Hose on rooftop

Tony Shelton

BS Detector, Esquire
We've got tiny hosereels attached to the the lift on both sides so most of the time when we pull hose on a roof we just put the lift higher than the pony wall on the roof and take off walking with it.

But over the past year we've gotten a lot of buildings we can't reach with the lift and have to pull the hose over the side of the wall. I've tried all kinds of things, mounting a tiny hosereel to a clamp and clamping it to the pony wall - doing something similar with a hosereel guide, etc.

But many times the roof has a decorative gable or whatever you call it that makes the pony wall 3 ft thick and I don't have anything to attach the apparatus to.

Now I'm thinking maybe if I could find some kind of heavy material like a semi-hard rubber I could just lay it over the edge and just pull it over that. My problem is some of these roofs have a curve to them and the hose tends to make burn marks on the roof as we pull it.

Any ideas?
 
I have an idea. How about designing something that you think will work, try it out, test it, patent it and then sell a bunch of them to other guys that are having the same problem and make $$$$.

18 views before mine and no one has come up with anything yet. You wanted a idea Tony so here it is :idea2:
 
Mount some form of pole to the lift to get the height that you need. Attach some type of wheel with a center channel inside of it and a guard over the edge so that the hose cannot come out. Pull off the reel, onto the pulley system and off you go..I can make one for ...... one million dollars if you wish........
 
Some of these buildings are another 30-100 ft higher than the lift. That would have to be a heck of an extension pole!

At harbor freight today I saw some 50 inch clamps. I was thinking about welding a hose guide to it and trying to get that to work. I'm just worried about the clamp breaking loose under all that force and hurting someone.

I'm going to try tomorrow with some heavy 1/4 inch rubber. I think it's not to heavy to carry up through the hatch, but is heavy enough to sit still while we pull on the hose. I'm still at a loss for a real solution.

This is how we do it on 4 stories or less now:


 
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