Automatic retractable bollards are an ideal solution for a variety of safety barrier needs. Get your free quote on our high-quality, American-made crash-rated bollards!
Blockaides, Inc. is your one-stop headquarters for high-quality automatic bollard solutions. We feature a wide selection of stainless steel automatic bollard systems with an assortment of drive style and mounting options, so you can find a solution tailor-made to your unique security and traffic control needs. Interested in seeing which if Automatic Bollards are the right solution for you? Learn more from our team, they are here to help.
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Installing bollards are an essential and useful tool for making our roadways, public and private areas safer and more secure. These barriers may simply look like metal posts, and you’re likely to overlook them altogether when you’re out and about, but they have a crucial role to play.
Bollards can help direct and control traffic so drivers know where and where not to go. They can also protect pedestrians from a vehicle that would run up onto a sidewalk or crash into a building if there were no barrier to stop them. These types of traffic incidents happen every day. Bollards can also help homeowners limit vehicular access to their driveways.
Bollards come in several different types, some of which offer permanent solutions and others of which are designed for temporary use. Automatic retractable security bollards have the unique ability to raise or lower on command in a matter of seconds, making them a flexible protection solution for deployment in heavy-traffic areas. Automatic rising bollards facilitate more efficient traffic flow and increase security by making it easier to control vehicle access to a property or facility. They also provide greater convenience when compared to many other types of bollards.
Bollards are an effective tool when you want to block off an area from traffic and control vehicle access, but what can you do when you only need to block off an area at certain times?
You could employ a temporary solution like traffic cones, but this solution requires someone to manually set up and remove the cones. Perhaps more importantly, a vehicle can easily run over and push away traffic cones. A better solution is to use removable bollards or manual retractable bollards, but you still have the problem of needing to move them or control them manually each time you want to block off or allow access to an area.
The unique solution you need for blocking areas part of the time and allowing access on-demand is automatic bollards, also called pop-up bollards or retractable bollards. Their high-tech design allows automatic bollards to raise when you want to block an area and to disappear into the ground when you want to open an area to traffic and vehicle access.
Unlike other mobile designs, these bollard solutions are permanently installed in the ground. However, they don’t have to remain in place at all times as fixed bollard options do. In short, automatic bollards give you the best of both worlds in one product, making them the ideal solution for a wide range of applications.
Automatic bollards can work using electric, pneumatic or hydraulic power. One of these types of power allows the driver mechanism to move the bollard up and down automatically. Let’s briefly examine the difference between these three types of automatic bollards:
Our pneumatic and hydraulic rising bollards are constructed to the highest standards and can integrate easily with your current access control or security system components. You can control automatic bollards in a few different ways, including from a remote control or key fob, a control room or a keypad.
The best setup depends on your specific location and application for the automatic bollards. For example, in the case of bollards for homes used to limit access to a private residence, the homeowners would likely find a button on their keys a convenient option to lower their bollards when they’re ready to pull in or out of their driveway. In a public traffic application, a city may want to control their bollards remotely from a control room.
Since automatic bollards are such a versatile choice, they can be useful in a wide range of applications. Some examples for these applications include:
There are several reasons to consider installing bollards — and automatic bollards, in particular — in an area. Some of the possible benefits of automatic bollards include:
Bollards on the market today come in a variety of materials. Some materials offer unique benefits that make them the best choice for a certain application. For example, aluminum is exceptionally lightweight, making it a good choice for bollards that are meant to provide more of a visual delineation than a heavy-duty barrier. When you need a strong, durable bollard, steel is an excellent choice.
As part of our commitment to offering bollards produced from only the best materials, all the automatic bollards from Blockaides are manufactured from high-grade stainless steel. A stainless steel bollard will provide superb resistance to corrosion, making it a good choice in wet and humid climates. Stainless steel is also less susceptible to pitting and staining than many other materials, helping to maintain the bollard’s aesthetic appeal.
What’s more, stainless steel requires less maintenance and is regarded as an environmentally-friendly material alternative. You can even paint or powder-coat stainless steel to a #4 finish.
In the U.S., the two most relevant crash rating standards for bollards are the ASTM F2656-07 and ASTM F3016-14. Both of these standards specify how bollard manufacturers should crash test their products to ensure they’re really capable of stopping a vehicle that runs into them. ASTM F2656-07 is the standard test for security barriers, and ASTM F3016-14 is designed to test barriers’ capabilities against a vehicle going 30 mph or less.
These crash tests are important to demonstrate that a bollard’s ability to stop vehicles is proven and not just theoretical. A bollard wouldn’t pass these crash tests if it were poorly constructed or made from weak materials. Automatic steel bollards from Blockaides meet these industry standards, so you know they will do their job effectively, even in the event of a dangerous crash. This is important since storefront crashes occur roughly 60 times every day.
To install an automatic bollard, you must first dig up the area where the bollard will go. In some cases, this may mean breaking up concrete or asphalt or raking away gravel. Once the surface layer above the dirt that has been removed, you can dig a hole using an auger or posthole digger. This hole should match the depth of the bollard.
Now you can position the bollard, contained in its rectangular steel encasement, in the hole. The rectangular casing and the top of the bollard should be level with the ground when the bollard is put away so cars can easily drive over the area as long as the bollard is not in place.
Another aspect of the installation may include running electrical wire to a control panel, though this step isn’t required for wireless options. Whatever control method is employed, properly installed automatic bollards will rise out of their rectangular casing on command and provide an effective barrier as needed and then descend back into the casing when you want them out of the way.
As mentioned previously, automatic bollards can rely on electric, pneumatic or hydraulic power unit for this operation. Hydraulic is the most powerful option and is able to raise and lower the bollards within seconds of you pressing a button or entering a code.
Blockaides has been providing high-quality bollards, barriers and other safety solutions since 2010. We work closely with architects, project managers, contractors and end users to provide the most reliable and cost-effective protection products for all our clients’ specific needs. We have the expertise to assess your security requirements and recommend the right product for your applications.
Automatic rising bollard systems are on the cutting edge of security barrier technology, but they might not be right for every application. Take a look at our site to find the perfect bollard for your needs, whether it’s fully automated or a simple, mobile design you’re looking for. If you’re interested in automatic security bollard solutions, we can discuss which drive and mounting options would best fit your intended application.
Contact us for more information and to receive a free automatic bollard estimate today!
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