Replacing façade panels? Choose the right scaffold.

For replacing facade panels you usually pick the RS51: the narrow Altrex with a floor width of 75 centimetres. That sounds tight for handling such large material, but extra depth changes nothing here, because the panel is never going to rest on the platform. What the narrow build does buy you is a stand that fits through a gate or along a garden path to the side elevation and that two of you shunt sideways in seconds. All the versions sit together in our range of mobile scaffolds.

The wide 135 centimetre build only becomes interesting if you also want to cut up there, sort screws and park tools, or if battens and insulation appear behind the old cladding that you intend to deal with straight away. Weigh that against the route to the wall, because a deeper stand does not pass everywhere. Where the elevation sits on a generous drive, the choice works out nicely. You can compare the dimensions of both models in the explanation of scaffold sizes.

A one-person model drops out for this work, however handy it is otherwise. Replacing facade panels is not a solo job: someone has to stand below to pass the new panel up and to take the old one as it comes free. So reckon on a stand that carries two people one behind the other, with the 245 centimetre floor as walking room between them. A room scaffold is no use either, since it is made for indoor work and never reaches an outside wall.

The height you order is your platform height with roughly two metres of reach added on top. When replacing facade panels on an ordinary house, 6 to 8 metres of working height puts you exactly at the top row, right up against the fascia or the roof edge. If the highest panel sits lower, on a flat-roofed extension for instance, you can take one section less and save yourself parts. Which build belongs to that figure you can work out alongside the build for eight metres.

Do not measure only to the top edge; think as well about the height you want to be standing at while you are holding a panel. The pleasantest floor is one where the top of the panel comes out at about chest height: then you pin it in place with your upper body while you drive the first screw. Work with a panel in your arm above your head and you lose the fight with its weight, the bottom drops away and the panel ends up crooked in the work.

Begin the measurement at the level of the castors and not at the front door threshold. If the elevation stands above a raised terrace, that saves a section; if the drive falls away towards the street, it works the other way and you hire a little more height. Choose generously rather than tightly, because the top row of panels often sits higher than you judge from the ground. For a two-storey house the page on the height of a first floor helps.

On this job you share the ground around the feet with a stack of panels. Lay that stack flat, on a few battens, and within walking distance of the stand: near enough to pass a panel across in a few steps, far enough away not to trip over it when you shift the tower a metre. Keep the four corners clear as well, because that is where the stabilisers point outwards at an angle and they want precisely the spot you had earmarked for something else.

In front of the wall you also want a strip where a panel can be tipped upright. A panel raised from the stack swings its top end a fair distance forward, and that must not be exactly where a hedge, a fence or the neighbours' car happens to be. Two metres of clear ground in front of the stand is a comfortable minimum. If the surface is uneven, the explanation about uneven ground helps you set the feet.

Look at the ground you walk over with a panel in your hands, too. Loose slabs, a garden hose or a raised border make the person walking backwards stumble at exactly the wrong moment, and then two people's weight hangs off one panel. Working on the street side, leave a way past for people on foot and check with the council that you may stand there. Sort that out before you hire the tower, not when the van is already pulling up.

Freeing a panel, bringing the old one down, passing the new one up and fixing it takes two of you half an hour to an hour, as long as everything cooperates and the fixings have not seized. The sum climbs with the number of panels and above all with the number of times the stand has to move: per position of 245 centimetres you usually reach two or three panels side by side. For a whole elevation you therefore soon book three to four hire days.

Leave margin as well for whatever appears behind the old cladding. Soft battens, a dropped rail or wet insulation must be put right before the new panel goes on, and you only see that once the old one is off. The weather counts for more than you would think too: a large panel catches wind like a sail, so on a blustery day you stop this work, even though the hired tower itself stands perfectly firm and is otherwise usable.

Booking generously costs little, since the full rate covers the first twenty-four hours alone and every further hire day comes in at ninety-five per cent below it. So set your end date beyond the day you expect to finish rather than on it, since an elevation with half a row of open bays cannot simply wait a week until you have arranged and built a tower again. For a sense of what other people book, see the article on hire days.

The floor is 245 centimetres long and 75 centimetres deep, and most facade panels are bigger than that. So you do not lay a panel on it, not even briefly. It goes up on edge along the outside of the stand: the person below holds the bottom and walks along, the person on the floor takes over the top edge as soon as it comes within reach. That way the panel stays visible against the uprights the whole way and you keep it in against the wall.

A panel will not fit through the hatch in the floor, and laying it across the guardrail is never a solution. A panel resting on the rail can slide on, and with a gust behind it, it pulls you straight off the floor. Set it against the battens at once and fix the top corners first, then you can let go and carry on calmly. Per position, finish only the panels you reach without stretching, and move the tower once more rather than leaning out.

What people underestimate is how often someone has to go up and down. Reckon on climbing at least twice per panel, plus the trip down with the old sheet under your arm. So at every new position take your screws, your tools and the sealing tape up in one go, and lay out below what you will want for the following panel. If another elevation also needs its cladding replaced, add those positions in now, because there too you shift on per pair.

What turns up at your address is a set of loose parts, counted out before it left our depot. Think about the order of two stacks in advance, because the scaffold parts and the facade panels both want a flat, dry spot and they must not lie in each other's way. Have the scaffold parts come first and the panels a day later, so the stand is already up when the builders' merchant unloads. Book before 15:00 on any working day and your set is loaded out the working day after.

You name the day of arrival and the day of collection yourself when booking. On this work a fitting day counts for more than an early day, because the panel delivery and the building of the tower have to line up. Putting it up belongs on your side of the bargain: a film online shows the right order, and with two people the stand is ready in half a day. So choose that day around your panels, not around the first free slot in your diary.

Once the last panel is fixed you dismantle the tower and lay the parts together; collecting is ours to do. While you take it apart, go over the surroundings, because on this job a clamp or a coupler quickly disappears under offcuts and packaging film. Count the pieces as you stack and the set goes back complete and the handover stays short. What we charge per province for bringing and fetching you read at the delivery rates.

Every square metre of floor on a hired mobile scaffold carries two hundred kilos, which is load class 3 in the EN 1004 standard. When you are replacing facade panels, two people stand on it, plus tools and a panel you are holding. That fits comfortably, but it is no reason to treat the floor as a store. A stack of panels does not belong up there, not even temporarily: that weight lands on a small area and it is exactly the stack that will start sliding as soon as it blows.

Roll the stand only when it is empty, so without people and without material aboard, and the castors are braked before the first of you goes up. After every move, walk round the stabiliser legs and see whether they are all bearing again. Stop the work in a strong wind, because a loose panel is the most dangerous object you hold on this job. The remaining agreements you will find in this explanation of working safely at height.

Keep the zone under the stand empty. Freeing old panels sends screws, lumps of sealant and sometimes a corner of a sheet downwards, and they land just where someone walks past. Fence that area off with tape or cones and agree that nobody goes underneath without the two of you saying so. Working on the street side, warn the neighbours as well, because a falling panel does serious damage to a parked car. Count that warning in with your hire preparations.