Are baby gates safe? (The pressure mounted kind)

Question

Even if baby was pushing and pounding on them, are they safe? In your experience have the pressure mounted ones ever fallen over? Thanks.

Answer 1

Although my baby is still to young to require gates, I have used them for my dogs... when mounted with the correct pressure they don't budge, however, I have had issues with paint from the wall sticking to the rubbery pressure points, took the paint clear off the wall!  I assure you the pressure was not excessive, just enough for the gate not to move. You may want to consider some kind of buffer like a small piece of felt (those sticky ones you put on the bottom of chairs).  They don't weaken the hold but do protect the walls.  Also, you can get the ones that have a little door in them that you can action with one hand so you don't have to remove the entire gate when you want to pass.  I like these ones the best, far less annoying when your hands are full.

Answer 2

We can't use those in our house because the crackpots who built the place didn't make the doorways even.  We've tried sticking cardboard between the door jamb and the rubber things on the end of the gate, but the cardboard just slides around.  My sister, however, has used the same tension gate through three kids and it stays in place just fine.  If you think you might have wacko walls like we do, measure your doorways at various spots to see if they're even, or borrow a friend's gate to see if it stays.

Answer 3

right now, i think our pressure gates are fine as they are used primarily to keep the cats out of baby's room; however, i will not feel comfortable using that feature on a stairwell, or anywhere else she can get hurt when she' s old enough to test them, those will be mounted properly......good luck

Answer 4

Yes they're safe, as long as it gives a fair amount of resistance when you push the bar down.  

Answer 5

I have a 38" 37lb 2 yr old and no matter how much she shakes it it hasn't budged a bit.

Answer 6

We had pressure mounted gates at the tops of our stairs.  Over time they do loosen, so you do have to be careful.  When we used them to block off the kitchen where there weren't any stairs, they had fallen a couple of times, but it mostly startled our sons, not hurt them.  They were also over about 7 months old.  When they fell in the kitchen, my hubby put a 1X2 inch board just under the top of the top stair.  He secured it to the wall on each side.  He put it about 3 inches from the stair so that we could slide the gate inbetween the stair and the wood so that when our son shook the gate, it had extra support at the base and we never had it fall then.  The gate sat one step down from the top.  And when the gate wasn't in place the wood was not in the way to be a tripping hazzard because of where he put it.

When we moved, we got the hinged ones that bolted to the walls.

To simply answer, for us... they worked fine, but over time they get loose and you may have to replace them.  I hope this helped some.  :)

Answer 7

I've been using the pressure mounted gates for 3 months and I haven't had a problem with it yet... As a matter of fact thank god someone invented it...