Swing gates - types, design options and installation features (130 photos and videos)

The entrance gate of a suburban area is the first thing people see. Therefore, the desire to choose a beautiful product is understandable. But the aesthetic function is not the only one - the important aspect is security and restricting access of strangers to the territory.

One popular solution is to install swing gates. Their main advantages are:

simplicity and sophistication of the design;
low cost of production and installation;
no special requirements for operation;
wide choice of gate shapes and designs;
possibility of using automatic drives for opening and closing.

The disadvantages of this type of gate include the large area required for the gate to operate and the limited possibility of use in places with high wind loads.

Peculiarities

Comfortable entry to the site is best provided by swinging passages. This type of gate to the dacha has a number of advantages:

convenient installation system;
durability;
ensuring wide and convenient access to the territory;
versatility.

The reliability of a design is evidenced not only by years, but by centuries of operation. Over the course of its use, craftsmen have added many features to the gate design.

Improving the appearance of a portal remains one of the most important areas of work for modern designers.

pros

The design of gates of this type has long been tested by many people, so there is no point in doubting their reliability. This is why installation of gates in a swing style has gained such popularity.

But besides this, there are other advantages that distinguish these gates from other competitors:

The use of special doors on hinges, which are a simple and uncomplicated fastening system that can solve not one, but several important problems;
Easy installation of the product;
Lack of mandatory concreting of the adjacent territory;
Ease of manufacture;
Acceptable financial cost;
High strength characteristics that provide a good level of reliability;
A huge range of different models;
Versatility. Such gates can be installed anywhere.

Input types

Looking at the photos of swing gates, you can easily choose the option that suits you. A variety of types of gates will satisfy the taste of the most fastidious person. The following types of passages are installed on personal plots:

single-leaf;
bivalve;
folding like an accordion.

Space saving

To provide a wide passage, folding gates are installed. They fold in half and do not block the space.

Space saving in small areas is ensured by installing gates with a wicket door. When installing gates, fire safety standards should be taken into account.

Beautiful and reliable wickets and gates. Personal experience

Which fence to choose for fencing a site today, a wooden picket fence or a solid stone fence, a popular structure made of corrugated sheets or a lightweight plastic fence, is a matter of taste and financial capabilities of landowners. But whichever option is chosen in the end, there are several details that unite the vast majority of all fences. Namely, gates and gates. We discuss how to make beautiful gates and wickets in this material.

With a merchant's flourish, “Prrr...Stop!” the cab driver shouts, and the cart stops at the carved wooden gates of the manager’s house. Gorbushkin's store. This episode of the film “It Can’t Be” was filmed by Leonid Gaidai’s film crew in Astrakhan, on Jean Zhores Street, which became Hare Lane in the comedy. And similar wooden structures with forged locks are still preserved in many Russian cities - in the 19th century they decorated the entrances to the estates of wealthy townspeople and merchants.

FORUMHOUSE member tol4ev also approached the issue of creating wooden gates and wickets in the fence near his house with merchant thoroughness. The structure, which he made with his own hands, is beautiful, strong and low-budget - the perfect combination. A feature of the structures that ensures their durability is the type of load-bearing pillars: they are divided into two parts - underground and above ground, and the ground-air transition point is made of one or two metal pins. When choosing such a design, our user expects that it will serve him for half a century, no less.

tol4ev member FORUMHOUSE

I love working with wood, but I was not at all ready to change poles every 5-10 years. My gate is literally suspended in the air and has no contact with the ground. Therefore, the estimated service life, subject to timely maintenance, is 50 years.

The width of the wooden gate is 0.75 meters, the gate is 3.3 meters. To create an iron frame, the forum member used old water heating pipes, which he cut into pieces 1.1 m long and welded a 5x5 cm corner 65 cm long to each so that the pipe could be completely concreted into a pit (pit 50x50 cm, 1 m deep, concrete exceeds the ground level by 10 cm). Then tol4ev welded the pipes together, 4 pieces each, so that the corners formed a square with a side of 150 mm.

After the pipes were concreted, the forum member began installing pillars made of 150x150 mm pine beams.

tol4ev member FORUMHOUSE

The beam was inserted into a square formed by the corners. I aligned it vertically and drilled through two holes in each. I inserted a galvanized M10 pin into the holes, screwed nuts on both sides through washers and tightened them. I cut off the excess length of the studs with a grinder after fixing. As the wood dries, it is enough to tighten the nuts with two wrenches.

The following stages of manufacturing are more or less standard: hinged metal fittings for the doors are assembled and fixed on poles, frames are made from 50x100 mm timber, metal locking elements for the lock and oak bolts are attached to them. tol4ev made the sheathing of the frame from planed inch boards. An important structural element: a roof that protects wooden pillars from excess moisture crowned the merchant gate.

Read a more detailed story from FORUMHOUSE user tol4ev about how to decorate the entrance of an estate with a solid merchant-looking wooden gate.

Do-it-yourself sliding gates

Traditional large swing gates are not the best option for narrow streets and areas with difficult terrain. Yes, and nearby power poles can become an obstacle to opening. All these reasons prompted FORUMHOUSE member hart77 to create sliding gates with his own hands. Judging by the reviews left in the thread by other forum users, it is difficult to imagine a simpler and cheaper option for sliding gates.

For the hart77 design, I bought a bearing and inserted it into the roller under tension. I welded the iron fingers to the drill poles and put a roller with an inserted bearing on them, a sleeve pressing the bearing ring and bolted them on.

hart77FORUMHOUSE member

I didn’t weld the handle, although I should have. And I open it by pulling the vertical pipes, and the top pin is the opening limiter; it rests on the roller. The most important advantage of such gates, which have a strong windage, is the rigid fastening at six points when closed and at four points when open. In addition, they open in winter, even if covered with snow.

Forum member hart77 covered the frame of his sliding gates with corrugated sheets, but if desired, you can use any other materials, wood, plastic, etc.

But FORUMHOUSE member tatar76 decided to make not simple sliding gates, but to equip them with an electric drive. The forum member assembled the design kit himself: he bought rollers, plugs, an 8-meter guide beam, an electric drive, key fobs, four sensors (two for installation in front of the gate and two inside), stands for internal sensors, a signal lamp with an antenna. All electrical wiring for connection was laid in advance in cable ducts at the stage of pouring the foundation (see photo).

tatar76FORUMHOUSE member

I took the guide beam as the base. The outer U-shaped frame is made of profile 80*40 (I bought 2 pieces of 6 meters each), the internal filling is profile 60*40 (I bought 6 pieces). The return post is welded from two pieces of 120*120 profile.

Read more about how tatar76 installed an electric drive on the gate in his thread. It is possible to equip not only sliding, but also swing structures with an electric drive.

Sim-sim, open up!

Technologies do not stand still, and electric gates today will not surprise anyone. With the development of Smart Home systems and mobile applications, they can be controlled (as well as the entire home energy supply system, plumbing, etc.) directly from the smartphone screen.

nae user FORUMHOUSE, Moscow.

Poking around in the garden at the dacha, I periodically encounter a problem: the neighbors want to come in, but the key fob opens the gate at home, but I’m lazy to quit work and go to the gate. But you always have your phone with you and it is within wi-fi coverage. I'm looking for a simple solution that would allow me to open the gate from a smartphone.

To control from your phone you will have to spend money on special devices. One solution is to install a GSM controller to control the automation. In this case, you can control the automation using free calls to the number of the SIM card installed in the device. When calling, the controller must check whether the calling number is in the database, and if access is allowed, it will open the relay and open the gate.

Another option is to install a Wi-Fi outlet.

asusesmember of FORUMHOUSE

Place it in the drive, next to it is a relay with a 220V control coil. A program from the manufacturer is downloaded to your phone or tablet, with which you can open/close the gate.

A similar principle of control via Wi-Fi is used by systems specially created for this purpose, many of which are on the market today. Remote control sensors connect to a home's Wi-Fi router, and homeowners can open the gate from a phone or tablet, even while they're halfway around the world.

Forum members on our website are discussing smart sensors for controlling gates. Read more about smart home systems.

Material for the “face” of the area

Raw materials for gates are selected taking into account the following factors:

taking into account the type of control - automatic or manual;
harmonious “consonance” with the material of the fence of the site;
depending on the wind load.

For the purpose of automatic gate control, the following are used:

polycarbonate or corrugated sheeting;
mesh, welded on a metal frame.

Gates made from these materials are easy to open and close.

Advantages and disadvantages

Like every design, such gates have their own advantages and disadvantages; we will consider them in more detail below:

Advantages:

relatively low cost, which will be a pleasant bonus to the installed gates;
ease of installation;
long service life of the installed structure;
installation can be done on your own;
installation can be done with your own design modifications;
if there are no restrictions in volume, then accordingly there will be no restrictions on passing transport;
you have the opportunity to choose on your own what material you will make the structure from, respectively, from suitable options.

Flaws:

for durable installation, it will be necessary to bury the pillars quite deeply, and this is not always easy to do with your own hands;
concreting these pillars takes a lot of time, and if concreted incorrectly, the pillars may warp over time;
a very large space will be required to install such a barrier;
it is unsafe to use such structures in strong winds, because it will be almost impossible to control the doors;
When installing an electric drive, you must purchase several wires to close/open the gate, which will increase the cost of your purchase.

As you can see, the advantages of such structures outweigh the disadvantages, and if you live in a region where strong gusty winds are not the norm, feel free to proceed with the installation of swing gates on your site.

Wooden doors

The doors made of wood look elegant. However, they are susceptible to sunlight and moisture.

Without painting, varnishing or impregnation with antiseptics, a favorable environment will be created for the development of fungi and decay processes.

Guide systems

The choice of track system depends on whether the gate has a flat top, whether it has a rake, the speed of the automation, and whether the pickets protrude from the front of the frame. All guide systems must be designed so that the gate cannot fall even if the rollers become loose.

Bearing rollers should be used for high-speed automatic gates. Standard rollers tend to have too much friction and end up pulling and leaving marks on the gate. O-ring rollers grip the gate and reduce friction marks. A must if you are interested in painting!
Angle guides welded to the back of the gate allow it to be guided from one side. If the gate has a curved top or pickets that protrude from the front, an angled guide will be required.
Stripes are a very simple way to guide small residential gates.

Metal gates

The most common gates are made of steel or aluminum. Gates made of metal bars, decorated with various decorative elements, look more elegant.

Lattice metal sliding gates are lighter in weight, but more expensive. True, they will definitely attract the attention of visitors to the site.

HORMANN Berry – the best up and over gates

The German company Hormann produces the strongest, highest quality and most reliable gates, but their new series of up-and-over models, which are a solid canvas, deserves special interest.

Here it is not divided into sections, which provides the structure with maximum rigidity, although the sash also goes into horizontal guides fixed to the ceiling.

Pros:

True German quality - often the gates are supplied already assembled directly from Germany;
The lowest heat loss rate is 0.7 m2 °C/W;
Possibility to choose painted steel sheets or made of solid boards;
Rich color palette of metal panels;
For each gate design, the manufacturer offers matching side doors;
Structures larger than 3x2.65 m are required to be equipped with torsion springs;
You can install an automatic opening system, a combination lock, and even a fingerprint scanner;
5 years warranty.

Minuses:

50-60% more expensive than analogues, although the quality justifies the high cost;
Long and expensive repairs.

Openwork gates

Forged gates look the most impressive. They combine nobility of style, sophistication and fabulous beauty.

Look great in combination with a transparent fence. Demonstrate the unity of home and environment.

Only experienced craftsmen can make such unique gates. They are expensive, but they will cause genuine delight (and maybe envy) of the guests of the dacha and demonstrate the high aesthetic taste of the owners of the site.

Weight and width

Each electric gate mechanism has a maximum weight and gate leaf width that it can handle safely and reliably. These limits are specified by the manufacturer and are calculated based on the size of a single gate leaf.

For example, if your double gate has a total length of 4m between posts and a total weight of 700kg, then you will need a kit with a working limit of at least 350kg at 2m per gate.

Under no circumstances should you install the kit on a gate that exceeds the operating limits specified by the manufacturer.

Lightweight materials

It is possible to install gates from fittings such as corrugated sheets or polycarbonate. They will cost the buyer less than metal ones and have the following advantages:

light weight;
durability and practicality;
speed of installation;
large selection of colors and different textures;
possibility of applying decorations.

And another positive side of modern materials is the preservation of the indoor microclimate (for example, in a garage).

RYTERNA SSD – sliding garage doors

The same sliding gate design, but directly for a permanent garage. The Lithuanian manufacturer offers sandwich panel sheets of any size up to 6x3 m. Aluminum guides are lined with plastic, which ensures quieter operation.

Pros:

A wide selection of panel design options - there are even models with frame glazing;
Sturdy galvanized metal fittings;
Easy to install - the guides are mounted directly in the opening and on the garage floor;
Sufficient thickness of sandwiches (40 mm), which reduces the risk of icing of insulated gates from the inside;
Rubber seals around the perimeter ensure the tightness of the opening;
Wide operating temperature range (-30..+70 °C).

Minuses:

Despite all the efforts of the manufacturer, the gate turned out to be noisy.

Combination of materials

An original solution could be a combination of different materials when installing beautiful swing gates.

The frame is made of pillars, and the doors are made of wood, sheathed with polyvinyl chloride or polymer composite.

Drawing conclusions

So, in this article we were able to disassemble the design of swing gates, their types, materials for manufacturing and step-by-step installation. Be sure that by carefully preparing and studying the proposed materials, you will be able to bring even the most complex idea into reality.

A thorough approach is the key to success

It is important to remember that you can only get a durable and reliable design by approaching the work responsibly.

Passage structures

The advantages of such gates include the simplicity of construction. You don’t need to have any special skills to make swing gates with your own hands.

They do not require a foundation or additional parts in the form of wheels and guides. To install the structure you need:

support pillars;
loops;
clamps;
reliable locks and massive bolts.

Opening and locking a simple gate forces the car owner to get out of the car twice. And in bad weather it is quite unpleasant. A way out of this situation could be to supply the gates with automation.

Installing additional accessories

For greater ease of use, you can add gate latches - by which they will be held open and a mechanical stop for the closed position of the gate.

To install automation on swing gates, you need the following minimum set:

Control drive for each leaf separately,
Control block,
Remote Control.

To properly install automatic gate opening and closing, you can invite a specialist in electrical work or do this yourself.

Additional accessories also include photocells, video surveillance systems, intercom and the like.

Swing gates are a practical, inexpensive and aesthetically worthy solution for any private home, office, or institution. Since the lining and decor can be completely different, any buyer can easily choose a gate model to suit his taste and needs.

Sectional garage doors: types, sizes, installation, advantages

How the price of garage doors is determined

Required dimensions

Beautiful design of the entrance is, of course, important, but no less important is convenient passage and access to the site. Carefully read the drawing options for swing gates and choose the version that suits you.

For a passenger car, the minimum passage width is 2 meters and 80 centimeters. When the approach angle does not allow a truck to enter the site, the width should be increased by one and a half times.

The maximum width of the plowing passage should not exceed six meters. In this case, it is necessary to maximize the thickness of the valves (approximately twice as much).

If such gates are planned to open automatically, the mechanism must have the appropriate power.

A significant gap should be left between the ground and the edge of the sash (at least 8-10 cm). Only in this case the gate will not get stuck while moving.

Free passage of passenger cars is ensured by a structure height of two meters.

Installation of supports

1. Careful measurement and calculation of the area.

Before you start installing support pillars, you need to carefully measure and calculate the area. To do this, it is advisable to clear the landscape as much as possible, remove debris, grass and anything else that may interfere with the marking.

2. Mark the location of future structures.

It is convenient to mark the location of future structures using pieces of reinforcement or electrodes. It is important to measure it several times to make sure that the supports are positioned correctly - once they are installed, you will not be able to move anything.

3. We dig the supports into the ground.

To install support pillars, they need to be dug into the ground. This must be done taking into account the length of the supports - the depth of the pit for the support is at least equal to the length of its above-ground part, but it is better if it is a little larger. The dimensions of the hole for the support are made taking into account the size of the support itself; the width of the hole in the ground should be slightly larger than the material.

The support for sliding gates, as a rule, has a metal rod inside (pipe, channel), and the outside is lined with brick, which can then be decorated with anything.

4. We concrete the support.

Be that as it may, in order to obtain a solid base for support, it must be thoroughly concreted. This is not difficult to do, just follow a few requirements:

Firstly, pour 5-7 cm of cement mortar under the lower (underground) edge of the pipe - this will prevent the possibility of premature corrosion of the metal;
Secondly, the lower part of the core can be additionally equipped with a cross made of reinforcement or thin corners - they will provide a solid foundation for the future support of the gate.

You can prepare the concrete for pouring yourself. This will require cement, usually M200, sand, crushed stone and water. The ratio of sand to cement is standard: three to one. You will need as much crushed stone as sand; you should not skimp on this material - it is this material that ensures the durability of the hardened mortar and prevents it from cracking.

The concreted supports will be ready for further work in about a week - during this time the solution will completely strengthen and harden.

5. Cover the support with bricks.

Next, the support is covered with bricks, evenly installing metal tabs - they are needed to secure the sashes.

Important
when laying bricks, take into account whether the gate will open inward or outward and where the automatic mechanism will be located - for this, even during the laying process, it is necessary to provide special niches and recesses.

Lever mechanism

Such a system can be hidden underground, but it should be placed in a case to protect it from moisture and protect it from freezing.

TECKENTRUP CarTeck GSH – reliable and safe

Beautiful sectional doors with solid wood cladding are distinguished by aesthetics and good thermal insulation. The wood is treated in production with fungicides and antiseptics, which significantly extends the service life of the wood.

Additional durability of the external panels is provided by a multi-layer varnish coating that is not sensitive to ultraviolet radiation.

Pros:

Comprehensive protection against external hacking;
It is possible to install an automatic opening system, but it is not difficult to do it manually;
Photocells in the lower part of the frame react to the appearance of foreign objects, pets and children in the opening, and the movement limiter immediately stops the lowering sections;
The cladding is made from northern wood and is highly resistant to moisture, warping and biocorrosion;
Protection is provided against spring breakage when the sash falls;
Protection against accidental pinching of fingers - before closing, the sash is forced to stop a few centimeters from the floor.

Minuses:

High cost, plus all sorts of extra charges for “special effects” of coating and automation.

Hydraulics

The most expensive operator for swing gates. Compared to other mechanisms, it has a number of advantages:

controlled from a distance of up to 30 meters;
opens the gate after a maximum of 15 seconds;
durability;
connects to standard electrical wiring.

It is installed on massive, heavy gates, which are also often used.

The last point is installation of automation

A separate item can be considered the purchase of an automation kit. You need to choose it carefully, since the installation of the gate will be considered complete when the electric drive control system is installed.

The installation manual must be included in the main kit. As a last resort, you can make an application to the appropriate company.

You can, of course, turn to the Internet for help, but there is a risk of receiving incomplete information. So it is better to approach this problem professionally and purchase instructions of guaranteed quality, according to which a system will subsequently be installed that works without failure.

In general, if you approach the work with due care and show patience, in the end the house and the entire private territory will be under reliable protection. It will be even more pleasant to know that the swing gates were installed without the involvement of outside help in the form of professional teams.

Security

For trouble-free and safe operation of the automatic passage opening system, it is necessary to take a number of measures.

Signal or flashing lights must be installed within the gate opening radius. An audible warning can also be used.

Attach signs warning of danger to people, children and motorists.

Life time

This parameter is influenced by external factors, materials used, regularity of service and quality of fittings. Based on statistics and customer reviews, swing gates last less than sliding gates.

Only one electric drive is needed, which is lower in cost.