Ensure your powered gates meet safety standards with our EN 12453 Checklist. Protect users, reduce liability, and demonstrate compliance efficiently.
Why You Need This Checklist
EN 12453 defines the essential safety requirements for powered gates, doors and barriers across Europe. Complying is not optional: it is a legal prerequisite under the Machinery Directive and many national regulations.
Beyond avoiding prosecution, a structured checklist protects end-users, maintenance staff and passers-by from crushing, shearing, drawing-in or impact injuries.
It also demonstrates due diligence to insurers and clients, reducing liability exposure, reputational damage and costly downtime. Because every installation, retrofit and service visit is unique, a repeatable checklist ensures nothing critical is missed, even under time pressure.
Auditors increasingly ask to see robust, readily accessible evidence. An EN 12453 checklist provides the documented proof that safety devices, control functions and warning signs were examined, tested and recorded correctly.
Safety Devices to Check
EN 12453 groups protective devices into two categories: primary detection, which prevents contact, and secondary detection, which minimises force if contact occurs. Your checklist should therefore begin with non-contact sensors.
Verify that every light curtain, photo-electric cell or radar scanner is correctly aligned, free from dirt and wired to a safety-rated input. Confirm that the response time meets the stopping distance for the gate’s operating speed.
Next, examine contact edges and pressure-sensitive bumpers on leading, closing and trapping edges. Look for splits, moisture ingress or missing end-caps, and squeeze-test each zone to ensure the controller registers a fault.
Check force-limiting drive units or inverters: measure the peak force with a calibrated test instrument and record that it remains below the maximum in the standard. Limit switches and mechanical end stops must halt travel before the gate leaves its guides or overruns the hinge geometry.
Assess the effectiveness of slack-wire or anti-drop devices on vertically moving doors; springs and counterweights should be secured, labelled and balanced.
Emergency stop buttons need a red mushroom head, yellow background and latching action; operate every station to verify the gate stops safely and cannot restart until reset.
Finally, confirm that the safety relay or PLC has dual channels, cross-fault monitoring and the correct performance level for the installation’s risk assessment. Record defects for prompt rectification.
Control Systems and Functions
Proper control architecture underpins every safe gate. First, confirm the control panel is securely enclosed, labelled and accessible only to authorised personnel, and that the main isolator can be padlocked. Test all operation commands—open, close, partial opening and stop—ensuring each delivers the intended movement without unexpected delays or overshoot.
Hold-to-run functions should require continuous pressure, while impulse commands rely on proven safety devices. Verify automatic reversal on obstruction and ensure the reversal distance matches the manual. Measure soft-start, soft-stop and deceleration ramps to keep forces within EN 12453 limits, and make sure loss of power leads to a safe state.
Manual Operation Requirements
Even the most advanced automated system must permit safe manual movement during power failures, emergencies or maintenance. Disengaging the drive should be simple, intuitive and achievable without tools. Locate the manual-release mechanism and check that any key or handle is clearly marked, kept adjacent to the door and inserts smoothly without jamming.
Operate the release while the drive is energised—nothing should move until the motor stops completely. With the drive uncoupled, push the gate through its full travel. It should glide smoothly without binding or excessive force; vertical shutters must not free-fall. Measure the manual operating force with a spring balance and ensure it remains below the limits for the door type, size and orientation.
Counterbalance springs, weights or hydraulic dampers must support the leaf throughout the stroke—inspect cables, anchor points and pulleys for fraying or corrosion. After reconnection, re-apply power and confirm automatic control is restored without generating fault codes.
Where manual winding devices are provided, ensure the crank handle is stored securely yet readily accessible, and that the gearbox prevents reverse rotation if the handle is released.
If a wicket or access door forms part of the structure, verify it cannot open while the gate is unlocked and moving manually. Finally, document signage that instructs users how to engage and disengage manual mode.
Warning Signs and Markings
Clear, durable signage is legally required and a frontline defence against misuse. Confirm the CE marking and manufacturer’s plate are permanent, legible and accessible. Locate user-facing decals such as “Automatic Gate—Keep Clear,” “No Pedestrians,” or crush-hazard pictograms, ensuring colours and symbols follow ISO 7010. Remove or replace any faded, peeled or obstructed labels.
Mark pinch points on scissor arms and apply height stripes where overhead doors sweep low. Inside control panels, keep safety schematics and reset instructions intact and in the site’s primary language. Install reflective strips or LED markers on gates near vehicle routes for night-time visibility, and update every label after modifications or periodic maintenance inspections.
Testing and Maintenance
Testing must be systematic, documented and frequent enough to catch degradation early. Begin with a daily visual inspection for damaged edges, loose fixings or obstructed sensors. Weekly, operate safety edges, photocells and emergency stops, timing the reversal response and logging readings in a service book.
Monthly, measure dynamic forces with a calibrated gauge and compare results to previous data. At each six-monthly service visit, strip, clean and lubricate hinges, rollers and drive chains, and update controller firmware if safety patches are issued. Ensure only trained, competent personnel perform maintenance, following written isolation and test procedures.
Record Keeping
Accurate records transform a routine checklist into a defensible safety file. Log the date, time and name of the person performing each inspection or test, along with serial numbers and software versions. Capture force-test readings, sensor activation distances and current draws on a standard form so trends are visible.
Photographs of critical components before and after remedial work provide valuable context for future engineers and insurers. Record faults, interim controls and rectification dates, and store all documentation digitally in a secure but easily retrievable location, backed up off-site for at least the life of the equipment plus one year.
Final Safety Check Before Use
After completing device inspections, control tests and maintenance actions, perform a holistic final check. Remove all tools, packaging and access equipment from the danger zone, then cycle the gate through three full open-and-close movements while observing from a safe distance. Confirm smooth travel, correct speed, stable stopping positions and silent locking.
During each cycle, deliberately interrupt photocells, safety edges and emergency stops to verify immediate reversal or halt, and re-measure dynamic forces to confirm nothing has drifted. Reset counters, seal enclosures, re-arm intrusion alarms and hand over the documented checklist to the responsible person for signature acceptance.
Our compliance and safety audit programme safeguards every stage of your electric gate’s life-cycle. We perform full inspections, automation risk assessments and routine compliance testing of sensors, safety edges, emergency stops, speeds, control panels and wiring.
