Free on-site gate assessment - hinges, posts, and your LiftMaster or Nice gate operator checked before anything is quoted
The assessment is free and the quote is the invoice.
Before
After
Before
After
Before
AfterFast, Reliable Gate Installation Across Celina
A new driveway gate in Celina typically runs $4,800-$14,500 installed, depending on whether you choose a single swing, double swing, or sliding design and what operator and access system goes on it. Most installations take one to three days on site, and we quote the full price before any steel gets cut. If you’re in Light Farms, Mustang Lakes, Star Trail, or Lilyana and that HOA letter about your sagging gate has been sitting on the counter for three weeks, call (979) 291-0947. We know these communities, we know their covenants, and we know the black clay under your posts better than most engineers do.
Why Gatewood Fence & Gate Is Celina’s Preferred Gate Installation Company
Hal Gatewood has been building and fixing gates since 2001, and his name is on the shop and on every invoice. That matters in Celina, where most gates went in during a narrow window between 2015 and 2022 and are now hitting their first major service cycle all at once. You don’t need someone to sell you a whole new gate because a capacitor baked out in August. You need someone who will weld the hinge post back true under your carport and match the powder coat so the HOA doesn’t blink. That’s how we work here.
Celina homeowners keep our number saved because we show up when we say we will, quote a price and stick to it, and back every job with the 90-Day Done Right Promise in writing. If it’s not right, one call brings Hal back. No runaround, no call center three states away. A live person answers the phone around the clock, seven days a week. Not a voicemail. Not a chatbot. The person who answers is the same person who’ll be standing in your driveway.
We also carry parts for the specific brands the Celina builders installed in bulk: FAAC, BFT, Linear, Viking, LiftMaster, and others. When an entire section of Lights Farms loses the same circuit board in the same month, we already have the replacement on the truck. That’s the difference between a company that serves Celina and a company that happens to have Celina in its zip-code list.
You can drive to the shop and look Hal in the eye before you spend a dollar. The address is published. The license number is published. We’re not passing through.
Our Gate Installation Services in Celina
Driveway Gate Installation
Most Celina driveway gates are ornamental steel or wrought-iron, and most sit on post footings poured in black clay that moves. We install the gate and the operator, but we start with the post. A gate sags in the hinge post, not in the middle. So we dig deeper than the original builder did, set the post in concrete with a proper rebar cage, and only then hang the gate. A heavy double driveway gate on a bad post is just a future repair bill with a bow on it.
Sliding Gate Installation
For wider driveways in Celina’s newer sections, a sliding gate often makes more sense than a swing gate. No arc to clear, no driveway slope problems. But sliding gates ride on a track, and when black clay heaves after spring rain, that track binds and the rack teeth shear off. We set rolling gate posts below the frost and heave line and choose operators rated for the gate’s actual weight, not the builder’s wishful thinking. The result is a gate that opens quietly instead of screaming like a table saw.
Security Gate Installation
Some Celina owners want more than curb appeal. A true security gate means a heavier frame, a high-cycle operator, and access control that works the first time, every time: keypad, intercom, camera, phone app. We install security gates with matched entry hardware so your teenager can still get in without tearing off the gate. And we’ll show you how to override the thing when the power is out and the ice storm has knocked down the line to Gunter.
Pedestrian Gate Installation
A pedestrian gate is the one your family actually uses, which means it takes more cycles in a month than the driveway gate takes in a year. We build them to commercial duty standards even for residential use: heavy hinges, self-closing mechanisms that don’t slam, latches a six-year-old can work. In Celina’s HOA-governed communities, pedestrian gates often have to match the driveway gate’s picket pattern and powder-coat color exactly. We confirm the spec before we order a single bar.
What happens when you call
- 1
A real person answersNo phone trees - you reach a local pro.
- 2
You get an upfront price rangeHonest numbers before anyone is dispatched.
- 3
A background-checked tech heads outLicensed & insured, dispatched right away.
- 4
You approve before work beginsNothing starts until you say go.
Trusted Brands We Service in Celina
Celina’s builders didn’t get fancy. They installed the same few operator brands across entire subdivisions, which means when a capacitor fails in one house, three more on the block are about to fail the same way. We’re certified to service FAAC, BFT, Linear, Viking, LiftMaster, Ghost Controls, DoorKing, Elite, and Mighty Mule. We keep the common failure parts for these brands on the truck when we head up to Celina, so we’re not ordering a board and making you wait a week with a gate stuck open. If you have an existing operator and want to keep it, we will tell you honestly whether it’s worth keeping or whether you’ll save money replacing it now instead of nursing it through one more Texas summer.
Common Gate Installation Problems We See in Celina Homes
- Black clay heave on gate posts. Celina sits on Blackland Prairie clay that swells after rain and cracks hard in drought. We see posts lift a half-inch in March, bind the gate in May, and trip the safety photocell every morning until someone disconnects the sensor. Our fix is a deeper footing with a concrete collar below the active soil zone, not just more concrete in the same shallow hole.
- Blistered capacitor banks from 100°F summers. Gate operators bake in the Texas heat. The capacitor bank is usually the first thing to fail, and in Celina’s uniform neighborhoods, we’ll see the same model year fail the same month across an entire street. We install operators with integrated cooling vents and use capacitors rated for sustained high-heat service.
- HOA covenant mismatches. You can’t just hang any black gate. Each community has a spec: exact powder-coat color, picket spacing, height, sometimes the manufacturer. We’ve seen brand-new panels rejected because the black was too glossy or the finials weren’t the right profile. We pull the community standards before we order anything. It saves you a violation notice and a second install.
- Undersized operators on oversized gates. Builders hang a beautiful 16-foot wrought-iron gate and pair it with an operator rated for half the weight. It works for a few years, then the motor burns out and the gate won’t close on a windy day. We size the operator to the actual gate weight plus wind load, because Celina gets wind that makes Prosper look calm.
Pricing for Gate Installation in Celina, TX
A single swing driveway gate with a basic operator in Celina typically runs $4,800-$7,200 installed. A double swing gate for a wider drive usually lands between $7,500 and $11,000. Sliding gates start around $6,500 and can reach $14,500 or more for a heavy custom steel frame with an underground operator. The operator itself, depending on brand and duty cycle, runs $900-$2,800 of that total. Access control like a keypad, intercom, or camera entry adds $600-$2,500 depending on how deep you want the integration to go. The price we quote is the price you pay. We agree on the number before any work starts, and we honor it. If you want a written second opinion on any estimate from another company, we do that free. And if you’re a senior or veteran, there’s a permanent 10% discount on the whole job. Call (979) 291-0947 for a free estimate on your Celina gate installation.
We Also Serve Cities Near Celina
We work throughout the corner of Collin County that’s growing faster than the road crews can keep up. That includes Prosper, Frisco, McKinney, and Aubrey. If you’re on the edge of Celina and moving toward any of those, we’ll still be your gate people. For a deeper look at what we cover, see our Gate Installation service page or the Celina city page.
Serving Celina, TX - Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Celina area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage - if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs - Gate Installation in Celina
Because Celina’s master-planned communities were built in a tight window. Light Farms, Mustang Lakes, Star Trail, and Lilyana all went up between roughly 2015 and 2022, and the builders pulled from a short list of operator brands. So a capacitor that’s rated for ten years in one house is rated for ten years in three hundred houses on the same timeline. We see the same board, same relay, same capacitor failure hit an entire section within a season. We keep the common failure parts for the brands that went into these neighborhoods, so when your gate dies the same week your neighbor’s did, we fix it without a two-week parts wait. Call (979) 291-0947 and we’ll tell you over the phone whether it’s worth repairing or replacing.
Black clay soil expands when wet and contracts when dry, and in Celina it moves enough to lift gate posts out of plumb within a few years of a standard installation. We set gate posts on a deeper footing with a concrete collar below the active soil zone so the post doesn’t ride the seasonal swell. We also account for drainage so water doesn’t pond around the post and accelerate the heave. A gate installed on the standard 30-inch footing will move. We don’t install on the standard footing. Get a free estimate at (979) 291-0947 and we’ll show you the difference before we quote.
No, and that’s the first thing we check. Celina’s master-planned communities enforce strict architectural covenants on gate materials, powder-coat colors, picket profiles, and sometimes the operator brand. We’ve seen new gates rejected for having the wrong shade of matte black or the wrong finial profile. We pull the community standards from the HOA or property management company before we order a single component, so the gate you get is the gate they approved. If your HOA has a pending violation notice about your current gate, call us at (979) 291-0947. We fix those here.
Yes. Celina operators run in sustained 100°F heat where capacitors and rubber seals degrade faster, and then they face ice storms in February. We set force limits and travel speeds for the gate’s actual weight and wind exposure, not the factory default. We also install battery backups or manual release mechanisms on the swing and slide gates we put in, because when the ice takes down the power lines out to Gunter, you still need to get out of your driveway. A properly configured operator runs cooler in summer and doesn’t bind when the gate is rimed with ice. Ask us about it at (979) 291-0947.
The hinge post footing. A 2018 swing gate in Celina is now six or seven years into the black clay heave cycle, and the original footing was probably shallow and unreinforced. The post leans, the gate drags, the photocell trips, and someone disconnects the sensor out of frustration. The repair that actually holds is pulling the post, pouring a deeper footing with a rebar cage, and reinstalling the gate and operator in true plumb. We do that work in your driveway with on-site welding, so the gate never leaves your property. If your gate scrapes the driveway or binds halfway through its arc, call (979) 291-0947. A free estimate beats another season of fighting it.
Written by Hal Gatewood, Owner at Gatewood Fence & Gate, serving Celina since opening his shop in 2001.