Gate Lift

[Tharrell]

Here's a couple of pics of my homemade gate lift. It's just garage door springs inside of pvc with a custom made bracket to hold the sheaves (rollers) at the rear. Here's the overall picture.

[Tharrell]

Here's a pic of the pvc tubes.

[Tharrell]

Here's a pic of the sheave holders I had made.The sheaves (4) were bought from Tractor supply for about $20. You can also see where I moved the lights and tag to the gate so I don't bang my shins on them anymore.

[Tharrell]

And the cable (stainless) runs up the tail gate. You could attach a short section of chain to the end to make it more adjustable but, I have it where I like it. Also, it's not necessary to have a lot of tension on it unless you're completely lazy. The instructions on the garage springs say to use 3 clamps on each end, DO IT.

[Tharrell]

Here's a pic of the whole trailer. I'm solo so I don't need any more than this right now. Disregard the pampas grass, it's just now coming back since I trimmed it, I should have divided it.

[Carolina Cutter]

When you say sheaves....is that like a pulley or something?

[Carolina Cutter]

More details....are the springs in the tension or rest position when the gate is up? How did you secure the springs to the trailer?

[Tharrell]

I bought the sheaves (the circular wheels) from Tractor Supply for about $5 each x 4. Make sure you get the ones designed for wire cable. I had a welding shop make the brackets and they welded them to the trailer for more strength. I have 145# garage door springs on bothe sides of the trailer and they are under minimal pressure at rest. My gate will fall if I let go of it. It can be set any way you want but my intention was to have an "assist" and I was concerned about the cable being under high tension when at rest. The end of the spring is attached to the trailer with a heavy duty bolt to the frame rail of the trailer. I drilled a hole through both sides of the pvc and the spring and pvc is attached with the same bolt. Don't forget to use fender washers on top of the pvc. The other end of the pvc is attached only from the bottom of the pvc but be sure to use a fender washer inside. You'll have to curve the fender washers to conform to the shape of the pvc of course. Be sure to use 3 cable clamps at eachconnection for safety reasons. You will need a total of 12 for a 2 sided system.

[coalburner]

Looks good!!

Just a little tip from my boilermaker days. It looks like you put the middle clamp on upside down. Never put the u-bolt on the load side of the cable always on the dead end side. My book says that two clamps will be ok for that size of cable, but an extra one wont hurt anything.

I went to a cable shop and had mine custome made $35 for two.

[fastlane]

Looks good . We just made an assist for a friends trailer.We used automobile exhaust pipes instead of PVC so it can't shatter when it's cold.