Fence Gate Reinforcement

[adrianp89]

Hey guys, when I bought my boat I quickly turned two of my 8 foot fence panels into gates, for a nice 16 foot opening. However, time as passed and it is time to finish these properly.

I want to create a metal frame foe each gate and then I will mount a wheel to that frame. My question is, would aluminum be strong enough for this, or should I get steel tubes? This is a vinyl fence. Also if going with steel - where do you even get something like that? I have a local aluminum place that I could use if I went that route.

 

[CraigAR]

Hey guys, when I bought my boat I quickly turned two of my 8 foot fence panels into gates, for a nice 16 foot opening. However, time as passed and it is time to finish these properly.

I want to create a metal frame foe each gate and then I will mount a wheel to that frame. My question is, would aluminum be strong enough for this, or should I get steel tubes? This is a vinyl fence. Also if going with steel - where do you even get something like that? I have a local aluminum place that I could use if I went that route.

Aluminum would be fine, just make a x brace for the doors and you could reinforce it with cables. At my shop, the city made us enclose our 2 big dumpster bins with block and we installed a double gate out of aluminum, half of our company is in the aluminum business. This holds up to the abuse that the dump truck driver gives it weekly and we did not even install a wheel on the bottom.

 

[adrianp89]

I found a 96" wide gate kit from Home Depot. Figured the kit is easier than trying to piece everything together so ordered two. It wont come for two weeks, but I can at least return it locally if it sucks lol.

 

[adrianp89]

Well finally got around to getting this done... minus one hiccup. The gate kit seems to work well.... but you need a solid post to put it on. I ended up putting in 6x6x12' posts 4 feet deep in the ground. The gate is heavy as shit and does not sag at all. I will post pictures once I fix my one mistake.