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 Crafton
Gate repair in Crafton, PA usually falls into one of two camps: an older iron gate that’s sagged or seized after decades of Pittsburgh winters, or an automatic opener that quit working. Most jobs run $180 to $650 depending on what’s actually wrong, and we can typically get to a Crafton home within a day or two, often same afternoon. Hal Gatewood has been fixing gates since 2001, and he’d rather weld what you have than sell you something new. Call (877) 610-2993 and a live person answers, any hour.
If you live on one of Crafton’s steep hillside streets, you already know the gate doesn’t sag the way it does in flat suburbs. The post leans, the gate racks, and the latch stops lining up. That’s the clay soil under your lot working against you. Understanding why is the difference between a repair that holds and one you’ll be calling about again next spring.
Why Gatewood Fence & Gate Is Crafton’s Preferred Gate Repair Company
Our Gate Repair team has worked on gates up and down Crafton’s side streets long enough to know what the terrain does to them. We’ve reset posts on Noble Avenue, Steuben Street, and the hillside blocks around Crafton Park. We know the older Craftsman bungalows and brick two-stories in 15220 still carry original ironwork that national companies won’t touch. They want to swap panels. Hal wants to fix what’s actually failing.
Hal Gatewood’s name is on the shop and on every invoice. He’s been at this since 2001, and his shop has a published address and license number anyone can look up. When you call, a live person answers. Not a voicemail, not a phone tree, not someone three states away. You tell us what the gate is doing, and we’ll tell you what it sounds like and what it’ll cost before anyone drives out.
Crafton customers get the same standing offers as everyone else: $40 off any repair over $200, no trip charge inside the county, a free second opinion on any written estimate, and a permanent 10% discount for seniors and veterans. Every job carries the 90-Day Done Right Promise in writing. If it’s not done right, one call brings Hal back. No runaround.
Our Gate Repair Services in Crafton
Electric Gate Repair
Electric gate repair in Crafton often comes down to an operator that’s been out in the weather too long or a sensor that’s drifted out of alignment. On hillside driveways, the gate has to work harder against gravity, and older motors wear out faster. We service Linear, Ghost Controls, and DoorKing operators regularly, and we stock common parts so we’re not waiting a week on a control board.
Automatic Gate Repair
When an automatic gate stops halfway on a Crafton driveway, the first thing we check is whether the post has moved. On clay soil, the post shifts a fraction of an inch every winter, and suddenly the limit switches, safety eyes, and gear alignment are all fighting each other. We fix the operator, but we also fix the post so the operator stays fixed.
Hinge & Post Repair
This is the repair Hal sees most often in Crafton. A gate sags in the hinge post, not in the middle, and on a hillside lot that post is slowly being pushed downhill by frost heave. We dig past the frost line, reset the post in a proper footing, and only then rehang the gate. Fix the hardware without the post and you’ll fix it twice. Hal would rather do it once.
Gate Realignment
After a post reset or a bad hinge replacement, a gate needs to be re-plumbed and re-squared before it’ll close cleanly again. In Crafton we routinely combine a realignment with every hinge and latch repair, because on out-of-plumb posts the hardware will never sit right. We weld on site, in your driveway, so the gate never leaves your property.
What happens when you call
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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 Crafton
We’re certified to service nine major gate brands, including Linear, Viking, Ghost Controls, and DoorKing. For Crafton homeowners with older systems, that matters. A national chain might tell you to replace a Ghost Controls opener because their tech isn’t trained on it. Hal’s been inside these units for over two decades. We keep parts on hand for the common failures and can often have an older operator running again the same day without swapping the whole system.
Common Gate Repair Problems We See in Crafton Homes
- Downhill lean from frost heave. Crafton’s clay-rich hillside soil expands and contracts through the November-to-March freeze-thaw cycle, slowly shoving gate posts out of plumb. We see posts racked two or more inches out of square on gates that were installed level just a few winters ago.
- Rust at weld points and hinge hardware. The original wrought iron and painted steel gates on Crafton’s 1910s-to-1950s homes are built better than anything you can order today, but years of humidity eat at the weld joints and hinge pins. We weld crack repairs on site and use rust mitigation that gets under the old paint.
- Obsolete operators without entrapment protection. Many of Crafton’s older automatic gates were installed before modern safety requirements existed. Their boards and sensors can’t be safely retrofitted, and they fail inspection. We’ll tell you honestly if yours can be updated or if you’re better off putting that money toward a new operator.
- Seized pivots and sagging hinge leaves. When an iron gate has hung for decades, the hinge pins wear egg-shaped holes in the leaves and the gate starts dragging. Tightening the bolts doesn’t fix it. The pivot needs to be welded and re-bored, or the hinge leaf replaced altogether.
Pricing for Gate Repair in Crafton, PA
A typical hinge and post repair in Crafton runs $280 to $550 depending on how far the post has moved and whether we’re resetting one post or both. Gate realignment usually falls in the $180 to $340 range. Electric gate repair starts around $200 for a sensor or limit switch and climbs to $650 or more if the control board or motor has failed. Weld and rust repair on an older iron gate typically lands between $250 and $500 per section. The price is quoted and agreed before any work starts. We don’t show up with one number and leave with a bigger one. Call (877) 610-2993 and we’ll give you a straight answer over the phone, then back it up with a free on-site estimate if needed.
We Also Serve Cities Near Crafton
We handle Gate Repair in Crafton and regularly work in the neighborhoods around it. If you’re just over the line in Dormont, Carnegie, McKees Rocks, or Mount Lebanon, you get the same local crew and the same 90-Day Done Right Promise. Call (877) 610-2993 and tell us where you are.
Serving Crafton, PA - Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Crafton 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 Crafton
Because Crafton sits on clay-heavy soil that expands and contracts with every freeze-thaw cycle, and gravity does the rest. Over a few winters, even a properly concreted post can heave and rack more than two inches out of plumb, and the gate starts leaning downhill. This is a Crafton-specific problem, far more common here than in the flatter western Allegheny suburbs, and it’s why a post reset is usually part of any real hinge or latch repair in the borough. Call (877) 610-2993 and we’ll take a look before the next freeze sets in.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. If the gate is still square and the hinges are sound, we can often add a modern operator with proper entrapment protection and bring an older iron gate up to current safety standards. But if the post has heaved badly or the gate has racked beyond a certain point, you’d be automating a structural problem. We’ll weld and reinforce first, then decide with you whether an opener makes sense. Estimates are free.
Look at the post, not the operator. On Crafton hillsides, the post is usually the first thing to move, and a shifted post throws off the safety eyes, limit switches, and gear alignment all at once. The operator often isn’t broken at all, it’s fighting a gate that’s no longer plumb. That’s the first thing we check on every automatic gate call in the 15220 zip code.
Repair is usually the better answer if the gate is original to a 1920s or 1930s Crafton home. Those old wrought iron gates were built by hand, and the steel is often better than anything manufactured today. We weld cracked hinge leaves, repair rust pockets, and reset posts, and in most cases the gate will outlast us. Replacement makes sense when the metal is rusted through at load-bearing points or the gate has been racked so badly it can’t be re-squared, and Hal will tell you which side of that line you’re on, plainly, before you spend a dollar.
Because the post behind them is moving, or the hinge pivot itself is worn egg-shaped. Tightening bolts against an out-of-plumb post or a worn pivot does nothing except strip threads. On Crafton’s clay soil, the post is almost always leaning downhill a little more each winter, and the fix is a post reset and a re-bore or weld at the pivot, not a bigger wrench. Call (877) 610-2993 and we’ll tell you what’s actually wrong over the phone.
On a steep side street off Noble Avenue, we reset a leaning wrought-iron swing gate on a 1920s Craftsman where the original hinge post had racked more than two inches out of plumb. Because the gate still carried its period hardware, we welded a cracked hinge leaf, installed a new post footing below the frost line, and re-hung the gate with sag correction. The owner expected a full replacement. We kept the original iron in service. That’s the job Hal likes best.
If your gate is leaning, sagging, seized, or just won’t open anymore, call (877) 610-2993. A live person answers, day or night. We’ll give you a straight answer, a real price, and a written 90-Day Done Right Promise on every job.
Written by Hal Gatewood, Owner at Gatewood Fence & Gate, serving the Crafton area since 2001.