Maintaining your roof can be an incredibly expensive, time-consuming and nerve-wracking job to do. After all, being afraid of heights is one of the most common fears there is, so nobody enjoys spending more time in a potentially hazardous situation than they need to.
With this in mind, it’s safe to say that efficiency is key when it comes to nailing your roof maintenance, ensuring any repair or installation work is carried out as quickly and professionally as possible.
Hiring a cherry picker can help aid this process significantly, enabling you to reach parts of the house that you wouldn’t have been able to otherwise and allowing you to get multiple jobs done at the same time.
Whether it be clearing your gutters, dealing with a pest bird problem, painting and decorating, or making chimney flue repairs, the freedom of access that cherry pickers offer opens up a huge number of avenues for effective roof maintenance.
However, before you go ahead and hire the first one you can get your hands on, it’s important to bear a few things in mind in advance. In this article, we will be running through some of these key things, highlighting all the components you will need to consider when choosing to hire a cherry picker to maintain your roof.
Know your rights
As with any other vehicle, there are a number of rules, regulations and restrictions over what you can and can’t drive. Cherry pickers are no different, so it’s important to know your stuff before going in.
If you hold a standard driving licence, for example, you are legally allowed to drive and self-hire a cherry picker machine of any weight up to 3.5 tonnes. However, if you need to hire a cherry picker that is heavier than this, you will need to hire a professional operator with the appropriate training required to drive such a vehicle.
Similarly, being such big, heavy duty machines, not everyone always feels comfortable driving cherry pickers, even when they do have the licence required. In these instances, please feel free to contact our team here at MC Property Maintenance – we would be more than happy to ease your worries and take the responsibility of driving off your shoulders.
Your safety is the most important thing, after all. So, if you’d rather leave your roof maintenance work in the hands of the experts, we would be happy to help.
Identify which cherry picker is right for you
While all cherry pickers do more or less the same thing, there are two main types to choose between, both offering their own various advantages and disadvantages.
Straight booms, also known as stick or telescopic booms, are pretty much exactly what they say on the tin – a straight lift which typically offers greater outreach and improved access to taller roofs.
Articulated booms, on the other hand, feature more of a bendable arm and are typically better suited to applications where the work platform needs to reach up and over obstacles.
However, it’s also important to think about the terrain you will need the cherry picker to drive over, as this could make a big difference to how freely accessible the roof is.
If, for example, you need the cherry picker to rest on uneven ground, choosing a standard machine may not be the right choice for you and could be potentially hazardous to use. So, please feel free to contact us if you aren’t sure which cherry picker is right for you.
Do you need a cherry picker?
While cherry pickers can make roof maintenance work a lot easier, they aren’t always the cheapest or most effective choice.
This will largely depend on the exact type of work you are looking to do though. If, for example, you are only needing to clear your gutters, it could be a better use of your time and money hiring a professional team to carry out the work on your behalf. If, however, you are needing to conduct extensive roof repair work, a cherry picker may be required.
Deciding whether you need a cherry picker or not will also depend on the height you’re needing to work at, since conventional ladders can only reach so high. So, to find out once and for all whether you need a cherry picker for your roof maintenance work, contact our team at your earliest convenience and we’ll be able to offer our expert advice.
Final thoughts…
Maintaining your roof is one of those jobs that is as annoying as it is important to get done.
After all, following prolonged periods of exposure to the sun, snow, rain and other types of weather conditions, there can be a number of factors which affect the roof’s membrane, causing a variety of other issues to form when left unresolved.
Therefore, hiring a cherry picker to carry out roof maintenance work can be a great option, allowing you to combat these issues before they manifest into bigger problems.
However, as the points above should now prove, it’s important to know your stuff when hiring a cherry picker, so don’t be afraid to ask questions before deciding whether it is the right choice for you.
To find out more about the cherry pickers we have available here at MC Property Maintenance, or to discover our full range of property maintenance services, please feel free to contact us.