We are in the process of building a new barn and am undecided about the width of the stall door/gates. How wide are yours and do you like the size??? I prefer a swinging door vs sliding one if that matters.
I have read that the standard is 4 ft however I have seen gates sold online that range from 48" to 53". I am thinking of going as wide as possible as I figure it would be best to have them too wide vs too narrow.
I also like the swing stall doors as I leave the top half open for the horses. Our opening is a standard 4 foot size and we have a relatively narrow aisleway and big warmblood horses. They have no problem at all turning to get into or out of the stall entrance way at that size.
I think it depends on if you’d like your gates to swing through the opening, or if you’d like them to swing only one way, but fold back against the wall.
A 48" gate will need a larger than 48" opening to swing through the opening. It will need a smaller than 48" opening if you’d like it to swing one way, but secure back flat against the wall.
If you’d like a 48" opening but would like to have that gate open one way and secure back flat against the wall, you’ll need a larger than 48" gate.
4’ gates need only a few inches larger opening, a couple will do and they will still fold back out of the way if you set the hinges properly so they will.
Our neighbor and veterinary clinic expansion have 12’ gates, the whole width of the stalls and they can close the aisle in front completely, so when they have a horse that is wild, they can shoo it in there easily.
You can make gates to fit any purpose you want.
Ours, first picture, in two barns, are 4’ and they fold all the way back.
The next two pictures are internet pictures, both look to be 6’ gates.
The last is the 12’ gates in our vet’s clinic:
My stall doors are 4’ mesh filled gates - opening is apparently 4’, gate itself is actually 45" (per the website: http://tarterusa.com/tarter-products/2-x-4-wire-filled-gate/ )
Mine are set in the door frame so they’ll swing both into and out of the stall (I use 2 way gate latches - https://www.amazon.com/Special-Speeco-Products-TV206691-Latch/dp/B000WMGR9E ) I did sacrifice the ability to swing them flush against the wall by doing that, though (as my stall doors are centered on the fronts).
Our stall doors are all a full 48 inches…our custom screens are 52 inches so they swing into the stall and lay flat against the wall when open and close against the 4x4 doorway post. If a horse bangs/charges the gate it will not slip past the post. Our doors are on one side of the stall…not in the center.
You WANT stall gates to open inwards ONLY, it makes them stronger. So however wide your openings are, the stall gate needs to be longer, and butt up to solid posts on each side. The hinges need to be anchored with a nut on the bottom of them, so that the gate can not be raised up/lifted off it’s hinge by a horse who tries to put it’s head under it (assuming it is not one that goes all the way to the floor). Both the side that has the hinges on it and the other where it has a snap against the posts so that it is well supported should a horse hit/ram it. Stall gates are handy for this type of horse, one who wants to ram, or jump out over a half door. But because they are a bit of a PITA to open and close for horses who do not need them, putting them on every stall is both expensive and unnecessary when a regular stall guard or stall chain is easier for more civilized and dependable horses.
No way do I want a stall door that only opens into a stall. You are totally SOL if you have a horse down against that door in distress.
Stall doors should ALWAYS only open OUTWARD, for safety of both horse and human. If you are inside and need to exit quickly, you could be pinned against the door, with no room to swing the door to exit. You could easily get severely injured or killed in an emergency situation. And what Bluey said. A horse could also get injured on that door opening inwards.
[QUOTE=Kevsgrlss7;8997748]
We are in the process of building a new barn and am undecided about the width of the stall door/gates. How wide are yours and do you like the size??? I prefer a swinging door vs sliding one if that matters.
I have read that the standard is 4 ft however I have seen gates sold online that range from 48" to 53". I am thinking of going as wide as possible as I figure it would be best to have them too wide vs too narrow.[/QUOTE]
I have both sliding and swinging doors. I prefer sliding. Decided to save money on stall fronts in one barn, and this was a mistake not worth the savings. Even though both fronts are welded steel with wood inserts, but the hinges and doors eventually sag a little bit. Never did install stall guards because I don’t like the doors being wide open into the aisle. My sliding stalls have drop down upper sections, so horses can put their heads out. All of these doorways are 48". My back doorways into paddocks are all 48", except in one barn that was already built. Doorways are too narrow at 40" and a large horse or two running in and out got a rub. No more large horses in those stalls.
Swing doors ALWAYS to the outside. For the reasons noted above…safety and access to the horse.
My half dutch stall doors were custom made and cost quite a bit more then a sliding door would. Looks nicer in my opinion and after 32 years of constant use I have not yet to replace a hinge. All the doors open and close perfectly. No sagging at all!
There are advantages to both, also disadvantages:
Sliding doors are space savers, you don’t need a wider aisle to open them, a narrow one will still work.
On the other hand, they tend to need adjusting and maintenance and are easier to get torn out if a horse is hard on stalls, the kickers and those that like to bounce off walls.
For the humans, sliding a door is not ergonomic, it twists and pulling and that sideways.
Some may develop bad shoulder and back problems from that, I did, resolved when we eliminated sliding doors.
Swing out doors need more clear room in front of them, but seem to be more horse and human friendly if a horse tries to rush and are definitely easier to open and close.
They rarely should need maintenance or repairs and stand to horse attacks better.
I never had to fight a swinging door to get it open or closed, but have to sliding doors that didn’t want to slide and/or kept getting hung half way.
People tend to prefer one over the other for their own reasons.
The differences are personal and small, so putting in the kind the one building the barn likes in their barn makes sense.
As for looks, most people don’t even notice which kind they are.
Both can be made with all kinds of windows for those that want the horse to stick their heads out of the stalls.
When that comes up, I always think about this picture someone posted on the internet:
with Bluey on this …we have sliding doors on overhead enclosed tracks.
Stall DOORS open outward. Stall GATES open inward. There’s a difference. A stall gate is a type of stall guard, usually does not go all the way to the floor.
My SO and his best friend built our small barn based on my specifications. Our stall doors are 5 feet wide and swing outward. After a lifetime around horses, I think 4 feet is too narrow if there is a dangerous situation, and I always want room to get away if necessary. Plus, we breed a few horses every year and the added width allows for mare and foal to safely exit the stall without banging each other around.
There is nothing that is 100% safe. A half gate that does not go all the way to the ground is safer than a full gate, and it should open INTO the stall. Because it’s a half gate, the horse cannot get stuck up against it. WRT to having exit in a hurry, I’d train the horse up rather than configure my barn in case I have to run for my life. And if you really want to be safe, each stall should have 2 openings - one into the aisle, and one to the exterior of the barn.
Did it again, it double posted itself when editing.
That is once yesterday, once today, may be a new glitch in the system?
We always considered stall doors/gates/screens to be best hanging where they open both ways or to the outside, NEVER the inside, as a basic, common sense way to hang them in the small spaces stalls are.
The reason, if you have a horse struggling, sick and falling into things, scared and trying to get out, colicky and keeps going down and flailing, you don’t want to have to push anything into the stall to try to get to him, or if you were in there with him, find a way to get that open and to get around it to get yourself out.
We have one door to the outside that we could not open out in our barn because of a column.
We do open that one to the inside by necessity, but it never is used to go thru it, is one that either stays open into the run, or closes the stall, is not a walk thru with a horse door.
The front door into the aisle is the one to lead horses in and out and that one opens into the aisle, not inside the 14’ x 14’ stall.
When we used screens on an open stall door, those were hung where they didn’t fold back, so they opened both ways, in and out.
We always opened them out to get a horse in and out of a stall, never into the stall, where they could have been in the way.
How to hang swinging anything in horse stalls is very much, every place and continent I have been in, standard to open to the outside of stalls, because it is what makes most sense, when you have a small space and the large mass of a horse to move around in there.
You don’t want anything possibly in the way in that small space.
"
The reason, if you have a horse struggling, sick and falling into things, scared and trying to get out, colicky and keeps going down and flailing, you don’t want to have to push anything into the stall to try to get to him, or if you were in there with him, find a way to get that open and to get around it to get yourself out."
Having dealt with a horse that was down and pinned himself against the door of his stall during a colic episode (ended up getting surgery), I was forever thankful that the doors opened out into the aisle.
I would have had to jump over the door and possibly onto him while avoiding legs and body thrashing just to get a halter on him and get him up. My guess is that I would have gone to the ER while he went up for surgery.
Just because you have never dealt with something doesn’t mean it can’t happen. When I designed the barn we just built I not only pulled from my experiences, but talked with many horse friends about their experiences.
In the end, I do believe my barn has a lot of features that make it comfortable and safe for both horse and human.
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