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Scaffold Tower purchasing Advice
We’ve been doing more and more signage work (good news as we’re a sign company) and are installing more too, and we’ve made do with the ladders, hired the occasional cherry picker and subbed out installations too.
Now we’re getting a larger van, we’re looking to purchase a scaffold tower as I’m not a fan of balancing on ladders.
We’re insured to work up 10m without getting extra cover from our insurers, and I’m ideally looking for a 5m platform, or smaller provided it can be extended in future when the need arises.
Can anyone suggest a brand or supplier of towers that will meet our needs?
Thanks in advance
Dave
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26 Replies
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Youngman/ Boss are the best in my opinion. Countless set ups and can be added to when needed.
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My old man seems to be leaning towards those.
There’s loads on ebay, that are used, at a fraction of the price new.
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I’ll second the young man boss tower, once you’ve bought one you’ll wonder why you hadn’t already.
Just remember your PASMA to go with it lol!
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Not bothered with PASMA before, but with the increasing installations we’re doing its worth doing, especially if we get our own tower!
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We just purchased a self erecting fold away tower. Granted it only goes up to 2m high, but it fold away or erects in 3 or 4 minutes and is light weight. Easily lifted into a van. Called a razor deck
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Yes I was thinking exactly the same found some on gumtree
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We also use a boss tower – 6m, we went for the grp version, makes a big difference in the winter – you can still feel your hands after putting the platform up!
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David
always hired ours, didn’t have to worry about storage or some toe rag pinching it and was always got cert of fitness on every hire and the cost was minimalKev
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When we’ve hired in the past, it’s a 1 weeks minimum rental, from memory about £400. That was from Speedy or HSS or similar.
I’d be interested to know approximate costs, and if you were renting from a local company or national?
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I can hire a ally tower up here for about £40 a day
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quote David Hammond:When we’ve hired in the past, it’s a 1 weeks minimum rental, from memory about £400. That was from Speedy or HSS or similar.
I’d be interested to know approximate costs, and if you were renting from a local company or national?
David
just use a smaller local company you’ll get deals on day, weekend and weeks hire and saves all the storage when not in use just add cost to the jobKev
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The old man has been trawling ebay looking at towers. Managed to pick up a 6.2m Youngman tower, looks like new.
Having tried to install an 8×4 sign on Tuesday off two sets of ladders, and admitting defeat the tower is a necessity, and will save us a small fortune in sub contractors over the coming weeks.
Storage is the issue… it’s likely going to live in our unit when I make some space, or in my dads garage.
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I would never buy a scaffold tower for our line of work and it is a last resort if I ever do have use one.
I use Aluminium Trestles and Staging for all sign fitting.
If we cannot use the trestles because of height, we switch to a cherry picker.We have 10ft Trestles and 10ft Staging. fits perfectly into the back of our vans.
We fit everything from factory, shop and trucks from this access equipment. it is light and fast to setup. a couple of minutes and its up!
Roughly speaking the platform is be about 10ft up, you stood on top with your hands up is at least 7ft, thats 17ft of reach, upwards and walking left to right for 10ft is a great span top work on.
Scaffold is used all the time in all industries i get that, i have also for many years but you have to erect it, its filthy, it takes up a lot of van space or its on the roof which takes time loading and unloading and inconvenient.
then take the signs, a 10×5 sheet of composite being passed up the inside is a nightmare without damage or its up the outside of the tower. all risky and as said, damage to the sign. it is also a tiring slog climbing up and down the tower for everything and anything. a cherry picker keeps you sweet with H&S and speeds up the installation no end. so where the customer pays for the cherry picker, they save on man hours on the installation. -
We looked at a trestle set up, but not having a LWB van, as it wont fit on the drive, we’d only get 2.5 length. Whilst the tower is 7m and will fit comfortably in the van.
Personally I wouldnt feel safe standing on there? We did an install last week stood on walking board spanning a stair well, I don’t trust my balance up there.
The tower we’ve bagged looks like new, and it’s got to be a million times better than hanging off ladders!
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We dont have a long wheel base either, mid wheel and short wheel base vans.
The SWB van has a slightly shorter trestle in it but works equally as well.They are very solid and stable, unlike ladders etc. they are great for large van and truck vinyl installs, where scaffold is a nuisance.
As said, once your scaffold is in the van stood on its side you really occupy the space that would otherwise be able to accommodate signs and tools. I used scaffold for 10 years and still "if i have to" use them, but i switched from scaffold to proper aluminium trestles about 16 years ago and would never go back.you really should look at getting tower erection/working at height licences also. as straightforward as these courses are you can and do learn a lot from them. We owned our own truck mounted cherry picker of about 40ft, for 10 years BEFORE i got my IPAF licence. I was annoyed that after 10 years operating one i needed a licence. but after the course i came away with a list of possible ways a cherry picker can and does topple if not taken into account. things i never considered before, so worth the money!
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Yes booked on for our IPAF course, £300 well spent to be ‘legit’ and are valid for 5 years.
PASMA will be next for hiring cherry pickers.
Will look at trestles in future [THUMBS UP SIGN]
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IPAF often offer both Scaffold and Cherry Picker courses at a good discounted rate.
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It’s arrived this morning, so we spend an hour putting it up and taking it down again, then seeing if it fits in the van.
Fits in the transit a treat, and we can still get an 8×4 panel over the top with ample room to spare. :thumbsup:
Chuffed to bits, the thing has hardly been used, still has the labels on the parts from the manufacturer.
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Looks good, how do you get the sign up there?
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Thats one of the questions we’re going to ask on our course in a few weeks.
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Let us know how it goes, I’m getting more requests for the kind of signs that require something like this
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You just need to think outside the box, and make use of the latest technologies.
Might take a few to lift a large panel, but I think I’m onto something…
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Haha
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Although thinking about, safety first and all that, I don’t fancy having those blades whizzing around my head, and we’re missing a great advertising opportunity.
(Can you tell I am waiting for a delivery???)
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I usually drill a couple of holes near the top of the panel (or on the return if it’s a folded pan) – fasten a bungee clip, then haul the panel up using a tow rope fastened to the bungee . This is fine when fitting a sign into a frame or when fitting folded pans as the holes will not be seen once the panel is in situ.
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quote Daniel Evans:Looks good, how do you get the sign up there?
That is part the problem with scaffold. By the time you get a 10ft x 5ft sheet of composite up there, it can be ding’d or scratched easily on the way up trying to negotiate the structure passing from one man to the next.
Nice tower David, a good buy regardless to my opinions mate.
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