Staging / working platform

[JumbleDuck]

This isn't boatie, but could be.

I need to do some work on a structure between 2m and 4m in the air. I have good solid supports available 2.6m apart, so I need something to bridge the gap and take my weight. Any bright ideas? So far I have thought of ...

• Scaffold planks, supported by a high trestle in the middle.
• Aluminium staging, which wouldn't need a centre support but is much more expensive
• 8' long plywood "plank" with suitable stiffening (4x2s?)
• Scaffold tower

I need to do this just once, and so I'd prefer ending up with expensive kit to sell. I'd therefore prefer to hire any specialist things.

OK, actual context: The oak frame of my new garage is now up and I have to put up the rafters and then fit the roofing next. It's not that different from staging round a boat in a yard, is it, except that I have a convenient hefty oak framework at just the height where I'd like my feet ...

 

[johnphilip]

Secondhand Youngman board off ebay such as:-
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/YOUNGMAN-...736074?hash=item25d6b1560a:g:lZMAAOSwB-1Y34uL

£70 and flog again when done.
All to easy to fall off though, a tower would at least have handrails.

 

[Daydream believer]

Either buy or hire a Youngmans . Good ones should have a handrail on one side to stop you stepping back off them. Consider how you will get it between the last couple of rafters as you get to the end if going from side to side.
As suggested-- buying & later selling if you are going to make a meal of the job !!!!

However, For the felt battening & tiling, gable, barge boards & guttering etc a scaffold tower would be infinitely better & if you buy then you might decide to keep it to work on the outside of boat/ house etc in the winter

 

[JumbleDuck]

Secondhand Youngman board off ebay such as:-
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/YOUNGMAN-...736074?hash=item25d6b1560a:g:lZMAAOSwB-1Y34uL

£70 and flog again when done.
All to easy to fall off though, a tower would at least have handrails.

Many thanks. The word "Youngman" is worth knowing. Nothing for sale on eBay within a hundred miles of me, but there are a couple of scaffolding hire places nearby and I'll talk to them tomorrow.

Either buy or hire a Youngmans . Good ones should have a handrail on one side to stop you stepping back off them. Consider how you will get it between the last couple of rafters as you get to the end if going from side to side.

There should be no problem getting in anything from below; there are only three horizontal tie beams, going front-to-back at each side and down the middle. That's partly why I chose this design - the rood spaces are available for dinghies ...

However, For the felt battening & tiling, gable, barge boards & guttering etc a scaffold tower would be infinitely better & if you buy then you might decide to keep it to work on the outside of boat/ house etc in the winter

It's not actually that high, just 2.1m at the front and 1.3m at the back, so guttering will happen from the ground. There is no access for a scaffolding tower at either side, so I'll be doing as much as I can from inside and the rest with standard and roofing ladders. Not ideal but not much choice either. A tower inside might work, so I'll check that out. Thanks.

 

[Quandary]

Jumbleduck, you are a young guy (comparatively), a sailor so as agile as most monkeys and with enough of a sense of preservation to ensure you will not fall on your head.
I built a two storey double garage from scratch using three trestles, two scaffold boards and a couple of ladders, all stuff I had for maintaining the boat, all the sarking, felting, battening and tiling has to be done from the top anyway.
TIP - even Tyvek will rot away where it dips in the gutters, buy a roll of Visqueen or similar dpc about 400mm. wide and use it at the roof edges under the felt and later when fixing the first course of slates, decide whether you will ever be cleaning the gutters and place them accordingly. The convention is to start from the centre of the gutter but if vertical clearance is limited access to clean them can be a pain.

 

[Daydream believer]

Thinking further. If it is open fronted etc do you need felt?

 

[JumbleDuck]

Jumbleduck, you are a young guy (comparatively), a sailor so as agile as most monkeys and with enough of a sense of preservation to ensure you will not fall on your head.
I built a two storey double garage from scratch using three trestles, two scaffold boards and a couple of ladders, all stuff I had for maintaining the boat, all the sarking, felting, battening and tiling has to be done from the top anyway.

Thank you for your encouraging words! The only bit which keeps me awake at night is getting the ridge board and the first rafters in place. The official method is to place the rafters at each and and the middle (two pieces; one slopes up from the front and one from the back), fix them to the eaves beams, push the ridge board up from below so it gets jammed between them and then nail it in place. After that the others should be easier, because I could put a ladder against the ridge board ... it's just getting the thing started.

TIP - even Tyvek will rot away where it dips in the gutters, buy a roll of Visqueen or similar dpc about 400mm. wide and use it at the roof edges under the felt and later when fixing the first course of slates, decide whether you will ever be cleaning the gutters and place them accordingly. The convention is to start from the centre of the gutter but if vertical clearance is limited access to clean them can be a pain.

I haven't decided on roofing yet. Eventually there will be slates, so I'll be installing sarking, but for now it will probably be something corrugated. Either bitumen (needs cut and joined) or galvanised steel (single sheets from eaves to ridge, but rather heavy).

 

[JumbleDuck]

Thinking further. If it is open fronted etc do you need felt?

At the moment I plan just to use sarking boards (150mm planks with 2-5mm gaps) with something corrugated on top. I don't think that needs battens as well, but I need to research more, this being my first roof construction.

 

[rogerthebodger]

I use scaffolding frames but use steel lip channel rather than wood scaffolding planks to walk on.

http://www.bsisteel.com/product-gui...teel-cold-formed-products-lipped-channel.html

 

[Quandary]

I used OSB ( oriented strand board) for sarking as it served well to brace the rafters against wind loads and looks quite tidy from underneath, no need for diagonal wind bracing, it was a lot cheaper than traditional tanalized boards and much faster to fix. It has done over ten years now without any visible deterioration., I took a bit of care with rafter spacing so that I did not have to trim the sheets. An unheated building with cross ventilation avoids all the condensation problems that dog house construction with a consequent benefit in durability and no need to worry about vapour barriers. If you have sarking and your roof covering is 'temporary' bitumen impregnated fibre corrugated sheeting is probably the cheapest option, light weight and not hard to fix. Full length metal sheeting will be a bit harder to take off in sections when you go to slate it. In either event I would use battens, increases the air space over the sarking and hides nails and screws coming through, no need for felt until you slate it. ( avoid cheap bitumen felt, modern breathable membranes are worth the extra few pence).
Because my garage loft was enclosed with an external stair up to it Building Control regarded it as a 'habitable room' and insisted on a fire resistant ceiling under ( which made the swallows very unhappy) and all the various regs. governing domestic stairs.

 

[Daydream believer]

OSB is good but the roof then needs counter battening

 

[Quandary]

OSB is good but the roof then needs counter battening

In Scotland, sarking means flat boarding of one kind or another, elsewhere in the UK it can just be a layer of felt, one of the many ways in which Scottish construction methods excel. Another is refusing to place windows on the outside face of a wall.
I agree though, that counter battening is good practice over any type of rigid sarking.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Another is refusing to place windows on the outside face of a wall.

It's amazing how cold and uninviting a village looks when all the original windows have been replaced with cheap uPVC double glazing flush with the outer walls. It took me several drives through Durham mining villages to work out why they were so unattractive, even though the buildings are nice.