Mighty Mule Automatic Gate Opener for Heavy Duty Dual Swing Gates for 18 Feet Long or 850 Pounds per Leaf (FM502)

do not waste any of your money on anything else. get this brand. Trust me. that other junk stressed me out! hand to send back with all of that stress. when you get this take the laptop to the gate , bring up youtube and watch, pause watch pause take your time get a beer, coffee, soda, take a break go play the dog a little. next thing you know you are done, and it works great noting worse than re doing instructions, or not being able to understand because you are in a hurry. I have a upscale kinda a house, man it looks great, I got this because we now have the grand kids a few days of the week, this along with the fence, they and the dong are in LOCK DOWN! and it looks like (the housewife show) YEA hit the remote...open gate, I feel rich! no stress , take your time , it feels so good when it comes together- ps I did have one q about a push button I added, she answered the phone, I told her my issue she said< 'honey it will not work if you are using a lighted door bell" I thought that was funny,in a good way... but correct. Got one no light, bada bing bada boom , taking out the trash? push the button!

Reviews of the GTO and Mighty Mule (MM) Do-It-Yourself (DITY) gates kits are mixed and many folks sustaining lightning strikes are unhappy with GTO/MM warranty coverage of their failed main boards or controller arm circuit boards. Other have has issues with the long term durability of swing gate operator mechanisms. We have had a GTO SL3000 12-volt DC solar slide gate operator in service for ~12 years with few problems other than an out-of-warranty failed main controller board at the 5 year point.Our most recent acquisition and installation was a solar powered Mighty Mule FM502 Heavy Duty Dual Swing gate system purchased via from Amazon. Between the two we prefer the sliding gate design and operator function to that of the relatively slow swing gates operation for both security and strength, but both suffice to control access to your property which is the main point of automatic gates. The installation of the FM502 is straight forward the the operators have worked well in light use. The GTO SL3000 unit s a much heavier duty unit but is for slide (rolling) gates.Some folks have complained the MM FM series swing openers are noisy in operation and we can only assume that complaint relates to the alarm beep option when the gates are either opening or closing. This in-operation alarm can be turned off with an on-board dip switch setting change. Factory default is for alarm sound during operation. The gates otherwise just have a mechanical gear noise that is not obtrusive and is basically a "background" type noise only when in operation. .

We installed our gate opener around March 2015, and it's still going strong as of this review nearly 7 years later. We added the gate lock and a wireless remote. We've replaced the batteries twice within the 7 years, which is reasonable. Being dual gates and having the optional gate lock does add a little complexity because the alignment has to stay within a tolerable range to avoid the lock getting stuck, but I'd say that's a "shifting post" issue. Once we better-stabilized our gate posts, we've have had fewer problems. We've had to occasionally reset our stop settings, and we wish that process was a little easier, but it's not a deal breaker. Might Mule is an affordable option worth considering.

The FM500/502 series opener supposed to be more heavy-duty than the other Mighty Mule openers. That's the reason why I purchased this one instead of the other opener units from the local home improvement store. The only thing better would be if it had an option of an extended warranty.This unit comes complete with all of the hardware needed to do a proper installation. You should read the instructions fully, as well as watch the install videos on the included DVD.***March 29, 2016 Update***The unit is starting to fail more often. What is happening is, the Electronic Gate Lock does not unlock before the gate opens, thus causing the gate to stall.Here is the catch, when using the keypad or the pushbutton (in the house, which both of these are hard wired), the gate always opens properly. It's something to do with the control board and the RF remotes that causes the control board to not unlock the electronic gate lock prior to opening. But it doesn't happen all the time, maybe once every 5 times. I am clearly out of the warranty period. I will contact GTO and see if a control board replacement is worth purchasing, or just buying a whole new kit.****Update April 18, 2017Control board no longer works. The second gate was opening very slowly. Then the unit would not open or close anymore.Went to troubleshoot it and noticed that whenever you try to open or close the gates, the control board will beep code 4 every time. This is for the Shadow input. There is nothing connected to the Shadow input.

Comes with a well written installation manual. Installed it and it worked properly for about a month then abruptly stopped. In many repeated calls to the manufacturer they will only say "it's a power problem" and will not provide a return/repair authorization. It is NOT a power problem, the battery is fine and charged, and the signals are received by the circuit board, but not sent on the the motors.

This is my second set of openers from GTO. The first ones lasted nearly 9 years without any problem but then just quit one day and would not open. After an hour of diagnostic testing while on the phone with GTO in Florida it was determined that the circuit board was no longer working correctly. I decided to buy a new set from Amazon.ca which were identical to my first set other than the name had changed to Mighty Mule. I felt that this way I would have some spare parts if ever needed. I installed the new set with all the same brackets etc. and everything is working well. No more opening gates in bad weather.I am going to send my old circuit board to GTO in Fla. to have it analyzed and repaired so my old set will work again and I may install it on another gate.The delivery was faster than expected and everything went smoothly. I hope I get another 9 years out of these openers.

Seems well made and installation instruction (DVD and manual) cover the obvious information but could be more helpful when non standard situation occurs ie when retrofitting to older gates.

The system was easy to install and to my amazement, I did it all. Works like a charm. I feel like a rich guy now, to be able to open our gates with a push of a button.

Have been using these openers for several years on our gates and overall they have worked fairly well. Unfortunately, winds of over 120kms damaged one of the openers (certainly not the fault of the opener) and when I tried to get a replacement through the manufacturer (based in Florida) I ran into all kinds of problems. They have no warranty/service centers in Canada and they have no serious interest in providing any kind of service to Canadian customers. The cost they quoted me over the phone for a replacement arm (including expected shipping costs) was nearly as much as what this complete package cost! In addition, they wouldn't even give me a shipment date, other than to say they found doing export shipments to be waste of time and they would try to get around to the order once they had some spare time.Please note - the service and delivery of this replacement package from Amazon was excellent. It was promptly shipped and I received the item well within the expected delivery timeframe.One thing to be aware of in using these openers is that the manufacturer is still very much behind the times in not supporting HomeLink and they do not seem interested in updating their product.

The installation instructions are clear and installation is not hard. During the summer they work great. The reception on the unit when using the remote openers is a little weak because sometimes it takes several presses on the remote to work. However, I'm now heading into my third winter with these and they stop working when the temperature gets somewhere below 0. I suspect that there is some problem with our units because we have neighbours with the exact same openers and they have no problems. So maybe you get lucky and maybe you don't - pretty expensive gamble. Considering we have below zero weather for a good portion of the year I can't give a good rating.