Linear Gate Motor Replacement Nationwide | Gatewood Fence & Gate

Linear Gate Motor Replacement: The Beverly Hills Owner’s Guide

Most Linear gate motor replacements in Beverly Hills run between $850 and $1,800 installed, depending on the model, arm or slide style, and whether the board, gearbox, or the whole operator has failed. We keep Linear-compatible motors, control boards, and arms on our truck, which means we can usually complete the swap the same day you call. What usually tips an owner off is a gate that’s making an ugly grinding noise, moves slower than it did last spring, or simply stops responding to the remote while the keypad still works.

Call (559) 844-6989

Linear has been one of the more reliable residential swing and slide gate operators on the market for years, but nothing built for a Beverly Hills driveway lasts forever. The good news is that a failed Linear motor doesn’t always mean replacing the whole operator. Sometimes it’s the capacitor, sometimes the limit switch, and sometimes it genuinely is the motor itself, seized or burned out from a gearbox that was never lubed. We start with what’s actually wrong before selling you anything.

Which Linear Models This Applies To

The Linear line breaks into a few families, and knowing which one you have saves real money. The most common we see in Beverly Hills are the Linear LSO (swing gate operator), the Linear SLR/APeX series (slide gate operators), and older Linear ACT units that some neighborhoods installed back when the houses went in. Within each series, Linear built residential and light-commercial versions, and the motors are not interchangeable between them.

Here’s the compatibility gotcha that catches people: Linear changed motor housing specs between the APeX generation and the older SLR boards. A replacement motor that fits an SLR from 2012 won’t always bolt onto an APeX chassis from 2019, even though both say “Linear” on the sticker. You need the model number off the operator arm or the cover plate, plus the manufacture date if it’s still legible. If the sticker’s faded, Hal can identify most Linear operators by the shaft size and the mounting bolt pattern in about five minutes.

On the OEM versus aftermarket question for Linear specifically: we’ll install a quality aftermarket motor when it’s a true equivalent and saves you money, but there are a handful of imported “Linear-compatible” motors we will not touch. Wrong shaft tolerance, undersized windings, faster heat death in a Beverly Hills summer where the gate runs five times a day. If the motor is going to fail again in 18 months, we’d rather tell you that before we quote the job, not after.

Gatewood Fence & Gate is an independent gate repair company. We’re not affiliated with Linear, but we stock their replacement parts alongside LiftMaster, Mighty Mule, and Ghost Controls components, and we know the Linear quirks from almost 24 years of opening them up.

Signs Your Linear Gate Motor Replacement Is Failing

• The motor hums but the gate doesn’t move. That’s usually a dead or dying capacitor on a swing arm, or a gearbox that’s stripped. If it’s the gearbox, the motor’s often fine and the repair bill drops significantly.
• The gate moves slower than it did six months ago. Sloppy limit switches or a motor pulling extra amperage as the windings degrade. In Beverly Hills, we see this accelerate each summer as the heat softens internal insulation.
• The operator trips its internal breaker repeatedly. This points to increased mechanical resistance, often the gate hinge post shifting, but a failing motor draws more current and can trip a breaker all on its own. Worth checking both before assuming.
• A burning smell from the operator housing. Overheated windings. By the time you can smell it, the motor’s usually done, and running it again risks taking the control board with it.
• The remote and keypad stopped working at the same time. Could be the receiver board, not the motor. This one’s worth a proper diagnostic before anyone sells you a motor you didn’t need.

None of these symptoms mean you should ignore the gate and wait. A failing motor that keeps getting cycled can damage the board, the transformer, and even the limit assembly, turning a $300 motor swap into a full operator replacement.

Replacement Cost & What’s Included

For a swing-gate Linear motor swap in Beverly Hills, plan on $850 to $1,200 for most residential units. Slide gate operators land between $1,200 and $1,800 because the work usually includes chain, sprocket, or rail inspection while we’re in there. If the failure took out companion parts like the capacitor or a limit switch, we’ll tell you the additional cost before we touch anything, and the price you approve is the price you pay.

The quote includes the motor, the labor, setting the open and close limits, adjusting the force sensitivity, and testing the safety reversal. No hidden fees, no trip charge inside the county, and every job carries our 90-Day Done Right Promise in writing. If it’s not done right, one call brings Hal back. He doesn’t hide behind fine print.

DIY or Call Us?

If your Linear gate is acting up, there are a few things you can safely check yourself: the breaker on the circuit the operator runs on, whether the remote has fresh batteries, and whether anything’s physically blocking the gate’s path. That’s about where we’d draw the line, and here’s why. A gate motor operates on 120V or 240V at the board, and the capacitor holds a charge even when the breaker is off. Grabbing the wrong wire before that capacitor drains is a genuine shock hazard.

Beyond the electrical danger, there’s the torque factor. A Linear swing arm under force can move a heavy gate through anything in its arc, and a mistimed limit can send it slamming into the post, or worse, a person. We fix gates for a living and we still set the force sensitivity and stop points with the gate disengaged first. If you want to try the diagnosis yourself, call us at (559) 844-6989 and describe what the gate’s doing. Tell me what it’s doing and I’ll tell you what it needs, no guessing, no runaround. Then you decide whether it’s a weekend project or a phone call.

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