Bait Coupons

After figuring out the problem lies with the RPM sensor, I still wasn't able to find it within the opener, as I was only looking on one side.

During that time, I found the Valpak coupons in the mail and among them I noticed this one:

From initial look, it has some good offers like "Free Service Call" and "$50 Off", so I thought why not calling them if that will help me solve the problem faster without wasting more time on it. And as expected that turned out to be another trap but luckily it has some good consequences. I called them and a technician came, this time was more professional and polite than the initial one. After looking at the door, he noticed it's unbalanced so his offer to fix the issue was to just do some "lubing and tuning" for $189! I mentioned to him about the RPM sensor and how I believe it's the real cause for the problem, but he didn't even seem to know about that sensor and insisted on just doing his adjustments, bragging about his 7 years experience and that manuals don't solve problems. I wasn't ready to get cheated again so initially I refused to take this and here he asked for a $49 service call!

That time I started to figure out the trap, looking at the coupon fine prints, you get the free service call only with a service, and in this case you don't qualify for the $50 off since you cannot use with another offer! Got it? So either I pay $189 for a lube and tune which is so expensive for that, and I was sure won't solve the problem, or I pay $49 for nothing. I didn't give up and started arguing and calling these numbers complaining about the bait and mentioning that his diagnostic is not going to solve the problem, I could hear him at that time talking to his boss on the phone saying "I like customers that think they know better than me"! I finally gave up, but the good thing after this fight, I got a word from them that for the $189 he will get it fixed, or at least I showed them that I won't be an easy victim.

He went on to do the lubing, which consist of spraying lubricant on the door rollers and hinges, then he adjusted the spring using a big iron bar. He got the door balanced in less than 10 minutes, which I could have probably done myself, but it's good to see it at least once. Also the spring tuning was a bit challenging and needs a special tool. I will post links for videos online showing how to do this. After that he went to adjust the opener force and time limit controls and thought that's going to get him the $189, but as expected that didn't work and the problem remained the same. He then removed the remaining of the opener cover (I had it already opened when he arrived, so no excuses) and kept looking inside with no clue, until finally he gave up. He was obviously embarrassed after this and spent some time thinking what to offer,  so he mentioned that the logic board needs to be changed which I can either wait for them to order and replace it for me or I can order it online and replace myself! It's nice when you get such suggestions from a service call, why am I calling them then? My concern was that they ask me to replace the whole opener similar to the previous one or pay $189 for the lubing and tuning, but I guess, feeling the embarrassment, he just asked for the $49 service call and told me that at least I got my door balanced, which I thought was fair. He also gave some good suggestions for what lubricant to use and doing it every 6 months. I finally wanted him to show me where's this RPM sensor (which was my main goal for this service call anyway), but he didn't have a clue, so he just told me to search online :)

Overall I was happy with this service, better than the first guy, at least getting the door balanced, but the real surprise came after he left, when I finally found what I was looking for. Since he removed the opener side nails and cover, I was able to spot the interrupter cup and RPM sensor inside and proceed with the solution. 

First Technician

The first garage door service I found was through Yelp. They have really good reviews, more than hundred 5 stars! I always wonder if they have some tricks to get so many good reviews, but that's another story. Anyway, I called them and they mentioned about sending someone within a one-hour window that evening, they said also their service call fee is $89 and that would include simple fixes. Well, that was the first trap! I waited for them during that hour but no one came, so I called again, the guy told me that he will look for his technician and call me back, but he didn't call! After another hour, someone knocked on my door and the technician was finally there.

At that time, I had already disengaged the release handle and it was only the trolley moving back and forth on the belt every time he clicks the opener button. He looked at it and didn't seem to have any clue as if it was his first time to see something like that. He said that hopefully it's just the wires need to be connected properly and on his own words that would be 'relatively simple to fix, otherwise we will have to replace the whole engine'! He anyway started messing with the wires and even broke some of the paint in the ceiling, even though it was clear that these wires were properly connected. These are the 4 external wires going into the opener, two of them coming from the door opener which was already working and the other two coming from the two safety sensors on the left and right side of the garage door, which were also having power since they had their orange and green lights on. 

After putting his own useless wires there, the problem was of course not solved, so he said the only solution is to replace the whole engine which would cost me $450 without the belt or $650 with the belt! That turned out to be twice as expensive as other quotes I got later, but anyway I wasn't convinced that a 5-year old LiftMaster opener can break so easily, these are supposed to be much more reliable and my model even claims to have a lifetime warranty (what that practically means is another story). So I asked him, if there are simpler solutions like replacing an internal part such as the logic board? He answered no, since the logic board is attached to the engine and we have to replace the whole thing. This turned out to be another lie, since as I will show later, the logic board can be ordered online for ~$50-$60 and replaced easily by removing a few nails and wire plugs. He was so useless, that he didn't even try to open it or put any effort on looking for the real cause. When I didn't seem convinced, he mentioned that he has to take the $89 service call, then took them quickly and ran, without even caring to clean the mess he created. To summarize, he took $89 for a false diagnostic and without any sincere effort to figure the actual problem. In my opinion, replacing the whole opener is only a solution for someone who has no idea how to solve a problem. As I will show later, it turned out there's a much cost efficient solution, so either they don't know about it and in this case they are incompetent. Or they know but they want to make big money out of it, and in this case they are not honest. I wonder in this case what they would have done with my old opener after replacing it?

One more thing, the guy noticed that the garage door was unbalanced, but instead of adjusting it (at least providing some value for the money he took), he wanted to replace the whole door rollers and replace the single spring with two springs, again trying to make some big money out of it. Theoretically, it might be true that two springs are better than one, but who wants to make such unnecessary changes on a relatively new door. Later, it turned out that some simple lubing of the wheels and tuning of the spring can get the door balanced.

I was so disappointed with this experience that I went on to look for the solution myself.