Gas Springs for Electrical Cabinets and Enclosures
The moment you open a panel door in the field and start working inside, the door becomes your enemy. Wind slams it shut in your face, a tilted door sinks under its own weight, and one hand is permanently busy holding it.
A small gas spring solves this at the root: the door stays where you open it, both hands are free, and the safety risk is gone.
Where are they used?
Outdoor technical cabinets — telecom street cabinets, energy metering and distribution enclosures, traffic signal controllers. Top-hinged lids work under wind load; the gas spring holds the lid open and prevents uncontrolled slamming on the way down.
Machine and automation panels — the door has to stay open during maintenance. If a second person or a wooden block is holding the door, what's actually missing there is a gas spring.
Generator and ATS panels, floor and shaft covers — on heavy sheet steel, the spring both lightens the lift and locks the cover open.
Heavy side-hinged panel doors — to hold at 90° and stop the wind from slamming them.
How to choose the force
The basic formula is simple: the force depends on the door weight, the distance from hinge to centre of gravity, and the spring's mounting point (F1 = FG × LG / (n × L1)).
Example: a top-hinged outdoor cabinet lid, 5 kg, 60 cm deep. Centre of gravity 30 cm from the hinge, spring mount at 25 cm, one spring: the required force lands roughly in the 70–90 N band.
Because panel doors are usually light, our smallest body group — the 6/15 series — covers most applications: 10–400 N force range, strokes up to 150 mm, compact dead length. It doesn't steal space inside a tight panel.
Three critical points for outdoor use
1. Corrosion: On cabinets standing in the field, a standard spring starts losing its surface within a few winters. For outdoor applications we recommend the stainless series.
2. Cold: Gas pressure drops with temperature; at −10 °C in winter the spring falls below the force you selected in summer. Details in our cold-weather force loss article.
3. Mounting orientation: The spring should be mounted rod-down — both lubrication and damping work correctly that way. The reasoning is in our mounting orientation article.
For panel builders: repeat orders with a standard code
For serial panel and enclosure manufacturers, the real issue isn't selecting one gas spring — it's sourcing the same product identically in every batch. In the COMSTAN code system, once you define the right configuration (length + force + end fitting), every following order is a single code line. Custom length and custom force are produced like standard products.
Find the right spring in 2 minutes
Pick series, length and force for your door in our configurator and send us your quote request directly. Not sure about the force? Start with the calculator — the result carries over to the configurator automatically.