Cantilever Gate questions answered in plain English

In Ireland, a manual steel cantilever sliding gate costs €2,800 to €4,200 supplied and fitted, while a residential electric steel cantilever gate costs €3,800 to €6,800. An electric powder-coated aluminium cantilever gate costs €4,800 to €8,500, and wide commercial cantilever gates (5m to 9m opening) cost €5,500 to €12,000. Pouring a new reinforced concrete counterbalance pad behind the pier adds €600 to €2,000.

A cantilever sliding gate has no wheels touching the driveway surface and no steel rail crossing the entrance. Instead, two heavy-duty 8-wheel roller carriages are bolted to a concrete pad behind one pier, and an enclosed steel or aluminium monorail channel welded to the bottom of the gate slides over those fixed rollers. A 33% to 40% counterbalance tail behind the pier balances the weight of the gate leaf as it cantilevers out across the opening.

Because the gate frame includes the counterbalance tail that stays spanned between the two roller carriages when the gate is closed, total gate length — and the straight run-back space needed behind one pier — is roughly 1.35 to 1.4 times the clear entrance width. For example, a 3.6m entrance needs about 4.9m of clear run-back; a 4.0m entrance needs about 5.4m.

Choose a cantilever gate whenever your driveway is surfaced in loose gravel, stone chippings or tar-and-chip (which jam a ground V-rail), where the entrance has a drainage crown or uneven cross-fall, where you already have finished cobblelock or resin that you do not want to saw-cut across the opening, or on commercial yards where heavy lorries would crush a surface rail.

At an existing domestic entrance, installing a cantilever sliding gate up to 2.0 metres high is exempt from planning permission under Class 5 of Schedule 2, Part 1 of the Planning and Development Regulations 2001 (S.I. No. 600 of 2001), provided you do not widen the roadside entrance or obstruct traffic sightlines.

Under HSA guidance and I.S. EN 12453, an electric cantilever gate must include motor force limitation with encoder slowdown, vertical resistive safety edges on the closing nose and rear guide-post shearing zone, roller-carriage finger guards, and inner and outer infrared photocells.

A standard tracked sliding gate needs a steel rail concreted right across the entrance, which collects loose stones and blocks the wheels. A cantilever gate hangs 70mm–90mm in the air from two roller carriages behind the pier, so nothing ever touches your gravel surface.

Because of the 35%–40% counterbalance tail that stays between the two roller carriages, you need roughly 1.35 to 1.4 times your clear opening width along the inside of your front boundary wall (for example, 5.5m of clear wall run for a 4.0m entrance).

Only behind the inside of one pier! You do not have to dig a trench across your driveway surface except for a small 50mm duct if you haven't already got a cable to the opposite pier for the safety photocell and catch post.

No — the bottom monorail is locked inside two 8-wheel steel bogies bolted to a multi-tonne concrete block, the top rail runs between twin nylon guide rollers, and when shut the nose rests inside a steel receiver shoe on the opposite pier.

Yes — unlocking the motor release lever with the supplied override key disconnects the drive pinion so you can push the suspended gate open smoothly with one hand on its sealed ball-bearing carriages.

Residential cantilever gates commonly span 3.5m to 6.0m in a single leaf, while heavy-duty commercial and agricultural cantilever gates can span 7m to 10m+ across yard entrances.