Staining a carport? Choose the right scaffold.

A carport is a structure of posts and beams, and between those posts the room is tight. Altrex builds the MiTower 75 cm across and for a single user, and that dimension is what carries you past a parked car, between a post and the side wall of the garage, and through the gap where the front bumper normally sits. Wider models get stuck there. What comes with this model is set out at the MiTower on hire.

The range starts at 4.2 metres and stops at 6.2 metres of working height, and a carport sits comfortably inside that. You are not going far up, but you do want to come out above the roof edge, and that is exactly the strip a pair of steps falls short of. The weight helps too. One person can wheel this tower, and on a carport you move it constantly, since every bay between two posts asks for its own position.

The trade off is room on the platform. One person fits, with a tin of stain, a brush and a rag, and nothing more. If two of you are working, or a sander and an extension lead have to be up there too, it is worth looking at a longer floor of 245 cm. For an average carport that is more than the job needs; for a double carport with a long roof edge it can pay. The models stand together in the overview of scaffold dimensions.

On this job the highest point is rarely the beams and almost always the roof edge. On a free standing carport that edge sits at around two and a half metres; where the carport is tied to the house it climbs to three or three and a half. You also want to look over the top of it, because the upper face and the joint with the roof covering come with the job. That lands you at 4 to 6 metres of working height, and that is the range you hire.

Working height and platform height are not the same figure. Take the height of the floor you stand on and add about two metres for the reach of your arms and upper body; that sum is the working height on your booking. To get your chest above an edge at three metres you are standing at a good two, so you hire towards five. Measure from the block paving under the wheels, not from the carport floor. The build is shown on the page about 6 metres.

Choosing too tight punishes you in one place when you stain: the top edge. Come up just short of it and you are brushing the head of the timber by feel, leaving a dry streak you only notice when it rains and the water works its way in. Half a metre of extra height costs almost nothing to hire, while a band of untreated end grain costs you a repair within two years. If in doubt, take the roomier build.

The standing spot for this job is nearly always the drive, and you share that with the car. Move it away for the whole hire period, because a car under a carport with stain dripping from above creates work nobody wants. Block paving and concrete carry the load fine; gravel and a grass verge do not, since the wheels sink in and your platform tilts while you are trying to pull a long line. Lay boards or track mats under the wheels if you are unsure.

Around the feet you need room for the stabilisers, and on a carport that is the awkward demand. On the outside it usually works, but between two posts a stabiliser meets an upright almost at once. So walk the positions through before the tin is open: stand the tower up, check all four legs are clear, and move half a metre along if they are not. If the carport sits on a falling drive, read the guidance on uneven ground.

Think about what is underneath you as well. Stain drips, certainly when you drag a loaded brush along a beam above your head, and on block paving that leaves marks which stay for years. Put sheeting or cardboard over the strip you are working on and slide it along as you move the tower. Bikes, a trailer and the wheelie bins go somewhere else for those days, because lifting them every time costs more than the staining does.

The staining itself moves along: an average carport has two or three sides of frame and an edge round the roof, and with a decent brush that is a day per coat. The season decides the rest. Stain wants timber that is dry right through, so after a wet week you wait until the surface takes up again, and in spring and autumn dew settles overnight on what you laid that day. That is precisely why hire days are not the same thing as working days.

Allow four to five hire days for a carport, then, even though only two of them see a brush. Between the first and the second coat sits the interval the tin prescribes, and that interval stretches itself when the air is cold or damp. Catch rain on a fresh coat and you start that face again. Anyone working in March or October plans an extra day as a matter of course; in June you often do not need it.

Booking roomy is close to free on this job. The full tariff covers the first day and night only, and each hire day that follows costs 95 per cent less. Two days spent waiting for dry weather therefore weigh nothing against half a coat that fails. So set your end date on the day after the second coat is definitely on and dry. What a realistic period looks like is set out in this piece on the number of hire days.

Work per bay between two posts and finish that bay completely before you wheel the tower on. Stain wants to go on wet in wet: you start at the top of a beam, run through in one pass to the end, and keep the edge live. Break off halfway to move the scaffold and you will see that interruption as a dark band once the timber dries. So choose your positions such that the join between two of them falls on a corner or a post.

Take up only what you actually need for each position. A tin of stain, a brush, a rag and perhaps a sanding sponge; the floor on this model is sized for one person and fills up quickly. Hang the tin on a hook rather than standing it loose on the deck, because a knocked over tin at three metres means stain on the paving, on the neighbour's car and over your own shoes. A hook costs nothing and takes that risk away.

What people misjudge is the number of positions. A carport of six metres with two open sides and an edge round the roof soon gives eight to ten moves per coat, and that times two coats. Allow a few minutes per move for releasing the brakes, resetting the stabilisers and lining the tower up square again. If opaque paintwork on the same carport follows later, count those rounds once more. You work out hire days from rounds, not from working hours.

The set arrives counted and complete as loose parts: uprights, braces, a platform, the stabilisers and the wheels. Point out a place where that stack can lie for a few days without being in the way, and keep it clear of the face you are about to treat. An order placed on a weekday before 15:00 goes into the van the next working day. See four dry days in the forecast and you can therefore start in the same week.

You decide which date the set comes and which date it may go, and for stain work you look at the forecast first. Have it delivered the day before you start, so that building it does not eat into your first dry day. Building is your side of the deal: the manual and the instruction video point out the order, and with two people you are standing ready inside an hour. The piece on hiring in winter covers the cold season.

After your last day with the brush we drive out again to collect the set. Only strike it once the timber feels dry, because stain that still tacks picks up dust and grit and then you finish the day cleaning instead of dismantling. Stand all the parts complete in the spot where they were dropped. What bringing and fetching costs together depends on your province and is listed on the page for delivery and collection.

The build you hire is made to EN 1004 in load class 3, so the platform takes 200 kg for every square metre. Stain work goes nowhere near that: a five litre tin and a brush weigh nothing. The genuine limit of the model is that one person belongs on it, so do not send a helper up with you; let them pass the next tin from the ground instead. What the class means is explained in this article on loading.

The basic rules hold even on a job of a few hours. Wheels braked the moment you step on, never moved with anyone or an open tin aboard, and down you come when it starts to blow. Wind counts twice with stain: you are standing higher than the carport and catch the full gust, and the stain then flashes off so fast that you cannot brush out your starts. Stopping costs you an hour, carrying on costs you a face.

The hazard that belongs to this work is a slippery deck. Stain running off your brush onto the platform turns greasy within minutes, and unlike paint you can barely see it lying there. Put cardboard or an old cloth under your feet and swap it as soon as it is saturated. Keep the zone under the tower clear as well, since one toppling tin can mark a carport, a drive and a car in a single go.