Utah Security Cages

Almost every cage we install in Utah is one of five layouts. Knowing which one fits your space is usually enough to get to a real number quickly.

Free-standing four-wall cage. A complete enclosure with its own four walls, ceiling and door, set anywhere on an open floor. This is the layout to use when you can’t rely on existing building walls or when the cage may move later.

Partition cage using existing walls. The cheapest option: two or three new mesh walls closing off a corner of the building. Because the building already provides the other sides, panel count drops sharply — but the existing walls have to actually go to the deck to be worth anything.

Pallet rack security enclosure. Mesh panels attached directly to the back and ends of a rack bay with bi-parting or sliding doors at the pick face. This secures selected bays without giving up floor space, and it is the fastest way to create a secure area inside a running rack system.

Full-height partition wall. A long run of mesh dividing the building — separating shipping from receiving, tenant A from tenant B, or a leased suite from common space.

Machine guarding enclosure. The same panel system used as a perimeter guard around robots, presses and automation cells, typically with interlocked access doors.

This is the part of a Utah cage project that out-of-state suppliers get wrong. The Wasatch Front sits on an active fault system, and Utah jurisdictions review anchorage seriously. Wire partitions and cage ceilings are treated as nonstructural components: their anchorage to the slab and any bracing back to the structure has to be designed for the seismic demands in the adopted building code (the International Building Code as amended by the State of Utah, which references ASCE 7 for seismic design of nonstructural components).

In practice that means three things. First, posts are set on base plates with mechanical anchors into the slab, not shot-pinned or left free-standing, and the anchor type, size and embedment need to be stated on the drawings. Second, tall runs and cage ceilings usually need lateral bracing or attachment back to the building structure so a long partition can’t sway or topple. Third, if the reviewer asks for stamped calculations, we can arrange them from an engineer licensed in Utah.

Nobody can promise you a permit — that decision belongs to your local building department. What we can do is give the plan reviewer complete, honest documentation the first time so the review isn’t the thing that delays your project.

The single most common mistake we see on cages bought online is the door. Cages fail operationally long before they fail structurally: the door is in the wrong place, it swings into a rack aisle, it’s too narrow for a pallet jack, or it’s propped open every day because the crib attendant can’t get through it while carrying parts.

Work through the traffic before choosing hardware. If a pallet jack or walkie has to enter, plan a 4-foot hinged or a sliding door and check the swing clearance against rack, columns and dock traffic. If only people enter, a 3-foot hinged door with a cylinder lock is usually enough. If material is issued but people do not enter, a Dutch door or service window keeps the crib closed while still moving parts.

Access control is straightforward: a card reader strike or electric lock in the cage door frame ties the cage into the same badge system as the rest of the building, giving you an audit trail of who entered and when. For controlled-substance and cannabis storage, self-closing and self-locking hardware is usually mandatory rather than optional.