Metal Repair & Restoration in Vancouver & the North Shore
Broken welds, cracked frames, bent steel, rust and worn-out parts — repaired and restored in steel, stainless and aluminum, at our North Vancouver shop or on site.
If a metal item is worth keeping, it is usually worth repairing. We fix and restore metalwork that has cracked, corroded, bent, come loose or simply worn out — from a gate that no longer swings true to a stainless table in a busy kitchen. Most repairs are in steel, stainless or aluminum, done in our shop on Francisco Court in North Vancouver, and some are done on site where the item cannot easily be moved.
What we repair
The failures we see most often are broken or cracked welds, corrosion and rust-out, bent or impact-damaged sections, worn or seized hinges, loose connections, and mounts that have torn away from what they were fixed to. Depending on the piece, a repair can mean re-welding a joint, cutting out and replacing a rusted or bent section, replacing a bracket or hinge, reinforcing a weak point, or re-securing components that have worked loose.
Items we regularly repair and restore include:
- Gates, and gate hinges and hardware
- Railings and handrails — repairs to existing railings and handrails
- Metal furniture, table bases and benches
- Planters and site furnishings
- Carts, equipment frames and stands
- Custom brackets and mounts
- Sculptures, decorative and architectural metalwork
- Broken or discontinued metal parts that are no longer available to buy
Repairs we cover in detail
Some repairs come up often enough that we have written about them in more detail:
- Metal gate repair — hinges, sagging leaves, latches, cracked frames and broken welds.
- Railing & handrail repair — loose or wobbly railings, broken welds, damaged brackets and corroded sections.
- Restaurant & commercial stainless repair — tables, shelving, sinks and equipment frames.
Many repairs are done in place through our mobile welding service, and general welding and fabrication is covered on our welding services page.
Remaking parts you can no longer buy
Some of the most useful repairs are for parts that are no longer sold. If a bracket, frame, guard or fitting has broken and the original is discontinued or was custom to begin with, we can often fabricate a replacement from measurements or from the broken piece, so the rest of the assembly can keep working instead of being scrapped.
Steel, stainless and aluminum
Steel, stainless and aluminum are different problems rather than the same problem in a different metal, and the right approach depends on which one you have. Cast iron in particular is not something to weld casually. Where it matters, we identify the material before we start, and we finish the repair to suit the piece — ground flush, coated, or left as welded.
When a repair makes sense
Repair tends to be worthwhile when replacement is expensive, custom-made, discontinued, hard to source, or simply inconvenient to swap out. A one-off gate, a built-in railing, a stainless counter that fits a specific space, or a part that is no longer manufactured are all cases where fixing the existing item is often the better decision. When a repair is not the sensible option, we will say so.
On site or in the shop
Smaller, cleaner and more precise repairs come out better in the shop, where we control the setup. When an item is fixed in place or too large to move — a mounted railing, an installed gate, a large frame — we can often repair it on site. Our mobile welding page explains what works well in place and what is better brought in.
Structural and safety-related repairs
Some metalwork does more than hold its own shape — guardrails, load-bearing frames and similar items are there to keep people safe. Repairs, alterations or replacements to this kind of work may need to meet current building-code or standard requirements for the affected work, and whether they do depends on the scope of the job, the building type, the governing standard, and the authority having jurisdiction. Requirements also differ by location: the BC Building Code applies in most BC municipalities, while work inside the City of Vancouver falls under the Vancouver Building By-law.
We cannot tell you from a web page exactly what a given safety-related repair will require — that is a question for the authority having jurisdiction and, where appropriate, a professional engineer. Where a repair may involve structural or life-safety requirements, we will raise it at the enquiry stage and recommend an engineering review rather than guess. Tell us what the item is and how it failed, and we will tell you honestly what we can and cannot take on.
Get a repair quote
Send a photo of the item and a close photo of the failure, tell us what it is and how it broke, and whether it can come to us or has to be done in place. Request a quote or call (778) 805-5333.