Rank: Forum user 
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A friend has contacted me for help with this issue and he doesnt belong to forum and we are getting to ends of our brain cells trying to come up with a solution.
For a number of years he has been advising a local garden centre/plant nursery, and this has been an on-going issue for them for a number of years. If they get a broken pane of glass in one of their 4 industrial size greenhouses (150m+ x 100m wide) how do they change the broken panes safely?
The current system is to get their smallest member of staff to climb along the gulley's and then lay across the glass and shimmy up and change the broken glass!!
I suggested that the safety advisor contact a specialist company to look at harness and wire protection or walkway (to spread weight in gully). They are struggling in the current financial climate, they understand their H&S responsibilites but finding it hard to makes ends meet so a large outlay isnt an option at present.
The glass cannot be replaced from below (due to how the greenhouse is built) and a MEWP doesn't reach over the top to most of the greenhouse (they have tried). We also came up with replacing the glass with perspex type panes that can be glued from below but they dont feel this would work.
Between us we have contacted some large nurseries in the UK and Holland to see how they undertake this task but they all seem to have glass that can be changed from below so much easier to work on using tower scaffold. Friend has also got a couple of fabricators in to see if they could make a walkway but this couldnt be done due to technical and financial reasons. So I'm looking for any suggestions that could help as I really don't think sending up a small man to lay across the glass is the best option.
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Rank: Forum user 
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Crikey, just the thought of lying across a sheet of agricultural glass trying to change another one is making me cringe! Is it not possible to use some sort of crawling board laid across a suitable nuber of glazing bars or from the gulley to the ridge?
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Rank: Forum user
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I came across this very situation many moons ago and we devised a bit of access equipment which enabled the glazier to walk along the gulley. It is quite hard to explain but it was lightweight balancing frame with a set of handrails with v shaped outriggers made from lightwieght aluminium that were supported by the glazing bars which was pushed along the gulley until you reached the spot on the roof that you require access to, then a ladder from gulley to ridge to work from. We had a MEWP inside the green house which shadowed the worker from below with airbags.
HSE was happy with this at the time!
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Rank: Super forum user
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It may be possible from inside but it will involve using a glazing robot or a gib to hold and manoeuvre the pain, which will have to be custom made or modified. Lift the pain vertical up from below at the widest point at the diagonal of the opening, up and out of the greenhouse. Swivel it into position and lower in place. You may have to bond it in place if the fixings are inaccessible
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Rank: Super forum user
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They say that glueing from below probably won't work. Glueing, clamping or similar fixing from below surely must be far safer, easier to justify and less punitive if things go wrong.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Ian - this isn't a building where an occasional leak at a glazed roof light could cause serious problems. I think the occupiers might possible review why they think that replacing from below is so problematic.
There may of course be some locations where the nature of what is within the greenhouse still means that access from underneath might be difficult, but it might be a case of looking for the exceptions to the rule of access from below, rather than defaulting to the assumption that people have to work over the roof which essentially is 100% fragile (unless designed so as not to be - unlikely in your scenario)
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Rank: Forum user
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Thank you all for the replies and comments. I met up with my friend to look through photos of the greenhouses over the weekend so i could see the extent of the problem. We discussed the comments you have made and he is going to speak with the company tomorrow.
Once I hear back I will give you an update
Thanks again
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