I have an opportunity to start fresh. Our new place has 3 doors, 8 feet tall, single car width. The prior owner put power outlets above each door, as though he planned openers, but there are no openers present. My wife would like to push a button and drive right in. Truth be told, I'd like that, too.

Anyhow, there's nothing above the garage, and there's a storage room next to it, so noise isn't an issue. These are pretty heavy wooden doors, but the springs look like they are in good shape.

Since I'm starting from scratch, what should I consider?

The Jackscrew versions look like they are a little easier to install, and they don't take up space above the door. The space issue isn't a big deal to me, the garage ceiling height isn't high above the door anyway, so I'm not losing anything. Install doesn't concern me much, since I'll be installing 3 of them, I figure I'll have it sorted by the time I hit door #3.

The jackscrew openers are definitely more expensive, however. And in my case, the power isn't right there, it's centered where standard opener head would go. I'll have to run the seeing eye sensors either way, so that's kind of a wash.

I've got two openers in my old house, a Genie something or other from about 2008 and a Chamberlain that replaced a genie in about 2018. They both open and close the doors.


Considerations, roughly in order of importance:

1) Longevity
2) Security
3) Ease of install
4) Price
5) Noise level (don't care at all)

If you were starting from scratch, what would you do?

Direct drive units are very smooth and very quiet.  I would never own anything else.

I was lucky that I had already put an outlet in the corner where the direct drive is now located.

It isn't that hard to drop a new circuit where you need it,  in most cases.

You may be able to go with a solar option and use a battery system.

Liftmaster!  Mine is driving a heavy double wall insulated Clopay door, so these things have some balls.

Mine has a solenoid driven cross bolt lock, which I think they come with standard. I also have a Garage Door Butler with a timer that shuts my door.  There is a bunch of wifi bullshit you can buy for this now, too.  More shit to fail.

Thanks - running the circuit won't be hard, I'm just lazy, looking for the easiest way out. I called the local garage door place and they quoted almost $3,000 for three openers, installed.

So I'm lazy AND I'm cheap.

I've always installed my own openers.  In a new house, I put them in.  In a house that already had them, I replaced them with belt drives.  Done it four times, so a total of 8 units installed.  All 3 homes that had existing openers were screw drive.    Yeah, that's a good idea, let's have a great, big 8' long spinning shaft.  Yeah, that won't be noisy or require constant maintenance.  

If I had to do it now, I'd take a serious look at the direct drive units.  I'd have no problem just running a white extension cord along the ceiling from the existing outlet.

That being said, I've never had an issue with belt drive units.  Smooth and powerful.  Current house has 8' solid wood doors, a single and a double.  Got a 1/2 horse belt for the single, and a 3/4 horse unit for the double.  Fucking doors are heavy.  I had the torsion spring break on the single door.  And then I tried to open it.  I'll bet that fucker weighs 200 lbs.  Barely got it open.  You can hear the 3/4 horse unit struggle opening the double, and you can see the belt tension and slacken when moving the door.

Liftmaster direct drive 8500 retail is $380 each.  You will probably be getting springs too.  What all is on the quote?

Garage door companies, especially large ones, love rape.  Is rape included in your quote?  

This is really where you need to "know a guy".

You said "rape" twice.


I think the quote is one of those....we don't really have time for you and don't want the business so here's a big number that will make it worth it to darken your doorstep.

They quote is "install 3x Chamberlain openers with one two button remote each" - no detail or model numbers.

He said he can do it by mid-May.

This is the kind of thing I can do over a few days. I'll start with the least used door for practice. Then I'll allow plenty of time to do the door my wife uses and get it done, then the final door.

I'll have to look at the springs. The torsion springs installed are clearly doing well. The doors are heavy wood and I can lift them without much effort.

The last door I installed was a Raynor showcase with nylon rollers. Opener was a Genie Stealth drive. Super quiet

I don’t have any fancy direct drive ones but I have one chain and one jackscrew style. The chain one is much quieter and lower maintenance. I’m sure belt is even better.

I think at one time there was a misconception that screw drive openers would be more quiet than chain. I still remember my dad searching out screw drive openers (not common at the time) bc he had been told they would be whisper quiet. This was before the days of internet.


Not anymore! Liftmaster has really jacked the price on the 8500 up. And the brains of the 8500 are in the wall control so any loss of communication between the wall control and motor unit and you're SOL. That was a big sticking point for me. Plus, to use our Homelink controls (built into our cars) it takes an extra interface unit.

I went with Genie jackshaft openers when I highlifted my doors a few months ago. Cheaper, the wall control is truly just auxiliary, the units will operate without the wall control, and no interface unit required to operate with cars equipped with Homelink.


That's the truth!

I had my local door company out to quote doing the highlift conversion for me. #1, they came at the time I told them I wouldn't be available and called asking where I was. Then told me there was no way to convert my doors to high-lift and they would just quote me new doors.

I ended up piecing together highlift conversions myself because even DDM that sells ready-made high-lift conversions is raping people. IIRC, DDM wanted $335 each door for a conversion kit. I pieced my own together and crimped my own cables for just over $100/door (that includes $70 for double springs).

I have two Liftmasters (one with battery backup, one without) and a single Chamberlain.  Liftmaster, Chamberlain, and Craftsman are the same thing.  All mine are belt driven and WiFi connected.  I've installed a total of three of the Chamberlain units myself at different homes - it's not too hard if you have basic handyman skills.  I really like being able to look on my phone and verify my doors are closed, and I have notifications set to let me know if a door stays open for more than 2 hours.  I have my utility garage door set to automatically close at 9:00 (I get a notification if that happens too).  The nicer units have motion sensors to turn on the light, and all should turn on the light if anything breaks the infrared door sensor.

If you get the professionally installed Liftmaster, you'll get a one piece rail.  The Chamberlain/Craftsman will come with a multi-piece rail so it fits in the retail box.  I don't see any difference functionally.

I've been very happy with them and would buy /self-install again if I needed to.

So what is the go to jack shaft opener that does not break the bank? Need to replace two crappy chain drive craftsman units

Our house had the Genie screw drive when we bought it. I put in a Chamberlain belt drive about 10 years ago. Other than the backup battery dying, it has been trouble free and stupid quiet.
I've installed five garage doors with springs (coil, contained, stretch) and three openers. IMO it can be a DIY for someone that has some mechanical skills.

I've installed these things, they aren't tough at all, but since I'm starting from scratch, I'm trying to decide if the wall mount style is 1) Worth the extra cost and 2) reliable.


For some reason having a clean ceiling is appealing.

Neat!... I had not heard of those type of openers before.
I'll stick around and learn. Looks nice and compact.

I installed the jackshaft openers at my house.....super quiet.

The Liftmaster 8500 seems to be the most popular but it is also the most expensive and has several disadvantages I mentioned above. Chamberlain (owned by Liftmaster) has one that is mostly the same as the LM 8500 just lacks some bells and whistles, but still has the downers of the LM 8500.

Genie 6070 (no wifi) and 6170 (wifi) are what I bought. They were cheaper and I didn't have to buy accessories to make them work (mentioned above). Plus they are smaller and one location on my install was going to be a very close fit for the Liftmaster.


I absolutely LOVE mine. SO quiet! Free ceiling space and take up so little wall space!

Obviously the biggest benefit is when you high-lift or vertical-lift the doors but that's not to say a standard door doesn't see benefits too.

One benefit I didn't realize until I spoke to a sales guy is that bc a jack-shaft opener requires some weight to keep the cable from unspooling, most jackshaft openers are built heavy enough that they can still operate fully with no spring. You wouldn't want to make that your normal procedure but if your spring breaks you can still open the door. A broken spring on some of the others may result in a broken opener and damaged door when it slams into the floor.

Chamberlain belt drive WiFi garage door opener with battery backup.  Can be purchased at HD, Lowe’s or Amazon.  The price depends on whether you want 1/2 or 3/4 HP.  Opener is super quiet and app can be set up to alert you if you accidentally leave the garage door open.

Get a Liftmaster 8500W jackshaft opener and be done.

Money well spent.

I just had a jackshaft opener and new door installed tusday

Love having more room and how clean it looks

@MrTinkles

I wanna do this in my garage, but I have low ceilings... any chance you can give me some details? I currently have extension springs, so I need to convert to torsion frist, I think I have room for it.. But I need to know what the clearances are for the opener before. I convert... Looking at your pics, It looks like I may have the room... But I would like some actual data before I start converting to torsion just to use an opener... There is no way I traditional open will work... I had to use and after marker set of top rollers/hindges just to get my door to work... All I need is some basic info...

@-FiveFiveSIx-

On my setup the spring is 13" above the door and the opener only sits maybe 1" above the spring shaft wheel so you wouldn't need that much clearance for the opener. Also the opener doesn't mount on the wall for the record so you dont have to hurry and finish the wall like i did.

My door is a 7x16 with 9ft ceiling, the highest part of the rails is 13" below the ceiling with a slight angle down to help the shaft opener

Let me know if i misunderstood you, i can go out and measure whatever you need

Thanks.  That visual and your description helps

Thank you for the info... looks like I can make it work... Like I said I have a very odd set up... Ill post a pic... If Im looking at it correctly, the only measurement that I need to be sure off, is the top of track to top of the liftmaster.. If I can get that to fit the top of my door height *should* not come into play..


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I know it looks tight, but that after market hinge roller setup allows the top of the door the turn immediately and travel horizontally... I went with this option rather than the double track because I wanted as much room above the top track incase I went with an opener... Any chance you can measure the drum roller size (looks to be 3-4in) and how high the top of the lift if from the top of the track... Like I said, It looks tight, but I think I can make this work...

@-FiveFiveSIx-

Wheel looks to be about 4 1/2 or so and the top of the opener is close to 6"from the top rail, that angle steel is within 1/4 of the top of the rail.

Sorry for the shitty pic its dark and i haven't wired the lights in the garage yet

Thank you.. Looks like I’ll have about 1/4-1/2 inch to spare lol worst case I can always fab up a gear or chain drive extension for it..

This. Why am I just now hearing of these openers? I have a new in box Genie belt drive with wifi waiting for me to get around to removing the old non-wifi Genie screw drive opener so I can put it up. A direct drive / jackshaft opener will make what I have planned for the garage much easier.

All I ever used were chain ones. Have one now in my new house. They always worked for me fine.

The house I bought last summer had a garage, but never had any kind of opener installed.  I'm the only person living there, and there's just attic space over the garage in any case, so I didn't give a rat's ass about noise.  I'm also a cheap guy, so I just kept shopping Lowe's and Home Depot until a decent chain-drive opener went on sale.  I think it was somewhere in the $160s.  Gave them another hundred bucks and they hired a guy to come install it.  According to him, all the box-store brands are all the same inside, just with different colored casings.  Chain drive, while noisier, seemed to have the best reputation for durability and longevity, so that's how I went.

8500's here, love them
Do yourself a favor and make sure the encoder gear on the main shaft is tightened down (small set screw).
Mine started slipping and giving my a heck of a time but it was a stupid simple fix.

Dang! I knew by comparing dimensions of the LM vs Genie that the LM was bigger but the pictures of yours installed really put it in perspective. I never would have been able to fit that monstrosity on my door with tight clearance. I'm glad I found the Genie openers and strayed from the LM recommendations.

For the record, I understand why the 8500's were popular when the price was sub-$400, but now that the problems they're plagued with have become more known and they're over $500, I don't understand why so many still consider it the gold standard.

Problems?  A friend is a commercial opening guy.  He installs a lot of these and uses them at his house.  No problems.

A quick search of garagejournal reveals the multitude of troubles, most of it is all due to the fact that the LM8500 brains are in the bluetooth wall controller and it cannot operate without a functioning wall controller. Wall controller goes bad (it's a frequent problem) and your otherwise functional door opener is made non-functional.


I'll make this easy...