A gravel grind from the opener head with a door that barely moves usually means a worn nylon drive gear. Stop cycling it. A shop can swap the gear kit or the opener and should check spring balance.
People oil the tracks first. Fair instinct. Wrong noise. Roller screech lives down low. This grind lives in the plastic housing. Chain or belt openers with a worm drive often use a nylon gear on a metal worm. Years of lifts and a tired spring wear that nylon flat. Then it strips. Then every cycle sounds worse.
If you hear gravel from the head and see white or gray crumbs under the gear
Unplug the opener. Stand clear of the door. If the cover comes off without forcing anything, look for white or gray plastic dust under the gear set. That is the nylon shedding. You can sometimes smell hot plastic after a few failed tries. Keep running it and you can chew the worm or cook the motor. Stop mashing the remote. Each gravel cycle turns more plastic into dust.
If the door creeps a few inches then stalls while the head grinds
That is the half stripped gear pattern. Enough teeth left to start the lift. Not enough to finish. The rail may move a little. Then the grind gets louder and travel dies. Do not keep jabbing the button hoping it will catch.
Pull the emergency release only if you need a car out and the door still feels balanced by hand. Freeing the door by hand works the same way it does in a power outage. Move it slow from the side. If it fights, lists, or feels like a brick, leave it. Use the house door. Do not stand under a hanging panel.
If the grind started after the door got heavier
A tired or broken torsion spring makes the opener lift weight it was never meant to carry alone. Gears die early on unbalanced doors. If yesterday the unit was quiet and today it grinds after a cold night or a bang, treat spring balance as part of the same visit. A shop that only swaps the gear kit without checking the spring often sells you a second kit later.
A door that lists crooked while it grinds can be two problems at once. Weak spring plus a dying gear. Or a cable starting to fray and the opener fighting the imbalance. Do not keep hitting the remote hoping the noise will seat itself.
What it is not
This is not a spring bang. A spring snap leaves the door dead heavy, and the opener strains or hums without that gravel sound. It is also not a door that screeches every open from dry or cracked rollers. Roller screech lives low. This grind lives in the motor head. More in the noise guide.
Silent remotes are batteries, lock mode, or power. A remote that does nothing leaves the opener quiet. Grinding means the motor is trying and the drive train is losing teeth.
A freewheeling door after you yanked the red cord is quieter still. The head runs clean and the door never moves with it. That is a disconnect, not a chewed gear. A door that hangs stuck halfway is usually track, cable, ice, or spring. A door that starts closing then climbs right back up is usually eyes, travel, or force. Rocks in a blender points at the head.
What not to do
Do not keep cycling the opener until the plastic goes quiet. That silence is often a stripped gear or cooked motor, not a fix. Do not pour oil into the head. Do not stand on a ladder under a half open door with power still live. Do not force a random gear kit onto the wrong worm.
A shop that does garage doors will usually swap the gear kit, or the whole opener if the housing is cracked or the motor is cooked. They should also check spring balance.
I am not a contractor. This is just what shows up when the motor head sounds like gravel and people keep pressing the button hoping it will quiet down. Get someone who works on these to look at the gear, the worm, and the spring before the next cycle finishes the job.
DASMA notes that openers are built for balanced doors, not as a fix for a heavy door. Their garage door opener safety tips cover balance checks alongside the usual reverse rules.
The U.S. CPSC garage door operator page covers federal opener safety rules. Grinding from the head is usually the drive gear, and an unbalanced door kills gears early.
If the opener sounds like gravel and you want someone local to look, get a quote.