Hey Mr. Aaron, my name is Corbin Hardwick, I’m a 22 year old linework student at Texas State Technical College way down here in Waco Texas and I just want to say thank you for starting your channel. Truly. I grew up trying to grow corn on a tiny sand dune in West Texas where technology is probably 10 years behind and the only real way to learn how to do things is to pry at the old men who try and gatekeep knowledge for sake of “figuring it out” and hearing your passion for the trade in all of your videos and how genuine you are ignites a fire inside of me I didn’t know I had. The biggest motivating factor for me to get out here every day in the 104° weather and climb up a pole is how sincerely relieved the customers seem when you turn the power back on. I can’t wait to get out there and work alongside guys like you because it’s more than just a job to people like us. I’ll finish up my certificate along with my Class A and my OSHA 30 come next month and man I truly appreciate all of the knowledge and support you have consistently provided through your channel. If you have any pointers for landing my first apprenticeship, that would be the icing on the cake! But again, I just wanted to say thank you 🤝
I had the pleasure of speaking with a groundman last week while someone was on the pole. My mother in law called me because her power was being really weird. Sort of rural area but in a subdivision. I went to make sure she wasn't just being funny and I saw 117 on one leg and 60 on the other to ground. Before I measured it I thought her entry or fuse box. (Yes 60 amp fuse service) but it looked fine. Saw the guys up the road looking confused at the transformer that her and 6-8 houses were on. I didn't want to distract but they both were looking all around and the guy in the air was not hands on. So I slowed down rolled my window and said I appreciate their work. I'm glad they are here. I can go to work now. He is said "o see so your seeing this too?). They had actually thought it was just one house that has an issue. Said they had to go back to hq and pick up a new transformer and be back later. Oddly enough my work is a small drainage creek from where they store all their transformers. I'll get a photo of their yard sometime and figure out how to share it. You need a discord server or somthing. Although I appreciate your time into these videos and it must be a lot for you to do for everyone to learn from. Be safe
Those bushes are certainly hawthorn. I have a lot of them on my farm in Sainte-Marie, I have no idea how many tires I've lost due to those stupid things. I've made it my life's mission to purge every last one of them from my land. I have been told it was the English who brought them over for hedge rows. I wish they had kept them in England, those trees are just evil.
As someone who is currently getting into linework just out of lineschool, I hope to work under someone as knowledgeable and as excellent of a teacher as you are and in turn emulate those skills myself. Cannot wait to get started in this field after just getting out of the military and from my exposure so far to the work I absolutely love it.
Over the years I've got to chat with the lineman that covers this part of town thanks to the local tree rat population deciding to play on top of the transformer on the pole behind our garage and met their maker because of it. I've had to remove several expired squirrels off the roof of the garage or from under the pole. The most recent one was very unpleasant to say the least. Pro tip for when you report an outage were you have found the remains of a squirrel or other animal: If you're fill out a report online mention you found a dead squirrel at the bottom of the pole or if you see lineman flag them down and tell them and they're usually very grateful (and glad they don't have to patrol the whole line). Where we live there's a fused spur that comes off the main line then goes down one side of a three block cul-de-sac then loops back around the other side. For some dumb reason none of the transformers are fused.
There was a crispy crow that hung upside down from the middle of a side line for at least a year. We don't know how it happened or why it was left there, but it was a local joke. Congratulations to the winner! That is a great example of no matter how we try to tame a natural force, it can always show it's wild side. Thank you for another interesting video, Aaron! Stay safe, and God bless.
i remember when I was a kid I watched this squirrel walk along the power line from my bedroom window when it got to this old ass looking transformer i heard a loud bang sparks flew everywhere and i watched this squirrel fall to its death that transformer gave that squirrel a nice little pop
Kind of unusual wiring on the pole with the trip savers. But like you say just a disconnect and a bypass arrangement! Beautiful country up there and thanks for the video Aaron.
Good job. I used to hate getting a cat pole calls. Especially with the owner right there waiting for me to get kitty down and hoping I get the crt. killed before it moved around too much. Then problem two. They will tear you up. My technic. Get a pillow case from the owner and have a pair of elbow length leather welding gloves (line is dead and grounded). Grab cat, place in pillow case, hold end tight and tell owner don't open until they're in the house with the doors closed. I've had them get out and run right back up the pole. And good comment on not leaving the deceased lay around
Since finding this channel, I now want to be a lineman. I’ve done work installing collision warning and GPS systems in Freightliners, International MV’s, 7600’s and more for Eversource, Altec, and more. As a kid, I always wanted to do something about lines and poles in my city. They almost always look sloppy. I respect and salute you Bob. Thanks for this inspiration.
"Sloppy" lines. I would love to hear that service call, "Hey, there are sloppy and old wires hanging from your poles all over town! You got to make them look a lot prettier."
I've got a huge soft spot for animals... It may sound rediculous, but it sometimes bothers me a bit when I show up to find these innocent little fellas :(
Bob: On the way back from PEI, I tried to explore the Milltown Hydro dam in St. Stephen. Needles to say it was very well secured. Back in the late 70’s, my friend and I stopped by the Mactaquac on motorcycles, and was given a grand tour. Too cool.
Love the learn and you do a great job of telling us what you are doing. Wish you would teach the guys around here. Power was out for the whole town back in June for 3 days. Power was out all around the area and they had crews in from all over the country. Any way they said power was restored to the town about 3 pm one day. Wife found a guy in his truck and when she said we still did not have power he said the whole town was on. Not for the 12-15 homes on our side. He followed her home and when I told him there was a pole down behind a house there he said they knew and it did not feed us. Strange a bunch of guys showed up about a hour later and replaced that pole and our power came back on then. Same thing about 3-4 weeks ago. Power was out for the town again after another storm. Said it was back on about 5 hours later at 1:30am but again the same area was still without power. Took them 4 hours to fix the pole next down the line from the last one that was down before our power came back on. Not sure why they still think that pole and line does not feed us but it sure has something to do with it
Aaron thank you for your videos I have been binge watching them. As an electronics tech and someone who has dealt with electricity my whole life its good to see a different side of the whole process. Wednesday we had a big storm roll through here in Houston and many are still without power. While on the nextdoor app there were people complaining about our linemen. Having watched many of your videos at this point I reassured them they are doing their best to restore power and that it's not as simple as throwing a switch to restore power. I referred them to your TH-cam and told them to watch the videos so they could get a understanding of what it takes. Again thank you for all your hard work and the information you share with us!!!
Thanks Cowboy! Appreciate you sharing the channel as well👊🤝. A big part of why I started documenting this stuff. A lot of people have no idea how much work is involved with what may appear to be a simple task..cheers!
I liked the different setups shown in this video. Especially the use of switches in series with the trip savers. Some of the guys that I’ve talked to have liked the ring test a lot like shown in a couple of your previous videos and this one.
Had a squirrel blown off the pole in my front yard. The lineman and I both decided we were just leaving it where it fell. It was gone the next morning, so I'm presuming it was coyote chow.
As one of the 20, Congrats to the winner! Many years ago I was awakened by two very loud explosions outside my apartment. I got dressed and went outside , walked up a few blocks and saw 7 spans of 3 phase 16kv (POCO had some odd voltages) completely gone. Near the far end of the spans was a very crispy seagull. The spans that fell before the recloser opened (this was a sideline of #6 harddrawn copper with NO cutouts, fed with large ASCR feeder,very stupid engineering, even the repair crew foreman was surprised) caused damage to a fence, burned some lawns and parts of the road, and burned a parked car, and there were hundreds of 2 inch bits of hard drawn copper everywhere. A length of the center phase was laying on one phase of the 4kv Primary underbuild, and very much live. As I approached the corner, a fire fighter was telling me to step back as HE reached out to move that wire out of the way. I screamed back telling him to stop and look UP, just before he made contact. The Chief (who I knew well) heard me yell, saw what I had seen, and came over and chewed his guy out. A very large crew showed up to fix the carnage, and seven hours later it was done.
@@liam3284 Indeed, and they didn't bother to add cutouts during the repair. That utility has some serious engineering/management issues, in that same area, there was an underground 16kv cable that failed repeatedly before they finally decided to replace ALL of it. A year later, the underground 4kv feeder from the substation that serviced my apt building and others around me failed. They replaced the faulty section, reenergized, then 20 minutes later another section failed. They replaced that section, powered up and within a minute yet another section blew. About 5 hours in I went to the riser pole to see how much longer for the fix. The crew was discussing bringing in portable generators and transformers to feed the overhead while they replaced all of the remaining sections of cable. I pointed out to the foreman the still functioning underground feed from another substation, and asked why not use insulated hotline jumpers to tie the overhead spans together, if the load was small enough. The foreman, who hated that I knew more about the system than he felt I should, got mad and told me to shut the f up. His boss overheard and asked him to call dispatch, find out what the pre-outage loads were, and get approval to do the tie I suggested. The boss talked to me while the now very angry foreman went to make the calls. He found out my background, and my relation to someone higher up in the company, and thanked me for possibly saving them a lot of time, labor and money. I then went back to my place and within a half hour power was back on. I went back to the riser to see the hotline jumpers in place. I later got a call from that foremans boss offering me a position with the company. 🙂 That foreman got fired a few months later, he evidently was rude to too many customers in the field and did have some poor decisions that cost the company too much money.
Really great videos man. I’m an Offshore HV Electrician with a past experience of LV streetlighting overhead lines. Some of your videos totally remind me of the harsh weather conditions I had to deal with and the sometimes difficult to find or unexpected faults that would occur as a result. Much respect from Scotland.
That fractals wood burn would actually mean a lot in a display for me honestly, bc your the only one here in North America who’s offered one and the daily life you live is part of what I’m interested in
Easy call-out! FPL near Ft Lauderdale loves the trip-savers. They are all over, even on single phase transformers. That had to cost some money! Too bad you didn't show the bird, people need to see exactly what power can do. Came across a channel yesterday, won't name it, but some yahoo doing distribution work and "doing it like the used to do it". Untrained, thinks he knows better and most of the comments love the guy. I'll give him a few years of effing around until he learns. Stay safe.
Definitely love the easy call outs! Hopefully the fella your talking about doesn't learn the hard way :/. .While safety has improved exponentially in recent years, there's definitely still lots cowboys. A lot of old school tricks were/are certainly effective but might dabble into some grey areas of safety... Promoting any unsafe work practices online worries me most with so many watching that are new to trade and looking for insight...
We had an interesting multiple brownout event here a few days ago along with a recloser trying to save the HV from the short. When the power came back two and a half hours later - still in a heavy lightning thunderstorm - I thought of y’all linemen out there taking care of business. Cheers.
We had a fault that took out a parts plant in Toronto .Some raccoon climbed up on the high side of a 120kv and got between the transformer case and the feed on the top of the insulator .Just left a black spot on the insulator and some hair .The crew came in and washed down the insulator and can of the transformer .Waited for it to dry and they Megger the transformer .Replaced the fuse and re energized .They lost a full day of production
Thanks for sharing that bit on the thorns. Back in 2016 I was doing yard work on a home I recently purchased and felt a pain in my arm, not enough pain to suspect a puncture, but upon investigation I could tell something was in there. I went to a local clinic, who actually numbed the spot and was ready to go in after what was in there, but at the last second decided not to. They instead gave me a tetanus shot and a prescription for antibiotics. 7 years later, and I can still feel the foreign object is under my skin. I don’t recall coming into contact with a thorny plant, but the object in my arm is almost exactly the size and shape of those thorns in your video. I had nearly forgotten about the incident until I saw the image of the thorn. I may do some research to see if those plants grow here.
Naw, that would have ruined the surprise. Besides, this was, as usual, a really great video, love how you show all of the process, and take extra care to not expose the public to the unfortunate critters who find out the hard way that 7200 volts isn't a good thing. Cheers, and thanks for placing me in the top 20. :)
👊North coast ("downeast") Maine USA. Hot today, missed your rain but it's coming. Hawthorn and Blackthorn, the Devil's bushes, can also set-off an immune system over-reaction. Keeps immunologists busy writing papers. Another vicious thorn plant is Osage Orange (mock orange, monkey ball). Most all the orange/citrus trees have thorns, but you mostly find them in orchards in Florida, Texas, Calif. Osage has been planted ALL over, as a cattle fence (before barbed wire) and as an ornament (but it doesn't look like much), and it runs wild. Workers in the US all know Poison Ivy and Poison Oak. If you get called more than couple miles into Maine, read up. (Yes, gloves, but wash the gloves before you touch the dirty side. The oils do not fade over time.) I wonder if that Hawthorn was a cattle fence along the road. I kinda wonder if that very-new ditch is newer than the pole you can't reach; we had no-ditch and silted-up ditches here you could back in and out of until 2 years ago when the town got a better backhoe so the road didn't wash-out so much. That's not a great excuse; I hate demarc and splice boxes facing the wrong way.
Hawthorns are NASTY. I stepped on one wearing sneakers as a teenager and had to go to the doctor for an antibiotic shot. My foot was swollen to twice normal size and the PAIN!!!!! The doctor said cellulitis. I haven't owned a pair of sneakers ever since. Interestingly, a couple hours after the shot the swelling was down and the pain was mostly gone. Thank God for lineman's boots!!!!!
Thanks for this video. I've heard the fuse blow on the distribution line, and it sounds like a firecracker. Now that we in the States are hearing the 4th of July, it's hard to tell the difference. They have installed S&C intellirupter equipment to try to avoid bigger outages near me.
sadly the worker didn’t think about the next person who will operate this switch , same for the TX when possible to make it more accessible to do maintenance on it !
Just a wild guess is that pole and its associated hardware were installed when the ground was clear because they had just made that drainage ditch. Those guys just didn't think ahead 10, 20, 30 years with the ground cover growing in. That said, ticks must be an issue for you guys while working in the brush. On another channel (construction) one of the guys stated they use flea collars (for dogs) and wrap one around each boot top. They are good for about 90 days, which is probably about the length of your season up there. On a different topic, our power went out yesterday due to a large branch falling on a primary, which burned through, dropped the line in the street, then burned a good size hole in the blacktop before the auto-recloser killed everything to about 3,000 customers. The FD was jumping through hoops because the intermittent power caused an elevator malfunction in a retirement home up the road. (was stuck between floors) This happened just after 4 pm on Sunday when the restaurants in town were starting to fill up. Several had a full patio when the kitchens had to close due to no exhaust fans... but the bar said they would still serve if people wanted to wait. (cash only, no credit card readers) Took about 4 hours for total restoration, which involved isolation of a few spans with rerouting to pick up most of the area in about 2-3 hours while work continued. All through this I am assisting with detouring traffic and explaining the process of how the power system works to the younger guys because I know some of the local circuits and which way the power flows through town. (years of FD and generator experience kicking in)
Can you do any videos going over transformer hookups, both single phase and three phase please? I’m struggling to find online resources to learn about transformer hookups. Thanks!
That was interesting about the new meters being checkable from the office. I came home to find an outage a week ago and called it in. The customer said she could see my meter and I should check the main breaker. I did, found it in the normal position, but reset it just to be on the safe side. I went out and looked at the meter and found it to be blank. I checked with the next door neighbor and she said the power had been out for several hours. I don’t know why the rep would have told me she could see my meter.
I lived in a condo with a smart meter, and my power company was Duke energy. The way they had it set up, my phone would immediately get a text message telling me my power was probably out. If I was home, that’s no big deal. If it was the power to my (hypothetical) summer cottage, then I would know there was an issue and might take action if I had a freezer full of food.
🤣🤣. They rarely actually fall off and when I responded to this same location years ago, it was sitting upright on the ground at the butt of the pole lol
I was called to an outage once where a raccoon met his demise on a transformer and then a hawk flew down to retrieve the raccoon and met the same fate. Thought it was all the same animal but never seen a bird with fir. Confused until I knocked them both off the can at the same time
Great videos, even though I'm not in this field, I like watching your videos to learn what goes on. I was wondering of the 3 phase lines on the top of poles but when there are other lines under the phase lines, how are they getting power to them, and could a line be directly connect to the 3 phase line with a transformer to be connected to a home or would be too much voltage????? When I'm driving around, and when I see so many lines on the poles, I say to myself, why so many lines? So I was wondering if you can do a video on explaining how the different lines/wires work. Thank you and to fellow lineman for keeping the power on. God Bless
This is why I wanted to be a lineman, I was an A wireman for over 34yrs, IBEW, I had no time to video, or anything like that, I'm just jealous, my job was service, had a lot of pressure and hard work, mostly by myself, witch I did prefer. Just saying.
I’ve been wanting to become a lineman for almost a year now and I think I’m actually going to enroll in school. My job pays $57/ hour for their line workers.
Recent subscriber here: Probably not going to go digging through your previous videos but I am loving the new content. Might check the most popular though.
Thanks for the sub! 🤝👊 Oddly enough, some of the most popular vids are ones that I was quite surprised got the most views lol. Many of the videos titled "being a lineman" have less editing and more in depth footage of calls we attends They don't get as many views likely because of the repeat thumbnail. I continue in that form because they appeal more to viewers that have a deep interest in the trade but might be slow and boring to some.
@@Bobsdecline Actually, I am looking into well paid careers with my twin sons in mind. Basically, I am looking to keep them in blue collar work and avoid massive college loans.
Oh nice! It's a great career that can literally take you anywhere in the world. The training is very diverse and open doors for movement into a variety of related tasks. Many lineman stay in the field of work for their entire career and many move into field safety, engineering groups or even work with tools and work methods for the trade.
Just don't be that Jokester. My friend whom is a Lineman (NE Ohio), took a dead squirrel back to the garage and put it in his co-workers locker as a joke to find for the next day. Unfortunately, the co-worker had gone on vacation for a week and it sat in his locker for that week. Needless to say it didn't smell great when he found it a week later.
I was wondering how you tell what voltage a power line is carrying? Is there any clues or indicators on the pole. Like a nearby transformer, the insulators, etc... that you can quickly recognize the voltage you're dealing with?
New to the channel love the content. @Bobsdecline could you explain what exactly happens in a phase to phase fault on power lines, the cause and result?
We just lost power for an 6 days in Oklahoma and it’s been 100+ degrees never realized I took them for granted but thank you guys all of you
Hey Mr. Aaron, my name is Corbin Hardwick, I’m a 22 year old linework student at Texas State Technical College way down here in Waco Texas and I just want to say thank you for starting your channel. Truly. I grew up trying to grow corn on a tiny sand dune in West Texas where technology is probably 10 years behind and the only real way to learn how to do things is to pry at the old men who try and gatekeep knowledge for sake of “figuring it out” and hearing your passion for the trade in all of your videos and how genuine you are ignites a fire inside of me I didn’t know I had. The biggest motivating factor for me to get out here every day in the 104° weather and climb up a pole is how sincerely relieved the customers seem when you turn the power back on. I can’t wait to get out there and work alongside guys like you because it’s more than just a job to people like us. I’ll finish up my certificate along with my Class A and my OSHA 30 come next month and man I truly appreciate all of the knowledge and support you have consistently provided through your channel. If you have any pointers for landing my first apprenticeship, that would be the icing on the cake! But again, I just wanted to say thank you 🤝
I’m goin to tstc as well for lineman but way way way really down here in Harlingen tx, how’s it going for you brother?
I had the pleasure of speaking with a groundman last week while someone was on the pole. My mother in law called me because her power was being really weird. Sort of rural area but in a subdivision. I went to make sure she wasn't just being funny and I saw 117 on one leg and 60 on the other to ground. Before I measured it I thought her entry or fuse box. (Yes 60 amp fuse service) but it looked fine.
Saw the guys up the road looking confused at the transformer that her and 6-8 houses were on.
I didn't want to distract but they both were looking all around and the guy in the air was not hands on. So I slowed down rolled my window and said I appreciate their work. I'm glad they are here. I can go to work now.
He is said "o see so your seeing this too?). They had actually thought it was just one house that has an issue. Said they had to go back to hq and pick up a new transformer and be back later.
Oddly enough my work is a small drainage creek from where they store all their transformers. I'll get a photo of their yard sometime and figure out how to share it.
You need a discord server or somthing. Although I appreciate your time into these videos and it must be a lot for you to do for everyone to learn from.
Be safe
Those bushes are certainly hawthorn. I have a lot of them on my farm in Sainte-Marie, I have no idea how many tires I've lost due to those stupid things. I've made it my life's mission to purge every last one of them from my land. I have been told it was the English who brought them over for hedge rows. I wish they had kept them in England, those trees are just evil.
16:16
I stress this to any of my apprentices. “ Think about the next person that needs to access or find this. Who knows, it might even be you. “
As someone who is currently getting into linework just out of lineschool, I hope to work under someone as knowledgeable and as excellent of a teacher as you are and in turn emulate those skills myself. Cannot wait to get started in this field after just getting out of the military and from my exposure so far to the work I absolutely love it.
Great job with Safely Removing the Dead Bird and Restoring Service to the Customer. Thanks! 👍🙏
Over the years I've got to chat with the lineman that covers this part of town thanks to the local tree rat population deciding to play on top of the transformer on the pole behind our garage and met their maker because of it. I've had to remove several expired squirrels off the roof of the garage or from under the pole. The most recent one was very unpleasant to say the least. Pro tip for when you report an outage were you have found the remains of a squirrel or other animal: If you're fill out a report online mention you found a dead squirrel at the bottom of the pole or if you see lineman flag them down and tell them and they're usually very grateful (and glad they don't have to patrol the whole line). Where we live there's a fused spur that comes off the main line then goes down one side of a three block cul-de-sac then loops back around the other side. For some dumb reason none of the transformers are fused.
Those might be CSP (self protected) transformers with internal primary fuses. Or they could be your POCO being cheap.
What is POCO?@@mxslick50
There was a crispy crow that hung upside down from the middle of a side line for at least a year. We don't know how it happened or why it was left there, but it was a local joke. Congratulations to the winner! That is a great example of no matter how we try to tame a natural force, it can always show it's wild side. Thank you for another interesting video, Aaron! Stay safe, and God bless.
As always…great job. Enjoy watching you work.
I always think of the other guy when I frame a pole. I try to frame for easy access with an extendo. Too to see ya brother. Great video as always
I highly doubt that would be the first dead bird those kids have ever seen. It's rural. People are real there.
i remember when I was a kid I watched this squirrel walk along the power line from my bedroom window when it got to this old ass looking transformer i heard a loud bang sparks flew everywhere and i watched this squirrel fall to its death that transformer gave that squirrel a nice little pop
Kind of unusual wiring on the pole with the trip savers. But like you say just a disconnect and a bypass arrangement! Beautiful country up there and thanks for the video Aaron.
I learn something with every video.
Good job. I used to hate getting a cat pole calls. Especially with the owner right there waiting for me to get kitty down and hoping I get the crt. killed before it moved around too much. Then problem two. They will tear you up. My technic. Get a pillow case from the owner and have a pair of elbow length leather welding gloves (line is dead and grounded). Grab cat, place in pillow case, hold end tight and tell owner don't open until they're in the house with the doors closed. I've had them get out and run right back up the pole.
And good comment on not leaving the deceased lay around
Since finding this channel, I now want to be a lineman. I’ve done work installing collision warning and GPS systems in Freightliners, International MV’s, 7600’s and more for Eversource, Altec, and more. As a kid, I always wanted to do something about lines and poles in my city. They almost always look sloppy. I respect and salute you Bob. Thanks for this inspiration.
"Sloppy" lines. I would love to hear that service call, "Hey, there are sloppy and old wires hanging from your poles all over town! You got to make them look a lot prettier."
I love your videos.
As someone who has two cockatoos (yah I'm crazy) I appreciate not showing the bird and taking it away from the area.
I've got a huge soft spot for animals... It may sound rediculous, but it sometimes bothers me a bit when I show up to find these innocent little fellas :(
seems my power has been better for the last 12 years. As I watch your vids I can see the new work as I walk the neighborhood.
maryland usa
The educational details you provide in your videos are unmatched anywhere on TH-cam. Thanks so much for providing this content👍
Thank You! very much long time watcher in Oregon! You are a true professional!
Thanks for a very educational and constructive video that really gives me appreciation for what you do. Stay safe!
Congrats to the winner
Bob: On the way back from PEI, I tried to explore the Milltown Hydro dam in St. Stephen. Needles to say it was very well secured.
Back in the late 70’s, my friend and I stopped by the Mactaquac on motorcycles, and was given a grand tour. Too cool.
Very interesting , thank you for posting
Love the learn and you do a great job of telling us what you are doing. Wish you would teach the guys around here. Power was out for the whole town back in June for 3 days. Power was out all around the area and they had crews in from all over the country. Any way they said power was restored to the town about 3 pm one day. Wife found a guy in his truck and when she said we still did not have power he said the whole town was on. Not for the 12-15 homes on our side. He followed her home and when I told him there was a pole down behind a house there he said they knew and it did not feed us. Strange a bunch of guys showed up about a hour later and replaced that pole and our power came back on then. Same thing about 3-4 weeks ago. Power was out for the town again after another storm. Said it was back on about 5 hours later at 1:30am but again the same area was still without power. Took them 4 hours to fix the pole next down the line from the last one that was down before our power came back on. Not sure why they still think that pole and line does not feed us but it sure has something to do with it
Aaron thank you for your videos I have been binge watching them. As an electronics tech and someone who has dealt with electricity my whole life its good to see a different side of the whole process. Wednesday we had a big storm roll through here in Houston and many are still without power. While on the nextdoor app there were people complaining about our linemen. Having watched many of your videos at this point I reassured them they are doing their best to restore power and that it's not as simple as throwing a switch to restore power. I referred them to your TH-cam and told them to watch the videos so they could get a understanding of what it takes. Again thank you for all your hard work and the information you share with us!!!
Thanks Cowboy! Appreciate you sharing the channel as well👊🤝. A big part of why I started documenting this stuff. A lot of people have no idea how much work is involved with what may appear to be a simple task..cheers!
Omg this is sooo awesome!!! Literally the coolest thing!!! Messaging you on Instagram now!!!
Nice! I'm online for a few minutes so I'll check right now.
As one of the other finalists, congrats to you sir!
@@mxslick50thank you!!!
Congratulations on winning the giveaway. I hope you enjoy the prize.
I liked the different setups shown in this video. Especially the use of switches in series with the trip savers. Some of the guys that I’ve talked to have liked the ring test a lot like shown in a couple of your previous videos and this one.
Had a squirrel blown off the pole in my front yard. The lineman and I both decided we were just leaving it where it fell. It was gone the next morning, so I'm presuming it was coyote chow.
As one of the 20, Congrats to the winner!
Many years ago I was awakened by two very loud explosions outside my apartment. I got dressed and went outside , walked up a few blocks and saw 7 spans of 3 phase 16kv (POCO had some odd voltages) completely gone. Near the far end of the spans was a very crispy seagull. The spans that fell before the recloser opened (this was a sideline of #6 harddrawn copper with NO cutouts, fed with large ASCR feeder,very stupid engineering, even the repair crew foreman was surprised) caused damage to a fence, burned some lawns and parts of the road, and burned a parked car, and there were hundreds of 2 inch bits of hard drawn copper everywhere.
A length of the center phase was laying on one phase of the 4kv Primary underbuild, and very much live. As I approached the corner, a fire fighter was telling me to step back as HE reached out to move that wire out of the way. I screamed back telling him to stop and look UP, just before he made contact. The Chief (who I knew well) heard me yell, saw what I had seen, and came over and chewed his guy out.
A very large crew showed up to fix the carnage, and seven hours later it was done.
The job of a fuse is to protect the wire, so stuff like that does not happen.
That had to have been scary
@@liam3284 Indeed, and they didn't bother to add cutouts during the repair.
That utility has some serious engineering/management issues, in that same area, there was an underground 16kv cable that failed repeatedly before they finally decided to replace ALL of it.
A year later, the underground 4kv feeder from the substation that serviced my apt building and others around me failed. They replaced the faulty section, reenergized, then 20 minutes later another section failed. They replaced that section, powered up and within a minute yet another section blew.
About 5 hours in I went to the riser pole to see how much longer for the fix. The crew was discussing bringing in portable generators and transformers to feed the overhead while they replaced all of the remaining sections of cable.
I pointed out to the foreman the still functioning underground feed from another substation, and asked why not use insulated hotline jumpers to tie the overhead spans together, if the load was small enough. The foreman, who hated that I knew more about the system than he felt I should, got mad and told me to shut the f up. His boss overheard and asked him to call dispatch, find out what the pre-outage loads were, and get approval to do the tie I suggested.
The boss talked to me while the now very angry foreman went to make the calls. He found out my background, and my relation to someone higher up in the company, and thanked me for possibly saving them a lot of time, labor and money. I then went back to my place and within a half hour power was back on. I went back to the riser to see the hotline jumpers in place.
I later got a call from that foremans boss offering me a position with the company. 🙂
That foreman got fired a few months later, he evidently was rude to too many customers in the field and did have some poor decisions that cost the company too much money.
Thanks for sharing the knowledge that you have. I’m a distribution design engineer and I really appreciate your videos.
Really great videos man. I’m an Offshore HV Electrician with a past experience of LV streetlighting overhead lines. Some of your videos totally remind me of the harsh weather conditions I had to deal with and the sometimes difficult to find or unexpected faults that would occur as a result. Much respect from Scotland.
That fractals wood burn would actually mean a lot in a display for me honestly, bc your the only one here in North America who’s offered one and the daily life you live is part of what I’m interested in
Easy call-out! FPL near Ft Lauderdale loves the trip-savers. They are all over, even on single phase transformers. That had to cost some money! Too bad you didn't show the bird, people need to see exactly what power can do. Came across a channel yesterday, won't name it, but some yahoo doing distribution work and "doing it like the used to do it". Untrained, thinks he knows better and most of the comments love the guy. I'll give him a few years of effing around until he learns.
Stay safe.
Definitely love the easy call outs! Hopefully the fella your talking about doesn't learn the hard way :/. .While safety has improved exponentially in recent years, there's definitely still lots cowboys.
A lot of old school tricks were/are certainly effective but might dabble into some grey areas of safety... Promoting any unsafe work practices online worries me most with so many watching that are new to trade and looking for insight...
lOVE THE VIDEO
Nice one Aaron, the Hawthorn there seems to have much bigger leaves than here in the UK, and thorns too!
"could've been a bird or something" lol
Awesome updates
Nice to get an easy one once in a while
Good job, you do your fuses just like I do
Congrats to the winner!
cut ooooooooooooooooooooooooooot
We had an interesting multiple brownout event here a few days ago along with a recloser trying to save the HV from the short. When the power came back two and a half hours later - still in a heavy lightning thunderstorm - I thought of y’all linemen out there taking care of business. Cheers.
We had a fault that took out a parts plant in Toronto .Some raccoon climbed up on the high side of a 120kv and got between the transformer case and the feed on the top of the insulator .Just left a black spot on the insulator and some hair .The crew came in and washed down the insulator and can of the transformer .Waited for it to dry and they Megger the transformer .Replaced the fuse and re energized .They lost a full day of production
Thanks for sharing that bit on the thorns. Back in 2016 I was doing yard work on a home I recently purchased and felt a pain in my arm, not enough pain to suspect a puncture, but upon investigation I could tell something was in there.
I went to a local clinic, who actually numbed the spot and was ready to go in after what was in there, but at the last second decided not to. They instead gave me a tetanus shot and a prescription for antibiotics. 7 years later, and I can still feel the foreign object is under my skin.
I don’t recall coming into contact with a thorny plant, but the object in my arm is almost exactly the size and shape of those thorns in your video. I had nearly forgotten about the incident until I saw the image of the thorn. I may do some research to see if those plants grow here.
Amazing how little fuse wire. Great video.
How we get electricity to our homes has always been an interest of mine, your videos have taught me so much. Thank you
A big hello from Bloomington, Indiana USA!
👍👊
Wow those thorn bushes make greenbriars seem not so bad. Those flies are not fun either. Welcome to summer in the woods!
"Cleared the bird!"
Always wanted to visit Sable Island...
Lol
Almost 3k a seat for an 8 hour tour and booked up for the year! Would be an amazing day trip!
@@Bobsdecline Ouch!
I had a squirrel with nose blown off on top of pole for 3 weeks, called electric co-op to remove, the co-op left it at pole base.
R.I.P. Lil Birdy.
Some non electrical hazards, those thorns looked mean.
Excellent video. Thanks for posting!!
Great job again like the way you show the work linemen do thanks 😊 iron river m.i.
Thanks for the ride along. You're pretty adept with those loooong extension poles. Good work.
Hey your welcome ! for stripping that bird wire extra long ,few years ago when the can was on the ground 🤜🏿
Lol
Hey all!
Feel free to skip from approx. 13:15 to 14:15 if you aren't interested in hearing the results of the fractal wood burn giveaway!
Naw, that would have ruined the surprise. Besides, this was, as usual, a really great video, love how you show all of the process, and take extra care to not expose the public to the unfortunate critters who find out the hard way that 7200 volts isn't a good thing. Cheers, and thanks for placing me in the top 20. :)
👊North coast ("downeast") Maine USA. Hot today, missed your rain but it's coming.
Hawthorn and Blackthorn, the Devil's bushes, can also set-off an immune system over-reaction. Keeps immunologists busy writing papers.
Another vicious thorn plant is Osage Orange (mock orange, monkey ball). Most all the orange/citrus trees have thorns, but you mostly find them in orchards in Florida, Texas, Calif. Osage has been planted ALL over, as a cattle fence (before barbed wire) and as an ornament (but it doesn't look like much), and it runs wild.
Workers in the US all know Poison Ivy and Poison Oak. If you get called more than couple miles into Maine, read up. (Yes, gloves, but wash the gloves before you touch the dirty side. The oils do not fade over time.)
I wonder if that Hawthorn was a cattle fence along the road. I kinda wonder if that very-new ditch is newer than the pole you can't reach; we had no-ditch and silted-up ditches here you could back in and out of until 2 years ago when the town got a better backhoe so the road didn't wash-out so much. That's not a great excuse; I hate demarc and splice boxes facing the wrong way.
Thanks for the videos
Hawthorns are NASTY. I stepped on one wearing sneakers as a teenager and had to go to the doctor for an antibiotic shot. My foot was swollen to twice normal size and the PAIN!!!!! The doctor said cellulitis. I haven't owned a pair of sneakers ever since. Interestingly, a couple hours after the shot the swelling was down and the pain was mostly gone. Thank God for lineman's boots!!!!!
grew up around box thorns, both are nasty things.
Bird got zapped like a fly in a bug zapper. Lol. ⚡️⚡️🐦💥⚡️⚡️
Thanks for this video. I've heard the fuse blow on the distribution line, and it sounds like a firecracker. Now that we in the States are hearing the 4th of July, it's hard to tell the difference. They have installed S&C intellirupter equipment to try to avoid bigger outages near me.
sadly the worker didn’t think about the next person who will operate this switch , same for the TX when possible to make it more accessible to do maintenance on it !
Just a wild guess is that pole and its associated hardware were installed when the ground was clear because they had just made that drainage ditch. Those guys just didn't think ahead 10, 20, 30 years with the ground cover growing in. That said, ticks must be an issue for you guys while working in the brush. On another channel (construction) one of the guys stated they use flea collars (for dogs) and wrap one around each boot top. They are good for about 90 days, which is probably about the length of your season up there. On a different topic, our power went out yesterday due to a large branch falling on a primary, which burned through, dropped the line in the street, then burned a good size hole in the blacktop before the auto-recloser killed everything to about 3,000 customers. The FD was jumping through hoops because the intermittent power caused an elevator malfunction in a retirement home up the road. (was stuck between floors) This happened just after 4 pm on Sunday when the restaurants in town were starting to fill up. Several had a full patio when the kitchens had to close due to no exhaust fans... but the bar said they would still serve if people wanted to wait. (cash only, no credit card readers) Took about 4 hours for total restoration, which involved isolation of a few spans with rerouting to pick up most of the area in about 2-3 hours while work continued. All through this I am assisting with detouring traffic and explaining the process of how the power system works to the younger guys because I know some of the local circuits and which way the power flows through town. (years of FD and generator experience kicking in)
Can you do any videos going over transformer hookups, both single phase and three phase please? I’m struggling to find online resources to learn about transformer hookups. Thanks!
That was interesting about the new meters being checkable from the office. I came home to find an outage a week ago and called it in. The customer said she could see my meter and I should check the main breaker. I did, found it in the normal position, but reset it just to be on the safe side. I went out and looked at the meter and found it to be blank. I checked with the next door neighbor and she said the power had been out for several hours. I don’t know why the rep would have told me she could see my meter.
Oh strange, definitely didn't look at something right 🤔
I lived in a condo with a smart meter, and my power company was Duke energy. The way they had it set up, my phone would immediately get a text message telling me my power was probably out.
If I was home, that’s no big deal. If it was the power to my (hypothetical) summer cottage, then I would know there was an issue and might take action if I had a freezer full of food.
Great vid as usual!
enjoy your videos even though I'm a software engineer / musician. Cheers from Quebec, neighbor ✌
Transformer is still on the pole-thats a good sign- no way you said that, in that serious way! made my day!
🤣🤣. They rarely actually fall off and when I responded to this same location years ago, it was sitting upright on the ground at the butt of the pole lol
Weird coincidence. Just 20 minutes ago I was playing around on Google Earth Pro and popped up a photo of a horse on Sable Island.
I was called to an outage once where a raccoon met his demise on a transformer and then a hawk flew down to retrieve the raccoon and met the same fate. Thought it was all the same animal but never seen a bird with fir. Confused until I knocked them both off the can at the same time
I'm surprised the bird didn't go poof
Great videos, even though I'm not in this field, I like watching your videos to learn what goes on. I was wondering of the 3 phase lines on the top of poles but when there are other lines under the phase lines, how are they getting power to them, and could a line be directly connect to the 3 phase line with a transformer to be connected to a home or would be too much voltage????? When I'm driving around, and when I see so many lines on the poles, I say to myself, why so many lines? So I was wondering if you can do a video on explaining how the different lines/wires work. Thank you and to fellow lineman for keeping the power on. God Bless
Thanks for the comment!
I'll see if can can put something together in the near future. Great idea for a vid! 👊
Great video and informative
10amp fuse is 72000 watts. Trip savers are just stupid and heavy and we’ve had nothing but trouble with them IMHO
Mmmm a pint of dry Blackhthorn 🍎🍏🍺😋
Hard wood slivers will cause the infection also
Tripsavers. FPL is in love with those.
Avian covers could help prevent this and fires that could start from the contact.
Thanks for the videos. Retired member local 400 ibew
This is why I wanted to be a lineman, I was an A wireman for over 34yrs, IBEW, I had no time to video, or anything like that, I'm just jealous, my job was service, had a lot of pressure and hard work, mostly by myself, witch I did prefer. Just saying.
On a single transformer like that we would only have the cut out at the road and only an arrestor at the transformer.
Interesting video. I always wondered how you guys fix this issue.
I’ve been wanting to become a lineman for almost a year now and I think I’m actually going to enroll in school. My job pays $57/ hour for their line workers.
Good thoughts about the animal remains.
Great video
If your power goes out and you start smelling chicken you now know why
Unfortunately the animal biohazard is sometimes better than the human customer
Great job. Don't forget your (non voltage rated) gloves next time!
Recent subscriber here: Probably not going to go digging through your previous videos but I am loving the new content. Might check the most popular though.
Thanks for the sub! 🤝👊
Oddly enough, some of the most popular vids are ones that I was quite surprised got the most views lol. Many of the videos titled "being a lineman" have less editing and more in depth footage of calls we attends
They don't get as many views likely because of the repeat thumbnail. I continue in that form because they appeal more to viewers that have a deep interest in the trade but might be slow and boring to some.
@@Bobsdecline Actually, I am looking into well paid careers with my twin sons in mind. Basically, I am looking to keep them in blue collar work and avoid massive college loans.
Oh nice! It's a great career that can literally take you anywhere in the world.
The training is very diverse and open doors for movement into a variety of related tasks.
Many lineman stay in the field of work for their entire career and many move into field safety, engineering groups or even work with tools and work methods for the trade.
Would be nice at 3:10 to later put an easy drawing and diagram in order to understand it better. It is very hard to understand just in words.
I agree! I added a few words after that clip mentioning that I'll follow up in a future video, but turns it out I didn't hit record 🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
Hawthorne trees are nasty they will go through your boots and tires the dead thorns are worse
something both fuse blown. that bird took more than 10 amps to ground.
👊 Colorado USA
👊👊
Just don't be that Jokester. My friend whom is a Lineman (NE Ohio), took a dead squirrel back to the garage and put it in his co-workers locker as a joke to find for the next day. Unfortunately, the co-worker had gone on vacation for a week and it sat in his locker for that week. Needless to say it didn't smell great when he found it a week later.
can you show close up the fuse, how are you able to bring it down and then just hook it back up?
I was wondering how you tell what voltage a power line is carrying? Is there any clues or indicators on the pole. Like a nearby transformer, the insulators, etc... that you can quickly recognize the voltage you're dealing with?
Sometimes you have to do it on a Sunday
And...Nobody hit any poles this weekend!
New to the channel love the content. @Bobsdecline could you explain what exactly happens in a phase to phase fault on power lines, the cause and result?