Shed Door Won’t Open: [Possible Reasons & Solutions]

There are many reasons why your shed door won’t open, some are listed below:

Reasons & Solutions

1. Due To Humidity :

Humidity swells the wood door of your shed and if it swells it stuck on the door frame and makes it hard to open the door.  

Solution:

To prevent swell on your wooden door you can paint it, you can lubricate it by rubbing a dry soap at the top and sides of your shed door. You can also use candle wax, paraffin wax, etc. 

If your shed door has swollen then you can use a heat gun or a hairdryer to remove the moisture from the wood and that way you can fix your swollen shed door. 

2. Bend Hinges:

If the hinges of your shed door are installed too close to the edge of your door frame then it puts pressure on the door frame and may cause a broken door frame. 

Hinges that are not inserted properly would bend and prevent the opening and closing of your shed door. 

Solution:

In this situation, you have to change the bend hinges to make your door open and close easily. 

3. Rust On Hinges:

Due to the weather and humidity, hinges get rust and make it difficult to open and close the door of your shed. 

Solution:

To keep your shed door hinges safe from rust you can spray Jig-a-Loo lubricant (Don’t use WD-40 here).

4. Lack Of Lubrication On The Moving Parts Of Your Shed Door:

Moving parts of your shed door such as hinges, door frames, and wheels (In the case of the sliding door) require proper lubrication to work perfectly. 

With time these moving parts lose lubrication and due to the accommodation of dust, and debris, they get stuck and make it difficult to open and close your shed door. Sometimes you hear an annoying creak sound coming from the shed door, this is also due to the lack of lubrication on its moving parts. 

5. If Your Shed Door Stuck With The Frame 

Solution:

If your shed door sticks to the door jamb or frame then it becomes hard to open it without sanding its edge. Sanding is only possible if you can take your shed door down but in most cases, you are not able to take your shed door down, in this situation with the help of a chisel and hammer, you can peel off that part of your shed door which stuck with the door jamb. 

Also Read: 5 Best Ways To Fix Shed Door Won’t Close: [Self Applied]

Different Types Of Shed Doors That Won’t Open [With Solution]

1. The sliding shed door won’t open

Reasons:

1. Sliding door may bind somewhere. 

2. Swollen wood of your shed door due to humidity.

3. The top and bottom sliding door jamb wheels may be gunked up or maybe their bearing is worn out. 

4. Due to sifting of wood of the door or its frame due to swelling. 

Solutions:

Lubricate the track and wheel area of your shed sliding door, to check if it does move or not.  For this, you can use a good lubricant (View on Amazon) that works on sliding doors and wood perfectly. I would advise not to use WD-40 lubricant here, use Jig-a-Loo instead to get better results. 

Just spray it all over the frame and wheels of the top and bottom door jamb, and rub the tracks and wood frames with candle wax. 

It will definitely help to open and close your shed door that was stuck.  

My friend tried to use Ikea tealight as a lubricant and trust me it helps to free up his 50 years old sliding door from its frame and helps to move it again. 

2. Shed Has Double Doors That Won’t Open 

If your shed has two doors and they won’t open then maybe the door is stuck with its frame because of wood swelling due to humidity.

Sometimes shed doors become misaligned and do not open easily. In this case, you have to align them. To align them you have to push the shed against its base upward so that the door jamb can move a few inches up and the doors will be aligned. 

For this, you can use a car jack (if your shed is big) or you can use a long piece of wood and put one corner underneath the base and a piece of small wood or brick at the center and press its other corner by your leg to lift the shed. 

In one word simply make a small wooden lever to lift your small shed a few inches up from its base. 

When your shed lifts a few inches from its base take some small pieces of wood and put them under its base to hold the shed at that upward position. 

3. If The Shed Has A Door That Opens Into The Shed And Won’t Open

I have seen that many sheds are made in such a way that their door open inside. My friend also has a similar shed. One day he was unable to open the door because something heavy fell on the way of the shed door. 

He was unable to take the shed door down because the hinges of the door were inside. You can also get trapped in this situation. 

There are some ideas you can follow to open your shed door without much damage. 

1. If you could find the position of your shed door hinges then you can make a small cut around the hinge by using a metal cutter or something like that to detach the door. 

You can compensate for the damage by replacing the hinges. 

2. If the siding of your shed door is made of vinyl then you would remove some pieces of it and could try to push the heavy element out of the way of your shed door. This method will not cause any damage to your door as Vinyl sidings can be easily inserted again in their place. 

Conclusion

In conclusion, there is a different-different approaches to fixing the problem of your shed door not opening. It depends on the type of shed door, the weather, the humidity level of your area, and on its maintenance. 

In this article, I’ve mentioned some most likely causes and solutions to this problem. I hope this article would help you to fix your shed door problem. 

FAQ