Garage Door Operator Back-up System

Ride through any housing development built in the last 15 or 20 years, and one aspect of the homes jumps out: the garage is right up front.

So it follows that a recent online survey found that 71 percent of homeowners use their garage door as the primary access point to their home. It’s so common that many people no longer carry house keys.

The problem comes when there’s a power outage and access to your home can be impeded.

I had a guy tell me he was trapped outside of his house several days. The power went out, his family was out of town, he didn’t have a house key, and he ended up at the neighbors’ for four or five days.

For getting out in a power outage, modern garage door openers have an emergency pull cord. You give a yank, and it disengages the door, allowing you to open it by hand. (If your garage door is balanced and working properly, you should be able to open it with two fingers.) But there are people who don’t know how the pull-cord works, and the process can be too much for the elderly or people with disabilities. And even if you can open the door to get out, there can be a big problem.

It’s not so much about getting out, it’s about getting in. When you do get out, you have to get back inside and re-engage the garage door opener to make sure it’s locked. Otherwise, the garage — and your home — may not be secure.

The convenient, no-hassle solution is a garage door opener with battery backup. The battery back-up openers control only the doors, not the lights. That’s to save power. The opener will operate for 20 up-and-down cycles, which should get people through almost any power outage.

All of us have become very dependent on garage door openers. They’ve become a necessity instead of the luxury item that they were years ago. It’s a very small investment to control the access to your home.

A Resource for Homeowners: Home and Garage Access During a Power Outage

LiftMaster launched their new site, GetInYourGarage.com, as a resource for homeowners, providing them with tips on how to manage their home and garage access during a power outage.

Coupled with statistics on the frequency of power outages across the country, this site helps connect homeowners to installing dealers who can educate them on and install tangible battery backup garage door opener and access solutions so they are never inconveniently blocked or locked out by a heavy powerless garage door when the power’s out.

Whether caused by inclement weather or grid failures, power outages are inevitable, leaving homeowners with a lot to handle until the power goes back on. GetinYourGarage.com offers a resourceful starting point for homeowners and families on what to do during a power outage and what steps they can take to ensure that access to their home is not jeopardized, leading them to a local dealer to learn more about maintaining peace-of-mind during an outage. 

The site also features information on the LiftMaster 3850 Belt Drive unit with battery backup built right into the opener, as well as a preview of LiftMaster’s new national television spot that highlights the features and benefits of installing this battery backup-enabled unit.

LiftMaster is a brand of professionally installed residential garage door openers, as well as a major manufacturer of commercial door operators, residential and commercial gate operators, telephone-entry systems and related access-control products.

No Electricity? Garage Door Won’t Open?

Ever worry about the electricity cutting out and not having a way to open your garage door? No worries here. Just bust thru it!

Kidding! There are a couple of easy solutions!

1.  The first option is to purchase an opener that provides an “emergency release latch”.  The latch allows you to manually open the garage door by hand.  Thankfully, all automatic openers provide an emergency release mechanism.

Lifting up a garage door is a trivial action for the majority of us; nonetheless, utilizing the emergency release latch can turn out to be a daunting task for the elderly or the young.  There is an alternative…

2. A battery-operated power backup is a proven and effective solution.  Essentially, the battery backup kicks in automatically when the electricity kicks out. Due to the fact that it is battery operated, it has a limited amount of use before recharging is required – an important note for those prolonged power outages.