Introduction
The first mistake you can make in buying a gate, is buying
one too late. Although most children do not start to develop
their motor skills before the age of six months, a significant
percentage of children have actually taken their first steps
at six months.
Don't wait for an accident or near accident to protect your
children from dangerous areas in your home. After the first
signs of rolling over and sitting up, it's usually a right
time to install a gate - before your child starts crawling.
The Second mistake is buying the wrong gate for your application.
As you will see, our site provides the best quality baby safety
gates for every application you may encounter in and around
your home. What's vitally important though, is to only use
a gate in an application that it is intended to be installed.
For example, a pressure mounted gate may be a great idea to
eliminate any drilling into your walls, but is it safe, lets
say, on a staircase? Absolutely not! Pressure gates work well
between doorways and hallways, provided there is solid wood
construction. Stairs are usually place next to hollow walls
which, when under pressure, will create a dent in the wall
and rapidly loosen the pressure fit, creating a dangerous
situation. In addition, Stair posts (Newell posts) have irregular
surfaces, making a poor mounting condition for a pressure
gate.
For proper selection of any gates used in your home please
refer to our Dog,
Pet and Baby Gates Selector or our Gate
Comparison Chart.
When your baby starts to crawl, explore, or use a walker,
it's time to install safety gates wherever potential hazards
may be present around your home. At the top of stairs, at
the bottom of stairs, and in between rooms, safety gates act
as barricades that communicate which areas are off-limits
for your little scooter. When purchasing safety gates for
your home, there are several things to keep in mind: types
of gates, features, and safety.
Types of Safety Gates
Pressure-Mounted Safety Gates - Pressure
mounted gates can be installed without the use of specials
tools and can be installed in just a few minutes. Placed in
the opening, adjustable feet can be expanded to tighen against
two solid wall surfaces to create a safe installation. These
baby gates are typically used between rooms and hallways,
but should not be used at the top or bottom of stairs.
Hardware-Mounted Safety Gates - This type
of child safety gate is mounted with screws mounted directly
into a solid wall or wood post (or used in conjunction with
our mounting kits) to provide the maximum strength and protection
for you children. Top of stair applications would used only
Hardware Mounted gates the have integral swing-stop mechanisms
to prevent gates from swings out over the stairwell. The gate
should also have no fix horizontal bar on the bottom that
can cause a tripping hazard. Check out these great stair gates
for top of stair applications - G20
Stairway Gate by Kidco or the Secure
Solutions Swing™ Gate by Evenflo.
Playpens - Playpens are good alternative
to childproofing an entire room provided they are used for
short periods of time (Academy of Pediatrics recommend children
be placed in playpen for periods not to exceed 20 minutes).
We only carry two types of playpens, PD10
Playpen by Kidco and the PD20
Playpen with pad by Kidco. These playpens are made
from tubular steel to provide maximum durability and safety.
The playpens are expandable by simply adding 24" extension
panels.
There are other playpens available made from plastic, but
have our safety testing and durability standards for free
standing playpens.
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