Home/Service Areas/Southlake
Tarrant County · 16 miles from our shop
Custom gates & gate repair in Southlake, TX
In most of DFW, a gate gets replaced when it stops working. In Southlake, it usually gets replaced when it stops looking right — rust bleeding through at the welds, a finish that's chalked to a different color than the fence it matches, ornamental work that's begun to look dated next to a renovated elevation. The mechanical failure comes later.
Why finishes fail first
Rust doesn't start on the surface. It starts at the weld.
A steel gate is cut, fitted, and welded — and every one of those welds burns away whatever coating was on the material. If the gate is fabricated from pre-galvanized tube and then welded, the zinc is gone at exactly the joints that carry the most load and hold the most water. Paint over that and you've buried the problem, not solved it.
Six or eight years later the owner sees rust weeping down from the corners of each panel. The gate still opens fine. It just looks like it's failing, because structurally it has begun to.
The way to avoid it is sequence: fabricate the gate complete, then hot-dip galvanize the finished assembly so the zinc covers the welds, the inside of the tube, and every cut end. Then apply the color coat over that. It costs more up front and it is the difference between a gate that looks correct in year fifteen and one that doesn't make it past year eight.
When we're asked to repair a rusting gate in Timarron, Carillon, Clariden Ranch, or the Shady Oaks corridor, the first real question is whether the underlying steel is worth recoating or whether the frame has thinned enough that a rebuild is the better money.
Custom fabricated entrance gate — Southlake
Matching pedestrian gate, same fabrication run
Finish systems
What we specify and why
| System | Service life outlook | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Hot-dip galvanized after fabrication, then powder coat | Longest | Zinc protects the steel even where the color coat is chipped, because zinc corrodes sacrificially. This is what we recommend for any gate expected to last decades in a visible location. |
| Hot-dip galvanized, left bare | Long | Excellent protection, industrial appearance. Common on ranch and commercial entrances; rarely the aesthetic Southlake wants at the street. |
| Powder coat over bare steel | Moderate | Looks superb on day one. Any chip, scratch, or coating holiday becomes a rust origin, and the coating hides it until it's advanced. |
| Wet paint over primer | Shortest | Serviceable and easy to touch up in the field, which is its real advantage. Expect a recoat cycle rather than a permanent finish. |
Matching an existing entrance
Adding a second gate, a pedestrian gate, or replacing one leaf of a pair means matching steel that has weathered for years. We match profile and pattern in the shop; color we match as closely as the aged coating allows, and we'll tell you honestly when the right answer is refinishing both so the pair reads as one entrance rather than two.
Design and drawings
Drawings before steel
Custom gate work goes wrong when it's described in conversation and built from memory. We produce a drawing showing the actual opening dimension, the panel layout, the picket spacing, hinge and post details, and where the operator hardware lands — and you approve it before anything is cut.
That drawing does real work beyond looking professional. It's what catches the fact that the intended design puts a rail exactly where the operator arm needs to mount, or that the picket spacing the architect drew doesn't divide evenly across the opening, or that the gate as drawn presents more wind area than the posts should carry.
It's also the document that lets a builder, designer, or HOA committee sign off on something specific rather than a description.
Engineering the leaf
An 18-foot ornamental leaf is a cantilevered structure carrying its own weight at the hinge. What determines whether it stays true over twenty years:
- Frame member sizing set by span and infill weight, not by habit
- Diagonal bracing concealed within the design rather than bolted on later
- Hinge selection rated for the actual leaf weight with margin
- Post and footing sized for overturning, not just vertical load
- Infill density checked against the wind exposure at that entrance
We do structural steel as our primary business through Trait LLC. A driveway gate is a small structure, and it gets treated like one.
Southlake questions
Common questions
Can you match a gate design we already have?
Usually yes. Send photos straight on and at an angle, plus the overall dimensions and the picket spacing if you can measure it. Fabricated steel patterns we can reproduce. The hard case is cast ornamental components from a manufacturer's discontinued line — those we can sometimes approximate with fabricated equivalents, and sometimes not, and we'll say which before you're committed.
Our gate is rusting at the joints after eight years. Repair or replace?
It depends on how far it's gone into the frame. Surface rust bleeding from welds on a frame that's still sound can be addressed by cutting out affected sections, re-welding, and recoating. If the tube wall has thinned significantly — which we check rather than guess at — you're putting good money into steel that will fail again. We'll give you the finding and the reasoning, not just a number.
Do you handle the automation as well as the gate?
Yes, and that matters more than it sounds. When one company builds the gate and another automates it, the operator gets mounted to whatever's available rather than to a mounting point designed into the frame. We design the gate knowing which operator will drive it, which produces a cleaner installation and a gate that isn't fighting its own hardware.
How long does a custom gate take?
Drawing and approval, then fabrication, then finishing, then installation — with the finishing step usually setting the schedule, since hot-dip galvanizing and powder coating both happen at outside facilities on their own queues. We'll give you a real schedule at quote rather than an optimistic one, including where the float is.
Southlake gate fabrication & service
Custom steel entrances, matching work, refinishing, and automation.