2026-03-30 7 min read
If you've lived in Godwin for more than a summer or two, you already know how relentless the humidity gets from June through September. That same damp, heavy air that makes your porch feel like a sauna is quietly working against the metal components in your garage door system. especially the springs. A broken torsion spring is one of the most common service calls we see throughout Cumberland County, and the good news is that it rarely happens without warning. Knowing what to look for can save you from a door that won't budge on a Monday morning.
Your garage door's torsion spring sits on a metal rod directly above the door. When you open the door, the spring unwinds and uses stored tension to counterbalance the door's weight. typically between 150 and 250 pounds for a standard residential door. Every time the door opens and closes, it burns through one cycle of the spring's rated life. Standard residential springs are typically rated for around 10,000 cycles, which translates to roughly 7,10 years of average use for most households.
Here in the Godwin area, that lifespan often gets cut short. High humidity causes rust to form on spring coils, and a corroded spring works harder on every single cycle. wearing out faster than the manufacturer ever intended. Temperature swings between our warm, muggy summers and the occasional hard freeze in January cause metal to repeatedly expand and contract, creating microscopic stress fractures over time. If your springs haven't been lubricated or inspected in a few years, they may be closer to failure than you think.
One of the clearest early signals is a door that suddenly feels much heavier than normal when you lift it manually. Disconnect your opener (pull the red emergency cord), lift the door by hand to about waist height, and let go. A properly balanced door should stay in place. If it drops straight down or feels like you're fighting it the whole way, the springs are losing tension. Don't keep using the opener to force a heavy, unbalanced door. you'll burn out the motor.
Many Godwin homeowners describe hearing what sounded like a gunshot or a car backfiring in their garage. That's almost always a torsion spring snapping under tension. After that sound, the door typically won't open at all, or it will hang crooked because one spring gave out while the other held. If this happens, do not attempt to force the door open. Call a professional. a door under uneven tension can drop suddenly and unpredictably.
Take a flashlight and look at your spring while the door is fully closed. A healthy spring should look like one continuous, tightly wound coil. If you see a gap anywhere along the coil. even a small one. the spring has already broken or is on the verge of breaking. You may also notice reddish-brown rust forming on the coils, which is a sign that the spring's protective coating has worn away. In our climate, where humidity regularly sits well above 60%, rust on unprotected metal is a matter of when, not if.
The cables on either side of your door work hand-in-hand with the springs. When a spring breaks, the cables often go slack or jump off the drum. If you see a cable lying in a heap on the floor of your garage, the spring system has almost certainly failed. Both issues need to be addressed together. replacing a cable without fixing the underlying spring problem is a waste of time and money.
If your door rises at an angle. one side higher than the other. you likely have one failing spring and one that's still holding. Most residential doors have two torsion springs. When one weakens, the door pulls to that side. This is especially common on older homes in the Cedar Creek and Black River areas of Cumberland County, where doors installed in the late 1990s and early 2000s may be well past their original spring's cycle life.
Spring replacement is not a DIY job. The springs are under extreme tension, and attempting to wind or unwind them without the proper winding bars and training is genuinely dangerous. If your springs are showing any of the signs above, the right move is to stop using the door and schedule a service call before the situation becomes an emergency.
Also worth knowing: when one spring breaks, the other is usually not far behind. Both springs age at the same rate, so replacing both at the same time almost always makes sense. it avoids a second service call a few weeks later and keeps the door balanced.
If your door is more than 10 years old, a spring inspection is a smart addition to any routine maintenance visit. You can learn more about what a full seasonal checkup covers in our guide to preparing your garage door for fall, which walks through a complete maintenance checklist useful year-round.
For homeowners in Hope Mills, Spring Lake, and the surrounding communities, the humidity and temperature conditions are nearly identical to Godwin, so these warning signs apply across the board. When in doubt, don't wait. a snapped spring at 7 a.m. on a workday is a much bigger problem than a spring you replaced proactively. Browse our full list of services to see how Godwin Garage Doors can help you stay ahead of failures like these.
Q: Can I still use my garage door if I think a spring is going bad? A: It's best not to. A weakening spring puts extra strain on your opener motor and creates an unbalanced door that could drop unexpectedly. Continuing to use it risks damaging the opener and creating a safety hazard. Have a technician assess it before relying on it further.
Q: How long does a spring replacement take? A: Most torsion spring replacements on a standard residential door take one to two hours. If both springs are being replaced and the cables inspected at the same time, plan for up to two and a half hours. A well-stocked truck means most jobs can be completed in a single visit.
Q: Should I replace both springs even if only one broke? A: In most cases, yes. Both springs are installed at the same time and go through the same number of cycles, so they age at the same rate. If one has broken, the other is typically close behind. Replacing both at once saves you the cost of a second service call and keeps the door operating evenly.