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dpb dpb is offline
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Default Re-roofing a barn

Jules wrote:
....
I'm happy doing the wall work, and I'd be happy doing the roof too -
except that it's so darn high, making access tricky. Must be about 40' to
the very top. I'm curious as to what the best method is to work up there -
a series of ladders*, scaffold, climbing ropes etc. (I'm not sure that a
cherry picker would either go that high or be able to reach over the
20' or so needed to get to the center? Plus the rental costs for one are
quite insane up here anyway - and they presumably didn't use one back when
it was first built)

....

Well, what I did when we moved back to the home place was to find and
buy an inexpensive 40-ft boom lift(1) from eBay. Cost $5K+$600
trucking from Chicago area to far SW KS. Best $5K ever invested w/ the
intent of being short-term--had it 10 years now and use it around the
place a lot from trimming trees to then roof repair/painting house
(2-story old square farm house) to the TV antenna that was taken down by
wind/hail to...

It reached the nearly 40-ft ridge and the lower eave of the cupola. To
do the cupola roof I set up scaffolding a-straddle the ridge (2-high!)
and used a walkboard across.

The way we roofed was I bolted a 16-ft 2x10 "L" to the front of the
bucket and we "landed" that on the roof. Hired hand and I would work
from opposite ends til we met in the middle and could reach about 3-4
courses each stop. By the time we used up the number of bundles we
could put in the cage and get in ourselves we were ready for a break.

Spent most of the first 18-months in that puppy almost continuously by
time did all the prep work and roofing followed by paint prep and paint...

(1) What I found was JLG 40H ca '88 vintage. It passed OSHA
requirements prior to shipment and my minimum was the only bid. I did
replace a head gasket on the Wisconsin 4-cyl engine but that was minimal
effort and expense. In 10 yrs only other maintenance has been replaced
one control lever electronics for the boom swing other than change oil,
normal lube, etc.

If you're at all interested I'll look up and see which broker it was I
dealt with--he's straight up; I just don't recall the business name
otomh any longer. The broker was in FL, the machine in IL, I in KS...

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