What to Check After a Storm

After a named storm the gate usually still works, and that is exactly what makes people skip the inspection. The post storm sequence collected at Gate Maintenance Mount Pleasant, SC thetaxpayers starts with structure and ends with electronics, because the damage that closes a Mount Pleasant driveway a month later was almost always done on the night nobody looked.

Before Anything Else

Do not operate the gate under power until it has been looked over. If wind has moved a leaf into a stop, bent a track, or driven debris into the swing arc, the first automatic cycle will turn a small problem into a bent rail or a stripped drive.

Structure First

Check each post for a new lean and the ground around each footing for cracking, heave or a gap where water ran. Saturated sandy soil around a shallow footing is the classic coastal storm failure and it shows as a post that a hand can rock. Then measure the leaf diagonals to see whether the frame has racked.

Hardware and Finish

Look at every hinge strap and weld for a fresh crack, and at the latch and catch for impact marks. Wind blown grit strips coating on the exposed face, so check the leading edges. Any bare metal exposed during the storm has already spent days wet and salty, so treat it now rather than at the next scheduled visit.

The Track on a Slider

A ground track fills with sand, shell and vegetation in a single surge, and the roller will ride over it and out of alignment. Clear the whole length by hand and by hose before the gate moves, and check the guides and the end catch for movement.

Electronics Last

Once the mechanics are sound, restore power and work through the operator, the loop detector, the photo eye and the keypad in that order. Water in a conduit takes days to show up as a fault, so a device that works on the day may still fail that week. A surge through the supply is common and often kills one board input rather than the whole unit, which reads as a single dead accessory.

Photograph Everything

Photographs taken before anything is touched are worth having for an insurer, and they also give the next inspection a baseline of what the storm actually changed.