What baby gates do you use and would recommend?

4 Responses to “What baby gates do you use and would recommend?”

1. boss says:

   April 20, 2010 at 7:18 AM

   My son is 14 months old and we have three very different gates up in our house. I’ve been happy with all of them. The first gate we got was Summer Infant # 07060, Sure & Secure Extra Tall Walk-Thru Gate. We bought this for our hallway. It is a large opening (45 inches) and I needed something with an opening to easily walk through. I also didn’t want this to be a permenant gate that screwed into the wall in case I needed to remove it temporarily. This gate did the trick. It’s pressure mounted. I’m very happy with the gate. We’ve had in installed now for about 6 months. Here are the pros and cons.

   Pros:
   pressure mounted
   extra tall
   easy to get in and out of once you get the hang of it
   fairly easy to install
   spring relase so it closes on its own
   My son has not been able to pull the gate down even though he tries to shake it.

   Cons:
   When my son shakes the gate he does move it slightly on the wall. Although as mentioned above he hasn’t been able to pull the gate down. So it does hold up good.
   It was a little tricky lining up the gate when installing it.
   You can’t tighten it too much or the gate won’t open and close.

   The second gate we purchased was for the bottom of our stairs. We also have a large opening at the landing so we needed an oddly configured gate. We went with the Configure Gate by Kidco. We’ve had this mounted now for about 4 months or so and I love this gate.

   Pros:
   Very Sturdy
   Easy to get in and out of
   My son can’t budge this gate
   Mounts to the wall
   Can angle it to fit odd openings

   Cons:
   Expensive
   Some steps in the directions are a little unclear. It wasn’t hard to install it just took a little longer than it should if the directions had been written better.

   The third gate we purchased was for the top of the stars. We went with the Evenflo® Secure Step Metal Gate. We’ve had this gate up for about 2-3 months now and haven’t had any problems. Although, my son isn’t upstairs for too long, so he hasn’t really tried to shake the gate yet. The gate seems like it’s very sturdy. My husband and I have tried to shake it and it doesn’t move. Of course, since it’s at the top of my stairs I’m always keeping an eye on my son just in case.

   Pros:
   Installed quickly
   Seems to be very sturdy
   Has an indicator on the gate – Red means the gate is not closed properly. Green means it’s locked properly.
   Easy to open once you get the hang of it

   Cons:
   The gate can be adjusted to various sizes. There are two screws to loosen, slide the gate to the appropriate length and then tighten again. I can tell you that for us hand tighening didn’t work. You were able to fairly easily slide the gate which rendors it useless since you can’t lock it. However, once I got out our adjustable wrench and lightened the screw with the tool. The gate length is now locked into place and hasn’t budged.

   I see from the reviews on Amazon for this gate that two other people had the same problem, I had with the knobs not tightening properly. As I said once we tightened them with an adjustable wrench, we didn’t have any further problems. But, you may not feel comfortable with this and may want to avoid this gate altogether.

   My favorite gate of the three by far is the Configure Gate. I hope this helps. Good luck.

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2. denomme says:

   April 20, 2010 at 7:09 AM

   These are the ones I would use and the one that I would recommend.

   I have two standard wood frame gates that work okay. They are the pressure mount type. They take two hands to set into place. Which can be frustrating (when do you have two hands free?). But they are extra tall so the dogs’ don’t try to jump them. Looks like one of these would work for your stairs.

   The one that I really like is the Perfect Fit Gate (I’ve linked to the Safety 1st site). It is one hand operated and still is a pressure mount (but has the option of being installed if you like), so no mounting is necessary. It is only a standard size so it wouldn’t work for the the 48″ opening. (We purchased ours at Babies R Us)

   I don’t have stairs but if I did, I would look into one that you mount and is especially made for the top of stairs. I’ve included one below.

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3. Artie Lange Fan says:

   April 20, 2010 at 6:19 AM

   I think Kidco gates are great.

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4. Momma Betsy says:

   April 20, 2010 at 5:32 AM

   We have the kind that you step on a pedal and it opens a door that is built into the gate so you don’t have to take it off every time you go through. You can buy extenders to make it longer if needed. It costs about $80 but it has been well worth it.

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