Scaffold

Abstract

 The invention relates to a scaffold (1) comprising at least one assembly of two supports (2) and a walk-board (5) carried thereby at a top end, wherein each support comprises an elongate standard (10) with a foot (16) determining a contact line, a stay (12) which protrudes transversely of the contact line, is connected to the standard (10) at a distance from the foot and which has a greater length than this distance, and a connecting element (18) between the standard and the stay which fixes the stay at a determined angle to the standard. The stay is connected to the standard for pivoting on an axis parallel to the contact line.

Description

[0001] The invention relates to a scaffold comprising at least one assembly of two supports and a walk-board carried thereby on a top end.

[0002] Such a scaffold, wherein the supports are formed by ladders, is for example known from the German Gebrauchsmuster 8804545.

[0003] Scaffolds of this type, wherein the supports in the form of ladders are placed at an incline against a structure, are used in particular for work on buildings, such as painting work. The supports are thereby placed at an incline against the outside wall.

[0004] Scaffolds wherein use is made of ladders as supports do not meet elementary safety requirements. in addition to the ladders being loaded in inappropriate manner with the danger of them thereby collapsing, these scaffolds are also inherently unsafe. It is known to arrange a railing on the walk-boards for the protection of the users. If however a user leans against the railing or leans thereover, the centre of gravity of the assembly of the scaffold and the user can easily be moved beyond the point of support of the ladders with the ground, whereby the scaffold tips over. To decrease this danger the ladder is therefore placed less steeply against the wall, but this again results in a considerable unfavourable loading of the ladder whereby the danger of it collapsing increases.

[0005] In view of these dangers preference is given for reasons of safety to scaffolding-like scaffolds to be constructed from elements. These are erected vertically, detached from the outside wall, and are very stable and thereby safe.

[0006] A drawback to these scaffolding-like scaffolds is however that a free space must be available over at least a significant portion in front of the structure before which the scaffold must be placed. This is seldom the case with houses. Erecting such scaffolding-like scaffolds is seriously hampered and in some cases even made impossible by the presence of bushes, trees, fences, porches and the like. Moreover, the construction time for such scaffolds is relatively long. For this reason use is still made of the unsafe ladder scaffolds as described above.

[0007] The invention now has for its object to provide a scaffold of the type described in the preamble which has the advantage that it can be erected very easily and rapidly and does not require extensive free space, while still meeting all safety requirements for the users.

[0008] This object is achieved according to the invention with the scaffold as characterized in claim 1. The stay prevents the scaffold from tilting, even if someone leans far over the railing of the walk-board. Because the connecting element fixes the stay at a determined angle to the standard and both the foot of the standard and the bottom end of the stay must stand on the ground, the angle at which the standard is placed against a structure is determined automatically. Consequently the standard cannot be overloaded by an incorrect position. The whole support can be dimensioned accurately for the anticipated loads.

[0009] The step of claim 2 is preferably applied. The stay can hereby be pivoted against the standard, whereby the support is easily transportable.

[0010] The connecting element can be a rigid connection such as a rod, which is detachably connected at one end to the standard or the stay. When the step of claim 3 is applied, it is not necessary for folding together of the support that this connecting element be detached. The connecting element can therefore be permanently connected to the stay and the standard, so that the safe action is ensured at all times.

[0011] The preferred step of claim 4 achieves that the walk-board can be connected to the standard at different levels, so that a suitable working height can be adjusted.

[0012] A favourable construction for the scaffold according to the invention is characterized in claim 5.

[0013] In preference the step of claim 6 is therein applied, which achieves that the stay falls between the stiles of the standard and is thus easily stacked. A number of supports can be stacked on each other and simultaneously transported to and from a work site.

[0014] A suitable further construction step is found in claim 6. A reliable and safe construction is hereby obtained which can be erected very rapidly.

[0015] The invention will be further elucidated in the following description with reference to the embodiment shown in the figures.

[0016] Fig. 1 shows a partially broken away perspective view of a scaffold according to the invention in the position of use.

[0017] Fig. 2 shows a part of the scaffold in the transporting situation.

[0018] Fig. 3 shows a detail view of a support of the scaffold of fig. 1.

[0019] It can be seen in fig. 1 that a scaffold 1 according to the invention is erected against the outside wall 3 of a row of houses. The scaffold 1 comprises a number of assemblies, each of two supports 2 and a walk-board 5 supported thereby on a top end. Each walk-board 5 is supported by a walk-board carrier 4 which is suspended from the support 2 in a manner to be described further.

[0020] Walk-board 5 is provided with a railing 6 for the safety of persons walking over the walk-board 5 and working thereon. In this embodiment these persons may for example be occupied with painting the roof guttering 8 or the window frames 7. In order to be able to continue working also under bad weather conditions, in particular rain, sheeting 9 is hung in the roof guttering 8 and draped over railing 6. Tubes are received in seams on opposite ends of sheeting 9 so that sheeting 9 remains lying in the roof guttering 8 and hanging over the railing 6 without further operations.

[0021] As shown in more detail in fig. 3, the embodiment of the support 2 depicted therein comprises a standard 10 which is constructed from two stiles 11 having a number of transverse connecting elements 17 therebetween, a stay 12 and a connecting element between the standard 10 and the stay 12 in the form of a chain 18. The bottom ends of the stiles 11 together form a foot 16 of the standard which defines a contact line. As shown, the standard 10 is erected parallel to the outside wall 3 with the contact line defined by the foot 16.

[0022] The stay 12 is hingedly connected to the standard 10 at a distance from the foot 16. Stay 12 is likewise assembled from two stiles 13 with transverse connections. At the top end the stiles 13 are provided with pivot ears 14 which protrude between the stiles 11 of standard 10 and through which is arranged a pivot rod 15. The length of stay 12 is greater than the distance from the foot 16 to the pivot rod 15 of standard 10. The bottom end of stay 12 can hereby support on the ground when the standard 10 is erected at an incline against the structure, such as the frontage 3. The connecting element in the form of the chain 18 ensures that stay 12 is fixed at a determined angle relative to standard 10. When the support 2 is erected against the frontage 3 the standard 10 is automatically placed at the correct angle against the outside wall 3. If an attempt should be made to place the standard 10 more steeply against the outside wall 3 the foot 16 would come free from the ground and at a position less steep than that intended the chain 18 would hang slack. It is therefore obvious at a glance whether the support 2 is disposed correctly. A correct angle of the standard 10 relative to the outside wall 3 is very important, since the whole support 2 will be dimensioned to a load situation associated with this position.

[0023] As the figures clearly show, the stay 12 has a smaller width than the distance between the stiles 11 of standard 10. In combination with the construction of the pivot ears 14 the stay 12 can hereby be pivoted against the standard and a number of supports 2 thus folded together can be stacked for transport purposes. Because the connecting element 18 is embodied as a flexible element, in this embodiment as a chain, it does not have to be detached, so that a permanent connection, and thereby a guarantee of a correct position when erecting the support, is ensured.

[0024] Fig. 2 shows an assembly of the scaffold according to this embodiment of the invention consisting of two stacked supports 2, a walk-board 5 and two walk-board carriers 4.

[0025] As fig. 3 likewise shows in more detail, the walk-board carrier 4 is provided with two transverse U-profiles 21 which serve as hook elements and which can be hooked round the transverse connecting elements 17 of standard 10. Because the support 2 comprises a number of transverse connections functioning as supporting elements 17, the carrier 4 can be arranged at a number of different heights, in this embodiment three.

[0026] The walk-board 5 comprises two longitudinal girders 23 with a U-profile open to the outside. The girders 23 are mutually connected by transverse connecting elements 24 and a plate 25 or the like forming the walking surface is arranged on these transverse connecting elements 24.

[0027] The walk-board carrier 4 further comprises two supports 28, 29 for receiving the walk-board 5. The support 28 situated closest to the standard 10 during use is embodied as a protrusion which can fall into the U-groove of profile 23. Support 29 supports the opposite girder 23 of walk-board 5 such that this is not slidable in the direction away from standard 10. When walk-board 5 is arranged the rear girder 23 is first pushed over the protrusions 28 of the co-acting walk-board carriers and then lowered until the other girder 23 falls into the support 29. A very rapid but safe gripping of walk-board 5 by carrier 4 is thus obtained.

[0028] The walk-board 5 is provided on the side facing the outside wall 3 when in use with an upward sloping edge 26 which prevents a user accidentally placing his foot between walk-board 5 and the outside wall 3. On the opposite side the walk-board 5 is provided with a standing edge 26 which prevents paint tins and the like sliding off the walk-board 5.

[0029] As shown clearly in fig. 1, only a small amount of free space is needed for erecting the scaffold 1 according to the invention. Furthermore, the placing of the supports 2 in the lengthwise direction of the scaffold can be freely selected within certain limits, so that any obstacles which may be present such as fences, bushes and trees do not hamper erection of the scaffold. The scaffold can be placed exceptionally rapidly. First a pair of supports 2 are placed, wherein the position of the standard 10 is automatically determined in the above described manner by the co-action of stay 12 and connecting element 18. A walk-board support 4 is then hooked onto each standard 10 at the suitable height and a walk-board is hooked into the supports 4. The railing 6 can be fixedly connected to the walk-board 5 or optionally fitted later.

[0030] The walk-boards 5 can optionally be mutually coupled in lengthwise direction so that a force transmitting entity is created.

[0031] The invention is not limited to the embodiment shown in the figures. The standard, stay and the connecting element of each support can of course be embodied in a different manner. The supports 2 and walk-board supports 4 do not have to be separate parts but can be integrated. Between the protruding part of the walk-board support 4 and the stay 12 an extra stay can be arranged if desired for further stiffening of the support 2, whereby this latter could take a lighter form. All these and other embodiment variants are deemed to fall within the scope of protection of the annexed claims.

Claims

1. Scaffold comprising at least one assembly of two supports and a walk-board carried thereby at a top end, wherein each support comprises an elongate standard with a foot determining a contact line, a stay which protrudes transversely of the contact line, is connected to the standard at a distance from the foot and which has a greater length than this distance, and a connecting element between the standard and the stay which fixes the stay at a determined angle to the standard.

2. Scaffold as claimed in claim 1, wherein the stay is connected to the standard for pivoting on an axis parallel to the contact line.

3. Scaffold as claimed in claim 1 or 2, wherein the connecting element is a flexible element such as a cable or chain.

4. Scaffold as claimed in any of the foregoing claims, wherein the standard has a number of supporting elements above each other for a walk-board carrier.

5. Scaffold as claimed in any of the foregoing claims, wherein the standard comprises two stiles adjacent each other at a distance, the bottom ends of which form the foot.

6. Scaffold as claimed in claim 5, wherein the stay has a smaller width than the distance between the stiles.

7. Scaffold as claimed in any of the foregoing claims 4-6, wherein the number of supporting elements is determined by transverse connections between the stiles, and the walk-board carrier comprises hook elements falling round the transverse connections.

Drawing