Perryville Overhead Door 573-547-4555
Midwest Garage Door 573-334-0111
Garage Safety
SERVING SOUTHERN MISSOURI AND SOUTHERN ILLINOIS FOR OVER 25 YEARS
Garage Door Safety Tips
At Perryville Overhead Doors and Midwest Garage Door, we not only install and service your garage doors, but we also make sure our customers know how to use the equipment correctly to maintain their garage properly. Modern residential and commercial garage doors have many safety features to ensure people do not suffer injuries, but it’s also important to know what to do if those features malfunction. Below are some tips to keep you, your children, and your employees safe.
Our Safety Tips
Store Flammable Items Properly
Make sure to read all warning labels and expiration dates of any chemicals you store in your garage. Certain household chemicals can ignite by coming in contact with each other. You may want to consider class B/C extinguishers for the garage because they are able to fight fires involving grease, oil, gasoline, kerosene and flammable liquids, as well as energized electrical equipment.
Proper Ventilation
If you warm up your vehicle in your garage or run a portable fuel-burning heater, make sure you have your garage door open to prevent deadly carbon monoxide buildup. In attached garages, fumes from vehicle exhaust can build up quickly and seep inside your home. Having carbon monoxide alarms installed on every level of your home and near sleeping areas can be crucial to ensuring your family’s safety in the event that fumes do enter your home.
Keep Your Garage Organized
Use cabinet and drawer latches and electrical outlet covers as you would in other parts of the house, and keep hazardous implements and substances safely locked away.
Don’t leave length of rope lying around or hanging down from hooks.
Store ladders in a horizontal position, so a child cannot climb up them.
Disconnect power tools when not in use. Plug locks are available that attach to cords and prevent their insertion into electrical outlets.
Separate items into categories such as auto supplies, lawn, and garden tools, holiday decorations and sports management. Then pitch, donate, or sell the items you don’t need or use. Invest in wall organizations and storage solutions such as shelving units, cabinets or peg boards to keep the floor clean of clutter. This is a great way to protect items and keep them out of reach of children. Consider labeling each so you can quickly find what you need.
Repairing the Springs & Cables on the Doors
Garage door springs are tightly wound, meaning that they are under a lot of tension. When they break, or when someone that doesn’t know what they are doing tries to fiddle with it, they can cause a whole lot of pain. If your garage door is old, or it is showing sign of age, let an experienced contractor inspect your garage door springs.
A garage door with extension springs will have a safety cable on each side of the door running through the spring and attached to the wall and ceiling.
These cables are an important safety feature. Extension springs are under a great deal of tension, and if one was to break, it could cause serious injury. Safety cables help control a broken spring. If you have extension springs on your garage door but can’t find any safety cables, call a garage door pro and gat a pair installed.
Contact us for Free Estimates
For more information about the services we provide or a for a free estimate, please contact our Perryville Location at 573-547-4555 or our Cape Girardeau Location at 573-334-0111. We look forward to serving you!