Why garage door springs break
A residential garage door spring is rated by cycles, not years — one cycle is one open and one close. Builder-grade torsion springs are typically 10,000-cycle, which works out to 6–8 years for a household that uses the door 3–5 times a day. Older homes still running extension springs along the horizontal track fail sooner because the load isn't shared evenly. In North Texas, summer heat cycling and humidity accelerate metal fatigue, so springs often break 2–3 years short of their rated life. We size replacements to the door's actual weight and install 25,000-cycle oil-tempered springs whenever the header has the clearance — same labor, roughly double the lifespan.
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