from Hacker News

Fred Dibnah shows how to erect a chimney scaffold at 200 feet (1982) [video]

by stevekemp on 9/28/25, 10:52 AM with 35 comments

• by ClarkMarx on 9/28/25, 12:52 PM

  As someone who grew up in a family of Steeplejacks (my father was third generation), I am always amazed and delighted by the amount of attention Dibnah got in his day in the UK and continues to get today via the internet. Here in the states, people would always just look at me like I had two heads when I told them what the family business was.

  This is interesting and not at all how we would rig a smokestack (as we call them). I worked for the company in the early 90s but we were using rigging that was built by the company in the 60s or earlier. In relation to how we did it his solution seems to me to be overly complicated and perhaps a bit more dicey than what we were doing.

  I can write something up if anyone is interested in how we did it.

• by philo23 on 9/28/25, 12:27 PM

  I don't know why Fred keeps getting posted to HN, but I love it. and I'm glad more people get to see his work.

  Something that might not be immediately obvious from this clip is that all the sound effects you're hearing of the planks bouncing and scraping off the bricks, the iron dogs being hammered into the brickwork or wind blowing etc, is all recreated and recorded after the fact in some BBC sound studio. There's no sound guy up there with a boom mic or even a lapel mic recording, yet all the sound effects are perfectly audible. Even the ones around the other side of the chimney. If they didn't dub them in afterwards the video recording from the ground level would be quite boring!

  Though there are a couple of other recordings of Fred with a one-man camera crew up at the top once he's got the platform fully setup.

  Besides, I suspect if he was mic'd up there'd be quite a bit more swearing than you'd be able to get away with on the BBC!

• by jmchambers on 9/28/25, 1:09 PM

  I grew up a short walk from where he lived, in Bolton, and you'd often see him setting up all the gear, solo, at the base of one of the local chimneys. We'd pull over on our bikes and shout "Is it coming down Fred?". He never failed to stroll over and have a chat about what he was doing. A genuinely nice chap.

• by yosser on 9/28/25, 5:15 PM

  I used to live just down the road from Fred Dibnah's house when I was in my early 20's. It was quite an interesting old building with a fairly steeply sloping garden that led down to an old workshop packed with steam engines and similar mechanical bric a brac. Despite the layout you could easily see down to the bottom of the garden from the pavement as you passed by.

  I had a sort of standing joke where I would wind my girlfriend up by pointing out that it was Fred Dibnah's place every time we walked past. I did this perhaps a little too often.

  One day, she had had enough and told me in a very loud voice that 'she couldn't give a shit if it was Fred Dibnah's house'. That's when I saw his startled face peering up from behind a traction engine. Sorry Fred. I hope you can forgive me from that big old chimney in the sky.

• by trebligdivad on 9/28/25, 11:59 AM

  Fred Dibnah videos are my goto for showing people heavy local English accents; it's rare you hear one that heavy any more, but they can be local down to only a few miles.

• by n1b0m on 9/28/25, 10:55 AM

  He once survived a near-fatal fall. In 1997, Dibnah was almost killed when a 2,500-ton concrete chimney on Canvey Island collapsed prematurely. He tripped while running from the falling structure, but luckily, the chimney corrected itself and fell in the opposite direction

• by scandox on 9/28/25, 12:01 PM

  This one makes my palms sweaty:

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R3-YwDZrzg

  And it's just a ladder really.

• by 2ICofafireteam on 9/28/25, 9:15 PM

  I used to show a clip to new helpers/labourers of Fred taking down a chimney one brick at a time because it beautifully showed what a person can do if they just get at it and keep at it.

• by nickdothutton on 9/28/25, 12:23 PM

  A man out of his time somehow. I enjoyed his shows as a boy.

• by onion2k on 9/28/25, 3:23 PM

  Impressive as Dibnah absolutely is, give a thought to cameraman who climbed that chimney with a 1980s film camera to record the footage from the top. :)

• by mrlonglong on 9/28/25, 5:01 PM

  I think H&S would have thrown fits about the lack of safety equipment if he still did any of that nowadays. The good old days, not so much. Men often died doing this sort of work and still do to a lesser degree.

• by outofmyshed on 9/28/25, 4:59 PM

  If you want to understand the UK, Dibnah is where to start. I named my cat after him.

• by dr_dshiv on 9/28/25, 12:51 PM

  Worth watching to the end if you want a great sensation of vertigo.

• by afandian on 9/28/25, 8:38 PM

  BCM Steeplejacks has great write ups and pictures of the jobs they do. Lots of modern equipment, but at the end of the day it’s still very high up and they rely on the strength of their own hands.

  https://steeplejacks.scot/lots-of-jobs-and-pictures/

• by Fairburn on 9/28/25, 5:32 PM

  Very much enjoyed that. Thanks