Finials and Spear Tops

A spear top changes the character of a leaf more than any other single element, and it is also the part most likely to be argued about with an insurer. The design notes held at Pearland Iron Gates, TX Elizabethbaron cover the fixing as carefully as the shape, because on iron gates in Pearland a loose finial is a projectile in a summer storm.

Cast, Pressed or Fabricated

Cast tops are the cheapest and carry catalogue detail. Pressed tops are stamped from sheet and are lighter, hollow, and prone to holding water. A fabricated point made from solid bar and dressed by hand costs the most and is the only one that will never split at a seam.

Fixing Them

A cast top slipped over the end of a picket and held by a single tack will eventually work loose. Welded all round, or pinned through and then welded, is the version that lasts. Anything hollow needs a drain path, since a sealed cap on a vertical tube is a reservoir with steel walls.

Height and Liability

Points at head height beside a footpath are a different proposition from points at eight feet on a driveway leaf. Many designs keep the spear profile but blunt the tip, or set the points behind a top rail so nothing protrudes at the edge. That keeps the look and removes the argument.

Coating a Complex Top

Every internal corner in a finial is a place a powder coat goes thin. Those corners are where rust appears first on a ten year old gate, long before the flat faces show anything. A hot dip before coating covers the geometry that a spray gun struggles to reach.

Repairing a Damaged One

A single broken top is replaced rather than filled, and matching it on an older gate is often the hard part. Keeping two or three spares from the original batch in the garage costs very little at build time and saves a search through catalogues years later when the pattern is out of production.

Spacing Them Along the Rail

Tops usually sit on alternate pickets or on every one, and the choice changes the density of the skyline more than the shape of any single point does. On a wide leaf, every picket topped can look busy from the street, and alternating gives the same character with half the parts to fix and half the corners to coat.