· by Michael Blair, Nashville's Garage Door
The garage door is the largest opening in most houses and usually the least considered. Several of the ways in need no force at all, and two of them use features that exist for good reasons. Once you see how they work, the fixes are plain and mostly cheap.
The emergency release
An opener attached to the door has to have a manual release, and the federal opener standard, 16 CFR Part 1211, says in section 1211.9 that its handle is colored red, can be set at 6 feet above the floor, and frees the door with a firm pull of no more than 50 pounds. The warning label the standard requires beside the wall button gives the reason: if a person is trapped under the door, push the control button or use the emergency release. It’s also how you lift the door by hand when the power is off, which our post on opening a garage door when the power is out walks through.
On many doors that handle can be reached from outside by working a thin tool or a wire hook through the gap at the top of the door and catching the cord. It’s a known way in, and it leaves no marks. Before you add a shield or tie anything to the release, ask the opener’s maker or the installer what they approve for your model, because the same standard tells installers to mount the release within reach, at least 6 feet above the floor, and clear of vehicles so it isn’t pulled by accident.
Are old garage door openers a security risk?
Age is the other weak point. Federal rules have required openers made since January 1, 1991 to be marked with the month or week and year they were built, according to the same Part 1211, so the opener itself should tell you how old it is, and we still come across old ones in Nashville garages.
Some older remotes set their code with a row of tiny switches inside the case, set by hand to agree with a row of switches in the opener. When we open a remote and find those, we suggest replacing the opener, and it’s one of the cheaper security upgrades on a house; our opener repair and installation page covers what that involves. Newer openers pair their remotes through a learn button on the motor unit instead, and Chamberlain’s support page for its garage door openers says the color of that button identifies the opener’s radio frequency and technology. If you want to know whether yours uses a rolling code, the model number and the manual will say, or the maker can tell you.
- Ask the opener maker how to secure the emergency release
- Replace any opener with dip-switch remotes
- Never leave a remote clipped to a visor in a parked car
- Cover or frost the garage windows
- Fit a deadbolt on the door from the garage into the house
The door between the garage and the house
Once inside the garage, an intruder is out of sight of the street and has time and, frequently, your own tools. The door into the house can be a hollow-core door with a passage knob, hung as though it were a bedroom door rather than a way in from outside.
We’d treat it as an exterior door: solid core, a deadbolt, and a strike plate with long screws into the framing rather than the jamb. The deadbolt and strike plate are our advice, not a code rule. What the door itself is made of is a code matter, and in Davidson County that code is the 2024 International Residential Code, with local amendments, on Metro Codes’ adopted codes list. Metro adopted the 2024 codes in July 2025 for plans and applications submitted after July 16 of that year, so we check that edition, or your own city’s code outside the county, before we hang a new one. If yours is hollow, or the opener is one of the old ones above, ask us to come look at both.
Which habits leave a garage open to break-ins?
A remote clipped to the visor of a car parked in the driveway is a key to the house left in an unlocked box. Move it to a keychain remote, or use the phone app if your opener has Wi-Fi.
Leaving the door open while you work in the backyard is the other habit, since an open, empty garage shows everything in it to the street. Many openers can close the door on their own after a set time, which 16 CFR 1211.14 calls unattended operation: it only works once you switch it on, and it isn’t allowed on one-piece or swinging doors, only sectional ones. A door that closes by itself leans on its reversing system, and the standard’s installation check is that the door reverses when it meets a 1 1/2 inch object, or a 2 by 4 laid flat, on the floor, which is part of every tune-up we do.
Sources
- U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, 16 CFR Part 1211, Safety Standard for Automatic Residential Garage Door Operators (eCFR) — Red-handled manual release on openers attached to the door, 6 feet, 50 pounds (1211.9); entrapment warning label wording (1211.17); mounting of the release (1211.16); date-of-manufacture marking since 1991 (1211.19); unattended operation enabled deliberately, sectional doors only (1211.14); reversal on a 1 1/2 inch object (1211.16)
- Metro Nashville Codes, Adopted Codes List — 2024 International Residential Code adopted with local amendments
- Metro Nashville Codes, Metro Adopts 2024 International Building Codes (July 23, 2025) — BL2025-898 signed July 16, 2025; applies to plans and applications submitted after that date in Davidson County
- Chamberlain Group support, Garage Door Openers — The learn button pairs remotes and accessories; its color identifies the opener’s radio frequency and technology
FAQ
How Garage Doors Actually Get Opened — questions
Is zip-tying the emergency release safe?
We wouldn’t do it without the opener maker’s approval. There’s no published strength rating we can point to for a plastic tie, and a tie that holds against a hooked wire may also hold against someone pulling to free a person trapped under the door, which is the case the release exists for. Ask the maker or the installer what they approve for your model.
How can I tell if my opener uses a rolling code?
Start with the model number on the motor unit and look it up in the opener’s manual, or ask the maker. A remote with a row of small switches inside is an older design we’d replace. Chamberlain says the color of the learn button on its openers identifies the radio frequency and technology, which narrows it down on those models.
Does a garage door need a deadbolt on the house door?
We think it should have one. That door is an exterior door in every sense that matters for security, since the garage is easier to get into than the front of the house. The deadbolt is our advice rather than a code rule; the code governs what the door is made of, and in Nashville that is the 2024 International Residential Code Metro adopted in 2025, so a replacement there is checked against it.
How do you secure a garage door?
Secure the emergency release the way the opener’s maker approves, replace any opener whose remotes have dip switches inside, and keep remotes out of parked cars. Covering or frosting the garage windows, a deadbolt on the door into the house and closing the garage door when nobody is out there do the rest.