My take on building a 5 bar gate

Thought I might share my method of building gates with you - it's not unique, but it's easy and accurate. If it helps some-one, then the thread is not wasted!

I start of with a scale drawing - in my case it's done with Photoshop, but any suitable program will do it - or even pen and ruler:

Next lay a strip of double sided transparent adhesive tape across the images, and remove some of the tack from the tape:



Now place the appropriate size plastic strip to form the post, trim, and then add the rails, trimming to fit:




Add the diagonal, and then flood the joints with solvent (MEK, etc.) Don't worry about flooding, it doesn't stick to the tape, and only adds to the appearance of the 'wood'.
When set, carefully remove the gate from the taped image.




Now get some grass wire, in this case the wire came from a Rioja bottle (waste not want not…) a couple of turns around a piece of piano wire, couple of twists, snip it off, and you have a hinge. Drill a hole in the upright, insert the hinge and fix with super glue.




The gatepost is a match stick, and the hinge pins are snips of a paper staple.
Drill a hole in an upright and insert a piece of piano wire as a support while you paint it all. 




And there you have it - a working five bar gate!








All the best,
Shaun.

Thanks, Shaun.

Shaun,
Now that is very inspiring. It most assuredly helps in keeping everything straight and true.
You have me thinking of where else that technique can be applied.

Thank You,
Wayne

Excellent, I have just finished building a cattle pen using matchsticks as posts drilled through to take 0.8mm wire to represent steel railings, the gates are going to be wood so this has come just right for me.

Hi Shaun I have taken the liberty of turning your excellent topic into our Monthly Project for April as we hadn't got one.

Thanks Robert, I wondered what had happened to the thread!!

This too has gone in the Forum Index Shaun under Scratchbuilding, Gates and Five Barred Gate. Great stuff.

[user=644]Campaman[/user] wrote:

Excellent, I have just finished building a cattle pen using matchsticks as posts drilled through to take 0.8mm wire to represent steel railings, the gates are going to be wood so this has come just right for me.

Thanks Andy.

I've just finished a cattle pen as well, but my brief was to build the prototype for Cardigan Station circa 1930's, and in 3mm scale.
Only two photo's to go on, and most of seemed to be built from old broad gauge rail!

Here's a pic:



ATB

Shaun.

Looks great Shaun. I can just imagine that settled into a layout.