Table. Capabilities of swing gate operators from Bft, Came, Somfy.

Swing gate operator capabilities.

Gate operators, in principle, have to perform two simple tasks for us – open and close our gate. Will every operator suit our gate? Not really. We have already wrote about this in our guide on how to choose a drive for a swing gate. The weight and length of our gate leaf are two basic parameters of our swing gate, which we will consider in this comparison in order to choose the right devices. As You can see in the table below, for most of the devices the acceptable length of the gate leaf decreases as the leaf gets heavier.

Gate leaf parameters.

The comparison table shows the acceptable maximum length (horizontal axis), and the corresponding maximum weight (vertical axis) of a gate leaf which a corresponding swing gate operator can handle (coloured lines). For example lets assume that our gate has two leaves measuring 3 meters and weighing 200kg each. To operate a gate with such parmeters we would need a pair of operators that at least match the capabilities of Somfy Ixengo JS 230V, or any of these models:

Gate leaf length and weigth.

We need to remember that the longer is our gate leaf, the harder it will be for our gate motor to operate. Lets take a another look at our comparison table, and inspect the capabilities of Came’s AXI25DGS operator. As we can see in the table this 24V operator is capable of handling a gate leaf weighing up to 300 kg, however the maximum length of a gate leaf with that weight can be no longer than 1,75 m. If our gate leaf would measure 2 m in length, AXI25DGS will manage to handle 275 kg, so 25 kg less. With a maximum allowed leaf length of 2,5 m, the allowed weight limit drops to 250kg.

IMPORTANT! Producers of gate opening systems usually add technical specifications to their products and/or catalogues. Not following the instructions supplied by the producer of Your device might result in damage to the device, improper operation and loss of warranty.