For Vancouver and Clark County homeowners, a repair or replace question often ends as a spring or cable repair on a sound door, because the parts that lift and guide a door wear out long before its sections do. The exceptions come down to damaged sections, matching and age, and this guide takes each in turn.
If you already know the door is done, see new garage door installation for how we handle a full replacement, and panel replacement for swapping one or two damaged sections. Either way, a photo of the door’s label and the damage gets you a price faster than a description.
Five questions that decide repair or replace
Work through these questions in order, standing in the garage with the door closed; the first one that gives a clear answer usually decides it.
- Is the problem the lift parts or the door itself? A snapped spring, a frayed cable, a cable that jumped its drum or a roller that has left its track is a repair on almost any door.
- How many sections are damaged, and are they still made? One dented section with a current match is a section job. Two or more, or none available, leans toward a new door.
- Does an HOA control the door’s look? If the rules set style and color, a section that does not match exactly may not pass, and a new door to the approved style may be the only fix.
- How old is the door, and what condition are the skins in? Age matters less than cracking at the hinges, separating layers and rust through the bottom.
- Do you want something the old door cannot give? Insulation for a shop or gym, windows, or a quieter door are reasons to replace that have nothing to do with damage.
Broken springs and cables are not a door failure
Snapped torsion springs and loose cables call for a repair, because those parts wear out on a schedule of their own while the sections carry on.
Standard torsion springs are sold with a rating of about 10,000 cycles, with each trip up and back down counting once. At four trips daily, that budget runs out in under seven years, so a door from the late 1990s may be on its third set. DASMA’s sheet on what shortens spring life agrees: spring life and door life are measured separately.
When we replace springs, we match wire gauge, coil inside diameter and spring length to what the door actually weighs, change the pair together when the door has two, and look at the cable drums, lift cables and bottom brackets for rust. Our spring replacement and cable replacement pages walk through that work and its posted prices.
When replacing one damaged section is enough
One section can be replaced on its own when the maker still builds that profile, thickness and color, and everything else on the door is in good shape.
The label is the starting point. Clopay, for one, fixes a label to the door’s inside face, often along a section edge or near the bottom, listing the model number, serial number and manufacturing date. With that, the width and a photo, we can check whether the section is current and what it costs against a new door.
Two cautions come with sections. Years of sun and weather can fade a door enough that a fresh section, even of the right model, looks a shade off. And DASMA’s sheet on component substitution warns that a part that looks similar may not have the same strength, with differences in metal thickness too small to see.
Signs the door itself is finished
Replace the door when its sections show fatigue, cracking or separating layers, because those are structural and no spring work fixes them.
DASMA’s door checklist for home inspectors and homeowners asks three questions about the sections: are they free of fatigue, free of cracking and free of separation of materials. A no on any of them is a stop sign. On steel doors we see cracks starting at the hinge screws of the top section, right at the opener arm’s pull point, and rust that has eaten through the bottom edge.
Repair or replace, by what you find on the door
Lift parts, track and a single matched section point to repair, while failed sections, missing matches and wanted upgrades point to a new door, and the table pairs each finding with its usual answer.
| What you find | Lean toward | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Broken spring, snapped cable, cable off the drum | Repair | Lift parts wear out on cycles; the door is fine |
| Roller out of the track, bent track section | Repair | Track and rollers are replaceable on any door |
| One dented section, model still made | Repair the section | A matched section restores the door |
| Two or more damaged sections | Compare both prices | The gap to a new door narrows with each section |
| Sections no longer made, or HOA needs an exact match | Replace | A mismatched section may not be allowed |
| Cracks at hinges, layers separating, rust through the bottom | Replace | The sections themselves have failed |
| Wood door with rot in the bottom rail | Depends on how far it spread | See the wood rot guide before deciding |
| A sound door you want insulated or quieter | Replace, by choice | The old door cannot be made into that one |
Does a garage door’s age mean it needs replacing?
Age alone rarely decides it, because a flat, rust-free steel door can outlast several sets of springs, and in Clark County many original doors are only 20 to 30 years old.
Census figures put the county’s median year built at 1993, with about a fifth of all housing units from the 1990s and another sixth from the 2000s. A 1998 tract house that still has its builder door has a 28-year-old door in 2026. The county’s Property Information Center shows the year built for any parcel, and the door’s label shows its own date.
A single sheet of uninsulated steel is no reason to replace on its own either: with fresh springs, a sound builder door can run for years. What changes the math is a dent or crack that needs a section the maker stopped building, which is worth checking before the damage happens.
How a repair and a new door are priced
A repair is priced by the parts it needs, and a new door by its size, insulation, windows and the springs and hardware that come with it.
Spring, cable, section and new door work each carry a posted starting price, and the price list shows each one before Washington sales tax is added. If the door you are weighing is wood, read our wood rot repair guide first, since rot changes the decision faster than dents do.