On 11/13/2011 10:08 AM, DD_BobK wrote:
On Nov 13, 6:17 am, wrote:
Our coop apartment building is four floors, on irregular ground. The upshot
is, getting access to the windows makes painting and cleaning pretty costly.

Our painters/cleaners routinely use 60-foot ladders to get to the
upper-floor windows.

My question is this: Is it possible to fabricate some very sturdy hooks
which would fit over the sill of the windows, going over to the inside of
the building, to support a platform to do the painting and cleaning?

I realize this sounds dangerous, but it seems to me if the hooks and
platform could be very securely fastened, it would be made to be at least as
safe as those platforms dangling from ropes on high-rise buildings.

The "ropes" that hose platforms are dangling from are actually steel
cable capable of holding 1,000's of pounds each.

What you are proposing is totally doable from a technical point of
view...... whether it is allowable from a legal point of view (OSAH or
other agency?) is another question.

The devil is in the details.
What does the exterior of the building look like?
Same questions about the interior& exterior sills.
How wide are the windows? SIngle windows or always a pair?

To have such a device properly designed, fabricated& tested could
cost many $1000's.
Depending on the size of your building, number of windows, frequency
of use and time saved per window.....your concept could wind up saving
money.

Before I left my previous employ, we were looking into a device such
as this (used not new)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:JLG_450_AJ_2.jpg

Boom lifts come in all sorts of flavors...... IIRC we were looking at
less than $20,000
Whether this could work depends on the local terrain and the type of
lift used.

cheers
Bob

The building I work in still has some of the 80-100 YO (depending on
wing) window washer hooks in the brickwork on either side of the window
openings. They are fitted as building is built, presumably with a
backing plate behind the brick or something.

No, they don't use them anymore. I would not, either. They use a
portable bosun's ladder setup, set up on the flat roof. Think big-ass
fishing pole welded to a big metal plate, covered with hunks of ballast.

--
aem sends...