Scaffolding is used to support and host people and materials and obviously to reach heights during the construction and repair of buildings and other similar large structures. It is a simple yet powerful tool to scale heights in a tall building and most importantly, it is generally safer to use as compared to alternate means due to inherent safety features such as lockable wheels. It is very important that a scaffold provides safety of the construction worker.

Most scaffolds are made up of metal pipes or tubes that are joined together by couplers and supported on a board. To provide strength to support a good amount of weight, the tubes are made of either steel or aluminium. Aluminium is the preferred material for the pipes due to its superior flexibility and strength and because it is lighter in weight. The couplers join together the tubes so that they stay together and thus can support the weight of a person and materials as well. Wooden boards are the most commonly used boards available in standard sizes. You might also come across a few wooden scaffolds, but metal scaffolds are much safer due to their superior strength and reliability and hence should always be preferred.

There are primarily two types of scaffoldings that are used during construction of buildings - fixed scaffolding and mobile scaffolding. Fixed scaffolding is further divided into putlog and independent types of scaffolding. The independent type of scaffolding has uprights on both ends of the platform, which means that the scaffold can stay intact and upright without requiring the support of the building structure. It is however not stable by itself and therefore at various levels, you will need to tie this scaffold to the structure of the building. The putlog type of scaffolding, on the other hand, has uprights only on the outer side and in the inner side is supported by the building structure. The mobile scaffolds are structures that stand all by themselves and do not need any kind of support from the building structure. These are mounted on wheels for easy facilitation of movement of the scaffold from one location to another.

The type of scaffolding should depend on your project requirements and your budget, the two most important criteria that you will have to look at. Since there is always that inherent risk involved, it is never advisable to compromise on quality, but even in the good quality segment, you can have a wide price variation. You always need to select your scaffolding depending on the actual job requirements.

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