best baby playards

Solid product with one stupid design flaw, June 12, 2009

By 

R. Harry – See all my reviews

  

First, I want to say I have not yet completely installed this product but I like it already. The gates themselves are solid. They have nice bumper pads on the bottom so as to not scratch the wood floors in my home. The gate itself is extremely safe but a little difficult to open. If you have looked at other gates you will often find ones of parents complaining that their toddler figured out how to open it on their own. That would be extremely difficult here as it has a locking button that must be pressed before the gate is then lifted to be opened. The gate only swings one direction which is too bad and could’ve been fixed with a different style hinge. That sections themselves can be pressure locked into place, making this a very stable play-yard/large gate for your home. Sections can be easily lifted out and removed or added back in. This thing is very versitile in terms of configuration. BUT it has one really stupid design flaw that can be fixed by the consumer but should’ve just been done by the manufacturer in the first place.

THE FLAW:

The gate sections interlock at the hinge and then are held into place by screwing in a support bar. At each hinge, there is one side that goes up and ones side that goes down (male and female for simplicity’s sake). Thus you need one male and one female hinge to fit together for the sections to interlock. The other aspect to this is that if you are hooking the play-yard up to a wall or you are using this as a large gate, the top bracket to hook this to the wall is also male or female (you get one of each in the box). The final piece to this is that rather than making each gate section have one female and one male hinge piece on each side, the company decided to make each gate section have two male or two female hinge pieces. Because they did this, it limits the configuration that you can easily do out of the box. For me, I want to use this as a gate with only 5 sections instead of six which made it so the exposed ends to fit in the wall bracket were both female… but I get one female and one male wall bracket… Likewise, if you were to buy the two section expansion for this product but only want to use one section, you would run into the same problem. Note that this will only effect those that intend to use an odd number of gate sections!!!

On a related note, the reason for this could be that the hinge piece are not “ambidextrous.” Meaning that they can fully fold in on each other one way but not the other (you are limited to a little larger than 90 degree angel I believe). So, the above issue might be there so that the gate can fold up all neat and nice to be stored. If that is the case, I supposed it makes sense…

THE FIX:

The hinge pieces are held in place by a single screw on the bottom of the gate section. You can simply unscrew these and swap them out with the gate piece you don’t intend to use. This took me only a few minutes but it took me a while to figure it out at first. If the above reason I am theorizing is correct, the manufacturer could’ve simply thrown two of each top bracket in to save the consumer a lot of trouble. This would not help those making this into an enclosed playyard using an odd number of gate sections but I have a feeling that issue is a lot less prevelent and a lot easier to simply cope with.

In the end, this is a solid product and much cheaper than some of its competitors (like the Kidco Configure Gate which is about twice as much for the same number of gate sections). Highly recommended.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 

Was this review helpful to you? 

>Report abuse
| Permalink

 Comments (3)

Solid product, and a snap to install, February 29, 2008

By 

Chinmay Nadkarni (Charlotte, NC) – See all my reviews

  

We installed this product along an L shaped wall to create a play area for our 19 month old. The area is about 32 sq feet in size, and accommodates a small table with 2 chairs, and several of his toys. The installation took less than 3 hours, and that was with my 19 month old “helping”. Without his “help”, it would have been a couple hours at the most.

The product was fairly easy to install, just be sure to install the screws into the studs behind the drywall, or use some heavy duty drywall anchors if that is not an option. We have used this gate only for about a week now, so there’s not much I can say for durability just yet. However, the first impressions are good. The product looks solidly built, and can be easily to set up to any shape or design you’d like without the need for even a screw driver (apart from the ends that are secured to the wall).

I would have given it 5 stars rather that the 4 I gave it, if it weren’t for the door. The door does not swing open a full 180 degrees, it only opens 90 degrees. My son have already started pushing on the open door, and I suspect that it is only a matter of time before it will either break off or come apart. Then again, I could be wrong, and it might be sturdy enough to survive the abuse; only time will tell.

[Update on 05/14/08] After several months of use, my (positive) opinion of this product has not changed. In addition, my worries about the door have so far been unfounded. The door has survived the abuse from my son without any problems. At this point I would gladly rate this product with 5 stars, unfortunately it does not look like there is a way for me to update my initial rating.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 

Was this review helpful to you? 

>Report abuse
| Permalink

 Comments (3)

Very sturdy, August 1, 2008

By 

S. Liu (New York, NY) – See all my reviews

  

Our 1 year old daughter is a strong one and would lean up against it. It works like a charm. I bolted down one side to the wall, and slid the other end in between the bookself and the piano.

We originally had it so she had a 4 feet by 12 feet of space to play in.

But she felt so trapped that I just blocked off the entrance to the kitchen, to bookshelves, and to computer equipment. The design was so flexible that we were able to redo the gates to just block off certain areas.

Between each metal panel, you can lock it tight so it doesn’t move. The panels can be aligned to about 100 – 180 degree angles. Each set comes with a panel with a door. Each panel is about 1 inch thick.

We actually bought two sets since we needed a large area to be blocked off. Well worth the investment over the flimsy plastic ones that break and bend.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 

Was this review helpful to you? 

>Report abuse
| Permalink

 Comment