Maintenance above a flat roof

[ToughButterCup]

This photo shows the (now infamous)  re-built East face of our cottage (the face with the ladder against it). At the moment it is covered in scaffolding because we need to finish that face first. Why? We need to build the flat roof and at the moment  the scaffold is in the way.

 

 

Which set me thinking.

How on earth am I going to maintain the East face of the building (when the wooden cladding has been fitted)  after the flat roof is built?

 

Now we have the chance for some creative thinking about how to make the flat roof safe to work from. All I'll need to put on the roof is a simple lightweight scaffold tower .

 

Help me start that thinking process, would you?

 

[Jeremy Harris]

Normally a flat roof like that will be more than strong enough to take a distributed load that is enough to put a portable tower on, or put a ladder on to work on one storey above.  If you're really concerned then increase the thickness of the top board cover to spread the loads a bit.

 

By way of example, we have a very similar sized flat roof on our old house, over the front door lobby.  I've used that as a platform for maintenance several times without noticing any flex in the roof at all.  I was a bit shocked to find that, when we had that roof replaced a couple of years ago, the board used was only 9mm thick plywood! 

 

What sort of loads do you think it might need to carry when doing maintenance work?  If it's just stuff like painting the wall or window above, then I'd say a normal flat roof build up would be fine.  When doing any maintenance it helps to just put some boards on the roof to spread the load, as this prevents there being a point load that could damage the surface.

[Triassic]

A friend has just done a slightly sloping roof, he used 11mm ply and then fiberglasses the whole lot using an off the shelf system.  

 

As Jeremy said, you will want to spread any point load, so as to protect the roof finish. I tend to plank or board out such roofs before doing anything.

 

ps. Why a flat roof, why not slate pitched roof?

Edited February 27, 2018 by Triassic

[A_L]

Long planks under the feet of the scaffold/ladders will be enough.

[Russell griffiths]

If we have to walk or set up on a flat roof we keep a couple of old 1m wide carpet off cuts, lay these out and put your scaffold planks on top. 

It just ensures that if you had a scratchy stone stuck to the underside of your scaffold plank it wouldn’t make contact with the roof covering. 

[Onoff]

And how are you going to guard against that access tower not toppling off your flat roof?

[Jeremy Harris]

22 minutes ago, Onoff said:

And how are you going to guard against that access tower not toppling off your flat roof?

 

 

Tie it to through the gable window?

 

When I put one up the side of our old house, with no space for outriggers, I drilled a couple of bolt holes in the wall and fitted a pair of rawl eye bolts in the mortar corner joints between bricks.  When the job was done I took the tower down and went up a ladder to fill the bolt holes with a bit of mortar.  You can't see from ground level that they were ever there.

[Declan52]

You could put in a steel hook low down so it won't be seen and use a ratchet strap to keep the tower in place.

As @Russell griffiths says carpet and planks is the way to go.