Strong Wooden Gate

A well maintained gate on the other hand can be welcoming and give passers by a great impression of the house beyond.

Strong wooden gate.

The latter can prevent someone from seeing or accessing your private space thanks to solid wood panel design and strong hardware. Garden gates sag because a square or rectangular frame is essentially unstable. Have you wondered how to build a gate that will last. You may want a purely decorative gate perhaps to act as an arbor framing your walkway or a more secure gate that provides access to the yard through a fence.

If you want to upgrade the wooden gate in a privacy fence or some. A broke down gate just makes your house look bad. When you decide to build a wooden gate you ll need to keep a few things in mind the first is what your intended purpose is. The unhinged free side sags from its own weight and from the trauma of being slammed.

Built with standard diy woodworking joints the gate will twist unless it is braced or pulled into tension. As for the height many local building codes cap fence and gate heights at 6 feet. The key is understanding a few basics about gate building and you can build any design gate you want. When building a wooden gate there are several factors to consider.

A diagonal cross brace was then added. See how i built my 12 ft wooden gate so that it doesn t sag. The gate was made by first creating an external frame of 2x4s that were screwed together with exterior screws installed through pre drilled and countersunk holes. Depending on the size you can prevent someone from seeing or accessing your yard with solid wood panel.

Once the cross brace is in place secure the last side of the frame. To complete the frame cover one side of the gate with vertical cedar boards that match the adjoining fence. Diagonal cross braces like this should always angle downward to the lower hinge. Gates can be merely decorative as in an arbor framing a walkway into your yard or more secure giving entrance through a full fence.

While this tutorial creates a 42 inch wide gate you can scale the gate width up or down as needed by adding or subtracting boards. This will keep the gate square and prevent sagging. Check with your local permitting agency about heights and whether you need to obtain a fence building permit. Design and hardware are what make a wooden gate operate well for decades.

Attach the boards with brad nails about 3 16 to 1 4 inch apart all the way across. The last board may need to be cut down to fit flush with the edge of the gate frame. This tendency is exaggerated because a gate is held along only one side.