Bricks won’t Stand the Test of Time. If your pillar is constructed of sand bricks or red bricks and they’ve cracked, or the buried hinges inside the pillar may be become loose, this could lead to the hinges and bearings lowering and as a result the gate may get stuck or scratch the floor. So, you won’t be able to open or close the auto gate. We’ve experienced several new housing areas where the gate contractors hired by the developers have done a sloppy job. Many of their gates have defects on the hinges that need to be rectified.

For auto gate pillars, our strong suggestion is to go for concrete material with internal reinforced bars. Concrete pillars can last a really long time without any problems. Unfortunately, some wet work contractors might push you with brick pillars instead of concrete. They might be hesitant to work with concrete because it requires more work. Even if they agree to your concrete pillar idea, but they don’t dig deep enough when they pour concrete for the footing. This makes the pillars less strong and they might not last long. It’s important to dig deep, like 3 to 4 feet, and make sure the pillars have a strong base. Sometimes, builders do dig deep as you suggested, about 3 to 4 feet. But they don’t always use enough reinforced bars. We’ve seen cases where they only use four Y12 reinforced bars for the whole pillar, which isn’t enough. We suggest using at least 24 Y12 reinforced bars and create a reinforced cage for a 2′ x 2′ pillar to make it stronger.

We have a customer who shared this with us. The customer told the wet work contractor, “I DON’T plan to change my gate and autogate every few years, so I need something that will last 30 to 40 years.” Immediately, the contractor understood and stopped trying to convince the owner otherwise.