Electrical Contractor License no. DELPHOC773DG 		Call now:(360) 349-6910
Autogate NW
5348 216th Ave SW
Centralia, WA 98531
(360) 349-6910
Clients please login
Home  Gates  Products  Services  Contact  Store  Manuals  Brochures  Maintenance  Links  About  Service Areas  Account  Terms
Return to Dashboard Return to System Designer

Gate System Designer Help

Workflow, coordinate conventions, construction assumptions, views, and saving.
Instructions and Help. Process / coordinates / construction / views

Gate System Designer combines a scaled property plan with gate units, walls, fencing, columns, equipment, and Section views. Work from the broad site information toward the detailed gate system, then save or export the finished plan.

This Help page describes the present working assumptions. More choices and project-specific controls can be added as the designer develops.

Recommended working orderA reliable top-to-bottom process
  1. Start or load a plan, then complete the drawing information.
  2. Adjust the gate-system plat: property width, depth, grid, frontage side, right-of-way, north direction, and surrounding context.
  3. Add Surroundings outside the property and Grounds inside the property.
  4. Add internal property boundaries and explanatory Site markings such as lines, arrows, and text.
  5. Open Place and equip the gate system, then place numbered gate openings.
  6. Add site construction: posts, columns, walls, and fencing.
  7. Assign saved Gate Designer gates to their numbered openings.
  8. Equip each assigned gate with its opening structures, caps, lighting, plaques, locks, and safety devices.
  9. Create or adjust Section views, then inspect the complete plat and combined elevations.
  10. Save the plan and export JSON, SVG, PNG, or printed output as appropriate.
  • Plat
  • →
  • Grounds
  • →
  • Markings
  • →
  • Gate openings
  • →
  • Site construction
  • →
  • Saved gates
  • →
  • Equipment
  • →
  • Views
  • →
  • Save
Plat coordinates and property orientationFrontage and inward depth

The plat uses decimal feet. The along-frontage coordinate runs from one end of the selected frontage to the other. The depth coordinate begins at the frontage property line and increases inward across the property.

Changing which side is the street/frontage rotates how the same frontage-and-depth coordinates are displayed. The values remain property-based rather than screen-based.

Property limits: Coordinates entered for property construction are limited to the nominal plat width and depth. However, a coordinate can still be the center of an object whose physical width extends beyond the property. See the next section.
Centerline placement of posts, columns, walls, and fencesImportant property-line convention

Construction coordinates are centerline coordinates, not outside-edge coordinates.

  • A standalone post or column is centered on its single frontage/depth coordinate.
  • A wall or fence is centered on the straight line between its start and end coordinates.
  • For wall/fence types with end columns, each end column is centered on the corresponding start or end coordinate.
  • Intermediate masonry columns in a fence-on-wall run are centered at the evenly spaced bay divisions.

To keep a square post or column inside a property line, place its center at least one-half of its width inside that line. A 2-foot-wide column therefore needs its center at least 1 foot inside.

Example: On a 150 ft × 200 ft plat, a 2 ft wide column centered at 150, 200 occupies frontage 149 to 151 and depth 199 to 201. It extends 1 ft beyond each adjoining property line. To keep it inside that corner, center it no farther out than 149, 199.

For a wall, the same principle applies across its thickness: half the wall thickness lies on each side of the entered centerline. For an angled wall, that half-thickness extends perpendicular to the wall line.

Visual caution: The plan clips construction to the property area and uses simplified plan markers. A clipped drawing may not make an overhang obvious. Confirm property-line clearance from the entered dimensions rather than relying only on the marker.
Surroundings, Grounds, and Site markingsThree different drawing layers
SurroundingsUse these for areas beyond the actual property, such as adjoining pavement, landscaping, water, buildings, or neighboring ground conditions. Surroundings render beneath the property.
GroundsUse these for opaque property-area surfaces and shapes. Their order matters because later/higher layers cover earlier/lower layers. A Building layer in Surroundings or Grounds may also receive an optional height for Section views.
Site markingsUse lines, arrows, and text labels to explain the drawing. These are annotations rather than physical construction.
Construction marker namesNames identify items in the editor and list only. They are not automatically printed on the plan; use a Site marking text label when visible wording is needed.
Place and equip the gate systemOpenings / construction / assignments / equipment

This region contains the physical gate-system work in top-down order: numbered gate openings, shared site construction, saved-gate assignments, and the equipment belonging to each assigned gate.

The System components sidebar remains at the right throughout this region on wider screens. It shows the shared masonry, capstone, post-cap, post-top-light, column-face-light, plaque, and photo-eye catalogs, together with reference cards for emergency and magnetic-lock equipment. On narrower screens it moves below the controls.

Selection: Masonry, post-cap, and capstone cards apply to the Site construction editor. Gate-specific materials, accessories, locks, and safety devices are selected within the applicable Equip gate subsection while the same catalog artwork remains visible for reference.
Site construction — posts, columns, walls, and fencingPlace and equip region

Choose the construction type first. The form then reveals the dimensions and materials that apply to that type.

  • Masonry selection: Click a brick or stone catalog card to select it. For fence on wall between columns, the same selected masonry is presently applied to both the wall and all columns.
  • Columns replacing posts: In fence-on-wall construction, masonry columns replace the ordinary fence posts. They are evenly spaced so the clear fence bays do not exceed 8 ft.
  • Optional endpoint columns: For construction types that generate masonry columns, the start column and finish column may be included or omitted independently. This allows a wall or fence run to terminate into separately placed existing columns while retaining any required intermediate columns.
  • Ornamental iron: The current Montage Residential-style default uses 5/8 in pickets, 15/16 in × 1-1/4 in rails, 2 in posts, and 3, 3.5, 4, 5, or 6 ft heights.
  • Rail choice: Three rails are the preferred default, with the middle rail 5 in below the top rail. Check Use 2-rail fence instead to omit the middle rail.
  • Caps: Catalog post caps and Gate Designer-style capstones are alternative treatments. Selecting one removes the other.
  • Chain-link and wood: The current controls begin with standard defaults that can be expanded later.
Good practice: Enter actual post, column, and wall dimensions before judging clear openings or property-line clearance. Symbolic plan markers are not a substitute for the saved dimensions.
Gate openings and saved Gate Designer gatesMarker first, design assignment second

Gate locations / numbered gate openings establishes each opening on the plan before assignment. A saved gate-only design can then be assigned to the corresponding marker.

  • The imported gate controls the opening width, gate type, movement direction, and slide storage length used by the system drawing.
  • A dual gate is treated as one two-leaf assembly with supports at its two outside ends.
  • Opening supports and related system equipment remain system-level choices because they depend on the complete installation.
Nominal heights: Combined elevations place posts, columns, walls, and fencing at grade. A moving gate can include bottom operating clearance, so its fabricated leaf may be shorter than the nominal adjoining fence height. Adjust the gate in Gate Designer when exact top alignment is required.
Gate-specific equipment: Each assigned gate receives its own Equip gate subsection for opening posts or columns, masonry finishes, capstones or post caps, post-top lights, column-face lights, plaques, photo-eyes, KNOX boxes, fire-strobe detectors, and—on swing gates—magnetic locks. These choices remain separate from independently placed Site construction.
Locks and safety devicesPer assigned gate

Locks and safety devices belong to a particular assigned gate because their correct location depends on the gate type, movement, opening supports, and physical viewing side.

  • Photo-eyes: Select a common catalog device, face or side mounting, and the primary driveway side. Swing-gate beam placement is automatic on the side away from the swing. Slide gates may use outside, inside, or both beam locations.
  • KNOX box: Choose the left or right opening support as viewed from the outside / street side. The selected support must be at least 4 inches wide.
  • Fire-strobe detector: Place the detector on an opening support or on a freestanding 3/4-inch pipe, then adjust its left/right, in/out, and height position.
  • Magnetic lock: Available for swing gates. Choose face or side mounting, lock count, gate/post location, and—on dual gates—the carrying leaf and physical face. Masonry columns automatically require side mounting while preserving the preferred steel-post setting.
Safety planning: These drawings document selected equipment and placement concepts. Final entrapment protection, monitored-device requirements, operator compatibility, wiring, and code compliance must be confirmed for the actual installation.
Section views and combined elevationsChoose what is seen and from which side

A Section view is an editable viewing line across the plat. Horizontal sections look either inward/up or outward/down; vertical sections look left or right. The viewing-depth limit determines how far beyond the section line objects may be included.

The standard fresh plan begins with two front views: the roadway/ingress side and the property-looking-out side. Additional perimeter presets can be added and edited.

  • The plat shows each Section-view line and its viewing direction.
  • The combined elevation gathers visible gates, construction, related equipment, and Building layers that have a saved height.
  • View direction determines the correct left-to-right order and which face of a gate is shown.
  • Suppress building heights in this view removes those building masses from one Section view when they would hide the gate-system construction being documented. The saved checkbox appears directly in each rendered Section-view control bar and remains available in the Section-view editor.
Image-export hint: A PNG or SVG export uses the complete saved Section view, not the current zoomed portion on screen. For a close, useful image, create or duplicate a Section view whose line begins and ends around only the construction you want to download, and set its viewing depth to exclude unrelated objects. Keep a wider documentation view separately when both are useful.
Building height: A Building Surroundings or Grounds layer remains plan-only until its optional height is enabled. The Section view projects the footprint as a simple building mass; roof shapes, doors, windows, and architectural detail are not yet modeled.
Saving, loading, and exportsKeep the complete system plan together
  • Server save/load preserves the complete plan under its drawing number and revision.
  • JSON preserves the structured plan data for transfer, troubleshooting, and future editing.
  • SVG and PNG export the complete selected drawing or Section view. For a tightly framed elevation image, first create or duplicate a Section view that contains only the desired area.
  • Print prepares the complete plat or selected drawing area for paper/PDF output.

Before saving a production-oriented plan, verify the drawing information, plat size, property orientation, construction centerlines, actual member dimensions, gate assignments, support choices, and Section-view directions.

Gate-system vocabularyCommon terms used on this page
Plat
The scaled property plan used as the base for the complete gate system.
Frontage
The selected property side adjoining the street or public right-of-way; also the direction used by the along-frontage coordinate.
Depth
Distance inward from the frontage property line.
Centerline
The reference line or point passing through the middle of a physical object. Construction coordinates presently use centerlines.
Grounds
Opaque surface or area layers inside the property; Building layers in Grounds or Surroundings may optionally carry a Section-view height.
Surroundings
Context layers outside or behind the property.
Site marking
An explanatory line, arrow, or text label rather than physical construction.
Gate marker
A numbered system-plan opening to which a saved gate-only design may be assigned.
Clear fence bay
The open fence width measured from the face of one masonry column to the face of the next.
Section view
An elevation assembled by looking from an editable line across a chosen depth of the site.