Free on-site gate assessment - hinges, posts, and your LiftMaster or Nice gate operator checked before anything is quoted
The assessment is free and the quote is the invoice.
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AfterFast, Reliable Gate Repair Across Burien
Gate repair in Burien usually combines two jobs that inland cities rarely face. Salt-laden air off Puget Sound eats through hinges, latches, and steel frames faster than you’d think, while the clay soil under Burien’s sloped lots slowly tips posts out of plumb. A sagging gate here is almost never just a hinge problem. It’s a post problem, a corrosion problem, and sometimes a power problem all at once. If your automatic gate in Burien is grinding, scraping, refusing to latch, or swinging on a post that’s drifted off vertical, call Gatewood Fence & Gate at (877) 610-2993. Hal Gatewood has been fixing gates in this kind of marine-clay environment since 2001, and he’ll give you a straight answer before he ever picks up a tool.
Key Takeaways:
- Burien’s salt air and clay soil mean most gate repairs here involve both corrosion remediation and post re-setting.
- A live person answers our phone 24/7. Not a voicemail. Not a chatbot.
- Free estimates, upfront pricing agreed before any work starts, and a written 90-Day Done Right Promise on every job.
- No trip charge inside the county. $40 off any repair over $200. Permanent 10% discount for seniors and veterans.
Why Gatewood Fence & Gate Is Burien’s Preferred Gate Repair Company
We’re Gate Repair specialists who fix what other companies want to replace. When a Burien homeowner calls us about a leaning hinge post on a hillside lot near Three Tree Point, we don’t give them a pitch about a full replacement. We dig in, look at the post footing and the soil, and tell them what actually needs doing. Hal Gatewood’s name is on the shop and on every invoice. He’s been at this since 2001, and the word gets around in 98062 the way it does in small communities: you see the same trucks, you know the number, and you know the person who shows up will be the same one who quoted the job.
Burien customers call us because we understand the specific failure patterns here. The clay under neighborhoods like Seahurst and Gregory Heights doesn’t behave like the glacial till you find east of I-5. It moves. It heaves through wet winters and shrinks in dry August. Posts set in that soil forty years ago have been quietly drifting out of plumb the whole time. We know to check post bases before touching a hinge, because fixing the hinge without fixing the post means you’ll be fixing it again in eighteen months. That’s not a guess. It’s what we see on gate calls across Burien every week.
Our Gate Repair Services in Burien
Electric Gate Repair
Electric gate operators along Marine View Drive and the hillside streets above Three Tree Point take steady punishment from salt air and constant damp. Control boards corrode, limit switches get finicky, and wiring connections lose integrity faster than inland installations. We service nine major brands including Linear and Viking. When your keypad stops talking to the operator or the gate starts reversing for no reason, we troubleshoot the whole circuit and replace only what’s failed. No part-swapping just to make the ticket bigger.
Automatic Gate Repair
Automatic swing and slide gates in Burien have one recurring problem we see more than anything else: the motor works, but the gate won’t travel smoothly because the posts have moved. An operator pulling against a misaligned post burns through gears and circuit boards fast. We check post plumb, hinge alignment, and track wear before we ever blame the motor. Then we fix what’s actually wrong. On long driveways off Ambaum Boulevard and Maplewild Avenue, we also handle solar-powered operators where running grid power would cost more than the gate itself.
Hinge & Post Repair
This is where Burien’s geography hits hardest. Gate posts in our clay soils migrate laterally or tip toward the downhill side of sloped lots. On the hillside streets stepping down toward Three Tree Point, it’s the single most common gate failure we encounter. A hinge post that’s drifted six inches out of plumb won’t just make the gate sag. It will eventually tear the hinge bolts out of the post entirely. We excavate around the footing, re-set the post plumb, and pour a deeper base with gravel drainage so the water has somewhere to go besides the clay. Fix the post right and the hinges will actually do their job.
Gate Realignment
A gate realignment in Burien often means more than adjusting hinges. Swing gates on sloped lots catch the wind coming off Puget Sound and slowly tweak their frames. Slide gates drag on driveways that have settled unevenly. We re-swing the gate, shim and true the hinges, trim or adjust the frame, and make sure the latch post and the gate actually meet square. If a mid-century wooden gate frame has rotted at the base, which happens constantly around Boulevard Park and Riverton, we’ll tell you before we touch it. Rot at the post base means the real problem is structural, not cosmetic.
What happens when you call
- 1
A real person answersNo phone trees - you reach a local pro.
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You get an upfront price rangeHonest numbers before anyone is dispatched.
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A background-checked tech heads outLicensed & insured, dispatched right away.
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You approve before work beginsNothing starts until you say go.
Trusted Brands We Service in Burien
We’re certified to service nine major gate brands including FAAC, BFT, and Linear. That matters in Burien because our trucks carry the parts and diagnostic tooling for these systems when we show up, which means fewer return trips and a faster fix. Whether your operator is a Viking swing unit on a solar panel setup or a BFT slide motor on a long acreage driveway, we can diagnose it and source what it needs without sending you through a manufacturer maze. Parts arrive faster when the shop knows exactly what to order.
Common Gate Repair Problems We See in Burien Homes
- Posts tipped downhill on sloped lots. Clay soil around Burien heaves through wet winters and settles in dry summers, slowly pushing posts toward the low side. A gate that scraped the ground last spring may not latch at all by September. Post re-setting is the fix.
- Corroded steel hinges and latches from marine air. Salt off Puget Sound settles on every exposed metal surface. Steel hinges installed in the 1970s are frequently pitted, swollen, and partially seized. Some can be machined and rebuilt. Many get replaced with marine-grade hardware.
- Rotted wood gate frames at the post base. Burien’s constant dampness keeps the bottom rail of a wooden gate wet for months at a time. Frames rot where they meet the post, the gate sags, and then the hinges start pulling out. We’ll weld or rebuild the frame rather than lecture you about replacing the whole thing.
- Operator failure from constant load and power interruptions. Automatic gate motors in Burien work harder than they should when posts drift and gates misalign. Storm-driven power flickers off the Sound also stress control boards. We check the full system whenever an operator fails, because the motor is rarely the only thing wrong.
Pricing for Gate Repair in Burien, WA
Gate repair costs in Burien generally run higher than inland King County because most jobs involve more than one repair. Here are realistic ranges for this market:
| Service | Typical Burien Price Range |
|---|---|
| Hinge replacement (single gate) | $180 - $340 |
| Post re-setting with new footing | $425 - $800 per post |
| Gate realignment (no post work) | $150 - $300 |
| Weld and rust repair (minor frame work) | $200 - $450 |
| Electric gate operator diagnosis and repair | $190 - $550 depending on parts |
| Solar panel and battery replacement for gate operators | $350 - $750 |
A typical hinge replacement in Burien runs $180 to $340. A post re-setting with a new gravel-draining footing usually lands between $425 and $800 per post. The price is quoted and agreed before any work starts, in writing. No trip charge inside the county. Free estimates are standard. If you have a written estimate from another company, we’ll give you a free second opinion on it. Call (877) 610-2993 to get your number.
We Also Serve Cities Near Burien
Our crews work all over the Highline area and beyond. If you’re in Normandy Park, SeaTac, Boulevard Park, or Riverton, the same owner-operated crew that serves Gate Repair in Burien covers you too. You get the same upfront pricing, the same written 90-Day Done Right Promise, and the same live person answering the phone.
Serving Burien, WA - Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Burien area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage - if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs - Gate Repair in Burien
Burien sits on the Highline plateau with clay-dominant soils that heave when saturated and shrink when dry. On sloped lots, especially hillside streets stepping down toward Three Tree Point, water moves through the clay and gradually shifts it downhill. That soil migration tips shallow gate post footings with it. Renton and Kent sit on more stable glacial till, so their posts stay put far longer. In Burien, we often re-set posts that are only fifteen or twenty years old. That’s just the soil here.
Yes, if it’s sized correctly. A solar gate opener with a proper battery bank will run a wide swing or slide gate on a long driveway with no grid connection at all, provided the panel gets direct sun for at least a few hours a day. The frequent overcast and marine layer off Puget Sound means you want a panel rated higher than the operator’s minimum and a battery system that holds through cloudy stretches. We install and service solar-powered gate operators regularly on rural and acreage properties around Burien. Call (877) 610-2993 for an exact assessment of your gate’s power draw and panel options.
On most 1950s through 1970s Burien ranch homes, it’s both. The original steel hinges are usually corroded from decades of salt air, and the steel post set in the yard’s clay has likely drifted out of plumb. If the post is still solid but tilted, we can re-set it. If the hinges are pitted and swollen, they get replaced with marine-grade hardware. Fixing only one leaves the other to tear the gate apart again within a couple of years. Call (877) 610-2993 for a free inspection before buying parts.
Every automatic gate needs working entrapment protection: safety photocells, reversing edges, or both. In Burien, the issue is that power flickers from storms off Puget Sound can interrupt operator sensors and leave a gate moving when it shouldn’t. A properly installed system with tested photocells and a battery backup rechecks its safety sensors on every cycle. We check entrapment protection on every automatic gate repair we do, and we’ll tell you plainly if yours isn’t adequate. This is a safety matter, not an upsell.
Salt air doesn’t rot wood by itself, but it accelerates the wet-dry cycle that breaks down the wood’s fibers at the post base and hinge mounts. The constant marine moisture keeps the lower rail damp, and the salt in that moisture draws more water into the grain. Add in Burien’s heavy rainfall, and a wooden gate frame near the Sound rots at the post base years faster than the same frame in Kent. The fix starts with post and frame repair, often with welding reinforcement at the hinges. Call (877) 610-2993 for a free estimate before the rot spreads into the hinge post.
Call Gatewood Fence & Gate for Gate Repair in Burien
Last week our crew reset a badly leaning hinge post on a long gated driveway off Maplewild Avenue SW near Three Tree Point. The original 1970s chain-link swing gate had corroded hinges and a post footing that had shifted nearly two inches out of plumb due to clay heave. We excavated and poured a deeper post footing with gravel drainage, then installed a new LiftMaster gate operator with a keypad entry and safety photocell. The gate swings true now. That’s the kind of fix we do all over Burien, from the hillsides above the Sound to the flat streets near Burien Town Square.
If your gate is sagging, scraping, refusing to open, or leaning hard toward the downhill side, call us. Hal will tell you what’s wrong, what it costs, and when he’ll be there. The estimate is free, the price is agreed before work starts, and the 90-Day Done Right Promise comes in writing. Reach us at (877) 610-2993.
Written by Hal Gatewood, Owner at Gatewood Fence & Gate, building and fixing gates across the Seattle metro since 2001.