Does anyone know of a way to improve the range (distance) of the homelink garage door opener? I back my car in to park and practically have to back into the door to be close enough for it to sense it. Thanks.

 

If it's a Craftsman opener (or whoever makes them for Sears - Chamberlain perhaps?), some of their models are famous for losing receiver sensitivity - still work but just about have to be on top of them for them to receive the signal.

Of course, you can tell if the your remotes (if you have any) have the same problem.

 

Lots of makes use the homelink system.

You will find that Jaguar owners are not alone in having range problems with homelink remotes. All kinds of fixes have been tried including rigging new antennas with aluminum foil.

Two things hurt the operating range. Interference from metal embedded in the glass, and a bent antenna wire on the garage door opener.

The bent antenna wire is normally straightened by feeding it through a soda straw. Another fix is to use a passive repeater antenna made from coax. It just tunnels the signal from outside to inside so that it is more "visible" to the garage door opener.

You can also try retraining your homelink unit with brand new batteries in the remote used for training. This is because the homelink unit also mimics the signal strength it sees from the remote used for training.

 

Try wrapping your antenna wire of the opener around a pencil or scewdriver forming it into a coil. Remove the pencil and stretch the wire slightly. I have done this to mine and has increased the range some. Hope it helps.
Dave

 

Good info, Plum... but I was specifically referring to a fault in several Craftsman openers (NOT the transmitter) in case that's what the OP has in his garage - the built in receivers have a tendency to lose their sensitivity - they require the transmitters (either the sears handheld units OR the homelink unit) to be very close to the opener unit in order to work.

 

Well that may be true ... but we may as well cover both ends, no?

 

Absolutely - I was just restating to overcome the confusion that my first post apparently generated.