Our company has recently been making a safety push and has been rethinking many of the procedures we use. We are in the process of developing a full safety program aiming at COR certification, or as near as we can get, given our company size.

I'm looking for input and ideas as to safety procedures for the fabrication and installation of staircases. It's rather an interesting issue, that the work we do (especially on site during installs) requires that we remove safety barriers in order to put them back up. I'm looking for ideas for safety strategies and procedures. We were doing a hazard inspection with our safety consultant of the shop, and he was, in many ways, at a loss himself as to control measures and ideas that would be practical.

For instance, recently we had two very large staircases in the shop at the same time. Working on the staircases was uncomfortable, to say the least. Not only because of limited space and their sheer size. Laying these staircases down, maneuvering them, or flipping them would have been near impossible, so we did all of the work on them with them standing up. The immediate thought, of course, is 'build temporary railings' or 'set up scaffolding'. However, both of these solutions would interfere with the work itself in significant ways, or impracticably increase the cost.

The risks of staircase installation are also of concern and we are looking at engineering controls to better handle that. I'm wondering what solutions others have come up with. Fall arrest systems are an immediate thought, but the practicality seems dubious. We recently installed a staircase with one of our subcontractors where two of his workers landed up standing underneath a mechanically suspended staircase. It quite frankly startled and frightened me. We're working on admin controls (hazard assessments and site inspections), but I'm also looking for better ideas for lifting.

What solutions have others come up with?

Our safety consultant suggested crash pads, for instance, for stair assembly. I would be concerned about durability, with that solution, as well as tripping hazard when working around them.

Thanks,

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Is there some reason that scaffolding surrounding the build and installation is not a consideration?

Normally I build the stairs and leave them in the jig for as long as possible. The stringers and treads are fully assembled to preserve the shape. With a finished staircase like this, the wood veneer on the insides of the stringers is done in the jig. The outside veneers, however, and the top and bottom capping, is done after assembly and the jig is removed. The amount of up and down, inside outside, top and bottom work makes scaffolding impractical. Anything that was placed close enough to the stringers to be considered a safety feature would interfere with the laying up the veneers and finish work. We do have a mobile scaffold that we use, but not something tall enough to be considered a safety feature. How would you reasonably set scaffold up around a curved staircase? Does anyone do that that has insight as to how they manage that?

You won't have to set the scaffolding for the lower sections of course. But I would box around the top and slide planks through and around the open treads. If you go high enough, the workers could actually hook on to a cable strung between the tower legs.

What will COR certification do for your woodworking business? Will you sell more stairs? Remember "Safety" is an industry now making billions a year. I know that all of this nonsense will make the end product more costly to produce, which you will ultimately have to pass on to your customers. For the "Safety guy" being a hammer everything is a nail, this guy spends 365 coming up with ways to make things "safer".... Installing stairs and then the railings; the whole process is a chicken and egg situation. There are many types of scaffolding other than the standard frames.. Layher, Peri up, Safway that can be adapted to nearly any shape; and theirs always fall protection the trick is where to anchor it on finished interior structures Im sure GCs will not want anchor eyes poking out of finished walls for someone to hook onto, but in the name of safety..hey! My 2 cents give the safety guy a pink slip and forget the scam of COR, where will these guys be in 10 years anyway??