Newbie question

[orcsong]

Hey kind people,
I'm involved in a building project that includes catwalks etc. No one has spoken of this so I'm going to assume (for the time being) that I should educate myself. The stairs leading to the catwalks are spiral and I can't imagine trying to actually haul myself and fixtures up that way and it makes me think we need a hoist of some kind.
I've not used one before so I have this vague image in my mind of a "boxy thing" with chains coming out both sides!
Can anyone enlighten me a little bit. It's about 26 - 30 ft. from floor to catwalk and beyond that I don't know what other information to offer. (except that I'm terrified of heights! Please pray for me!LOL)
Thanks a heap everybody,
Dave

[tedanderson]

You will probably need a material lift. This is a Genie SL-24 material lift that can be rented for about $50-60 a day or about $150 for a week.

We usually use one of these to hang speakers from the ceiling or to put a flat screen in place. It's safer and saves a lot of time and effort of multiple people being on the same ladder.

[Esoteric]

We just use a good old fashioned rope, carabeaner, pulley system. I figure if it worked to get units up to a 90' grid then it should work at the majority of churches out there. Plus it will cost you all of $100 or so.

Mike

[Pastor Ryan]

Let me speak from experience...get the lift, I did this in a Broadcast Production studio with about 25 ft ceilings and a spiral stair case to a catwalk...I hauled 30 some odd lights up that stupid stair case...

Big ETC Brigthlines, Monster Spots, Fresnels, you name it I hauled them up there...big ones...ugh...get the lift!

[orcsong]

I guess I just had it in my head that we needed a chain hoist with push button operation. Anybody use any of those?

[Esoteric]

We use them to lift truss and have a couple of half ton units for large moving lights (X-Spots, MAC2ks), extra heavy scenery, etc.

But a chain motor (or a lift) would be overkill for 90% of churches (unless you regularly lift lights/scenery in excess of 150lbs).

Mike

[RonK]

Halfway between the chain motor, which I agree with Mike would be overkill for occasionally moving fixtures, and the rope and pulley would be a manual chain hoist. you get the mechanical advantage of a hoist with speed and simplicity of a rope, at a fraction of the price of a chain motor.

[Esoteric]

I agree, hoists are great. But honestly if you are having this discussion are you moving instruments heavy enough to even warrant a hoist?

Mike

[tedanderson]

a chain motor (or a lift) would be overkill for 90% of churches

I would have to agree. We have a tech balcony/catwalk with a spiral staircase and even though we have a lift for changing lights and doing decorations, we use good old fashioned manpower to get equipment up there. It really isn't as hard as it seems. In some ways a spiral staircase is advantageous because you aren't restricted by the width of the stairs.

Sometimes when we are hauling a bunch of things up there (like the 30+ intelligent light heads for the youth) we do it in assembly line fashion where we can just hand it up to the person above us without having to move.

[Esoteric]

Yeah, we use a scissor or knuckle boom for decorations.

Mike

[theatre4jc]

When I was in college our theatre used a simple pulley with rope and at the end of it a heavy duty metal chain with a beaner clip attached to it. We would have someone on the ground hook up 1-3 lights putting the chain through the yoke, then one person in the Cats would haul it up. Took 2 people but it beats taking gear up stairs. Thinking of installing something like this at the church I now work at myself.

I wouldn't use it for hauling moving lights or anything more than the weight of 2 Source 4s with 10 degree lenses.

[waynehoskins]

In college we'd just use rope and haul them up to the position one at a time. Also quite valuable were the few 5-gallon buckets that we could put on the ropes to get loose things (lamps, color, templates, replacement parts like caps, and so on) up to the catwalk or electric or grid. We also had a spiral stair up to the catwalk leading to the second-floor control booth in our studio space. Not bad for walking, but it was a pain to move the really old, quite large, rather heavy Hunt lightboard (or an Express later) up and down.