Fred Dibnah Shows How to Erect a Chimney Scaffold at 200 Feet (1982) [video]
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Fred Dibnah
Steeplejacking
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The video shows Fred Dibnah erecting a chimney scaffold at 200 feet in 1982, sparking nostalgia and admiration for his work among commenters, who also discuss the risks and cultural significance of steeplejacking.
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https://www.tiktok.com/@uandyesterday/video/7349637646760561...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Dibnah
Definitely one of a kind.
With respect, this is nonsense.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R3-YwDZrzg
And it's just a ladder really.
Had some funny comments that video.
Something that might not be immediately obvious from this clip is that all the sound effects you're hearing of the planks bouncing and scraping off the bricks, the iron dogs being hammered into the brickwork or wind blowing etc, is all recreated and recorded after the fact in some BBC sound studio. There's no sound guy up there with a boom mic or even a lapel mic recording, yet all the sound effects are perfectly audible. Even the ones around the other side of the chimney. If they didn't dub them in afterwards the video recording from the ground level would be quite boring!
Though there are a couple of other recordings of Fred with a one-man camera crew up at the top once he's got the platform fully setup.
Besides, I suspect if he was mic'd up there'd be quite a bit more swearing than you'd be able to get away with on the BBC!
This is interesting and not at all how we would rig a smokestack (as we call them). I worked for the company in the early 90s but we were using rigging that was built by the company in the 60s or earlier. In relation to how we did it his solution seems to me to be overly complicated and perhaps a bit more dicey than what we were doing.
I can write something up if anyone is interested in how we did it.
i also suppose the ladder only gives you access to one portion of the chimney, and you may need to access enough different sections that the most effective method is to set up a ladder exactly where you need it while work is done?
There's anothing video of him setting up the ladder on a stack: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Keq-Lig-z74 while definitely sketchy it doesn't seem nearly as bad as the process to make the platforms, which he has to repeat over and over while knocking it down. So in that respect I'm not sure it would've saved him much time overall.
At 16:20 in that video, it shows the camera crew in a cherry picker filming at the same height as him. Ive always thought that Freds chimney days were pre technology like this. but why would he not just put the scaffold platform up in a cherry picker to start with instead of spending days fixing a gazillion ladders to the side of a chimney?
Fred was creating the platform with 3-4 guys and basic tools. Probably a lot cheaper than hiring a specialised Cherry Picker for a day or two.
All the stacks I worked on, save one I can remember, had beacon lights that needed regular maintenance and all had ladders built in. The ladders did not go all the way to the ground/roof level. That was to keep unauthorized folks from climbing it.
I remember two stacks had permanent catwalks around the top. One of them was quite corroded and not a comfortable place to walk. Like a sibling comment mentioned, that difficulty in maintaining them is a reason why many stacks don't have ladders. Some stacks that don't have them once did, but they were removed due to corrosion.
As far as access, all of the stacks I worked on had only one ladder. If the job was small and there was work that needed to be completed on the other side we had two options.
1. If the repair was low enough we could attach the ropes from which we hung our bosun's chair at the top and swing around to the other side.
2. If the repair was too high to do that or too involved we would build a scaffold all the way around the stack.
I wouldn’t trust permanently installed ladders that were completely exposed to the elements! Unlike the bigger iron structures, ladders have quite a high surface area/ volume ratio.
I wouldn’t climb up Fred’s ladders in a million years, but at least there was a quality feedback loop!
Now think of a steel right triangle with the legs being the vertical and horizontal aspect with the hypotenuse supporting the horizontal leg. The horizontal leg has a vertical tube welded where it meets the hypotenuse. The vertical leg as a hook curving down from the top away from the horizontal leg and a wooden pad at the bottom. We called these stackjacks but a Google search tells me that may have just been what we called them and not their actual name.
The hook hangs on the cable discussed above and the pad rests against the smokestack. 2 2"x12" (4cm x 29cm) walkboards are laid between these stackjacks. The vertical tube at the end accepts poles to which a railing is attached.
TLDR look at these photos of a company that does it exactly how we did. https://apexchimney.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/exteriori... https://apexchimney.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IMGP40400...
I've spent more time on scaffolding and a roof ladder this summer than I hoped I'd ever do in my life, and i don't think you'd get me on any of Fred Dibnah's ladders at gunpoint. I still find it fascinating to see how it's done by people who've made it their trade.
I had a sort of standing joke where I would wind my girlfriend up by pointing out that it was Fred Dibnah's place every time we walked past. I did this perhaps a little too often.
One day, she had had enough and told me in a very loud voice that 'she couldn't give a shit if it was Fred Dibnah's house'. That's when I saw his startled face peering up from behind a traction engine. Sorry Fred. I hope you can forgive me from that big old chimney in the sky.
https://steeplejacks.scot/lots-of-jobs-and-pictures/