am I going to have to go buy a new one? I am
trying to watch money as I have a 4 month old at home and did not know
if this was somethign I could repair myself or not.



I had the same problem on a 20 year old Craftsman door opener (made by
Chamberlain). In my case it was the nylon drive gear was stripped of
teeth. Got a replacement at the Sears repair outlet. Part # 41A2817.
Drive Gear and Worm Set. $20.99 (US)

--
Bill