Review on Cardinal Gates Auto Lock Gate White by Carrie Williams

Anyone who has attempted to keep children off a spiral staircase knows that it is no easy task. This is even more true when the staircase in question is in an apartment building and you need to minimize damage to the walls/stairs. I had already had experience with a cardinal gate at my parents' house (they use it for a regular staircase) and I had a feeling that this or that gate would work for the spiral staircase in our new apartment building. They use cardinal clamps to attach the gate, so I've seen this design in action as well. I decided to make my own clamps for our setup because the ones Cardinal sells are expensive for what they are and on the one hand cannot meet my needs. Also, I'm relatively good with a drill press. I bought this gate instead of a ladder gate because I thought the latching design looked less cumbersome and therefore easier to work with at our location (I was right). I bought some wood from the hardware store to make the clips and some screws to attach them. Then I got to work. The result is a reliable gate, easy to operate from both sides, it can be removed if necessary (e.g. if we need to move furniture up the stairs), looks quite good and does not take up much space. It takes a bit of fiddling to align it perfectly during installation, but once it's in place, it stays there. It is slanted, but this does not cause any problems for the hinge or the bolt. I love the facility and my children (ages 3 and 10 months) are much more confident on the stairs now. Edit (2017-01-12): I've had to replace the latch twice on this one. The first time about a month after installation and the second time about 3 months later. Both times the manufacturer was very quick to replace the latch under warranty. Both latches failed in the same way. The latest replacement seems to have a slightly different design that probably won't turn out like the previous 2. The manufacturer says they had a bad batch and they really do. Otherwise there were no problems with the gate. I won't be shooting a star as they fixed this for me quickly and for free and the problem seems to be fixed now. It would be great if they could replace faulty batch locks in advance.