Heavy machinery and young children are never a good mix of variables. Besides of being small and fragile, children often don’t understand the dangers that heavy machinery can pose to them. That means that as adults it is our job to ensure that such, like our garage door at home,never pose any serious threat to them. If you’re not too certain where to start going about this with your system, then here are a few good tips on how to keep your young ones safe around it.
The first thing you want to do is to make sure that your garage door opener’s safety features are working as they should. All systems should come with sensors and functions that stop the door from closing or opening if they detect an object on the door's path.
Children aren’t always picky about where they choose to play, and for this reason you should always make sure that your system's reverse function is working properly. Test it by rolling up some bath towels and placing them on the floor where the door comes down. Close the garage door to ensure that when it meets the towels, that the pressure this causes makes the door reverse direction immediately. If the door does not react appropriately to the obstruction, then you can be sure it is not safe for children, and needs adjustment.
Test your safety sensors as well, ideally, even if the reverse function is working fine, you should have confidence in your sensors’ ability to avoid any unnecessary clashes between people or property with your door as it is closing. Test your sensors regularly by standing between them when you close the door, if they are working correctly, the doors shouldn’t close at all, or it should automatically reverse immediately.
Garage door receivers, remotes and panels need to be properly taken care of to ensure that your door doesn’t open without you knowing. Keep remotes out of reach of children, and make sure that the panels are placed high enough to avoid being operated by adventurous little fingers. You likely had the system installed to give your family a better sense of security, so don’t let that be compromised with thoughtlessness.
Education starts at home
It’s not enough to just accept that children don’t understand the dangers of machinery, explaining to them how it works, and why it is dangerous is an important thing to do if you can. Garages are generally not safe places for children to play, and an automatic system will raise the risk of danger for youngsters. If you can’t find an effective way of keeping you children away from the door, make sure that they fully understand what can go wrong if they are not careful around it.
Keeping an eye on your system’s security measures should be enough to keep your family’s safety in good order, so don’t let these features fall to negligence if you can help it, and make sure to keep the remote out of the hands of your children.