Some of this year's gong show ;)

[245dlc]

As some of you know my family and I made the move from Manitoba to Alberta earlier this summer. It was tough and took a lot of work but we did it. Within a week of being moved in to our new place I found a job and the spent the first few weeks driving semi-truck, something I was trying to avoid but eventually I got into an excavator cab and several other machines. The company is pretty sketchy and pays poorly, 99% of the truck fleet should be scrapped and turned in to rebar they were so wore out. The first dump truck I drove had an 18spd manual transmission as most of them did but was so worn out if I tried to put it into first gear I would actually be in reverse so I always started it off in low all the time. They also had a 2,000 u.s. gallon water tanker truck that was having major engine issues and went through a gallon of engine oil and coolant every day and was emitting so much white smoke out the breather and exhaust that one of the younger drivers thought it was on fire!
When I did get on to an excavator it was a Komatsu PC350 that I was to use to tear down a couple of old buildings at an Irrigation maintenance yard but of course they were too cheap to put a screen or lexan windshield on the cab or fix the air conditioning so it was pretty dangerous and dusty doing that job but I was a little happier that I was in a machine. I can go on but I'll just post some pictures.

[245dlc]

After the buildings like the little one in the pictures were removed we had to put in new sewer and water services for a new shop that we were suppose to do the ground work for a foundation. The water table is high in that area so the engineers had designed the sewer and water services to be much shallower than normal so in order to keep the pipes from freezing in the winter the pipes had to be insulated with 8 inches of styrofoam before being backfilled and properly compacted. First thing was to hire somebody to cut a hole in an existing sanitary manhole which was an interesting process, much like Druid's boring machine a special diamond studded coring saw is used and set up on a surveyed spot on the bottom of the manhole. I don't think it took the guy much more than 45 minutes from setup to cutting through the bench to core his hole.

[245dlc]

'Coring' the hole for the sewer pipe turned out to be the easiest part as we had to dig under overhead powerlines, underground telephone lines and one on the surface, and a gas line.... We also had conflicts with the engineering company over the quality of the backfill and our compaction methods as well mechanical issues with the excavator mounted plate compactor as management wouldn't rent a proper trench compactor. In the end management was finally able to reason with the engineers and we mixed the parking lot gravel with the silty clay and that helped us get the moisture content down significantly...

[245dlc]

When we did the water line tie in we had difficulty finding the right shut off and ended up having to turn off the water to a large residential area there was a fair bit of difficulty getting the new 6" water line tied in and I think it was largely due to inexperience and we didn't get it completed until about eight 'o' clock in the evening and we had quite a few angry residents because of it.

[245dlc]

I think this is where I will end for the night and if you guys have any questions about what's going on in the pictures don't be afraid to ask.

[ianoz]

Digging around services is always interesting. Hopeing that they were put in properly ,danger tape /sand etc .
I did a job a while back Locating a Fault in an Optic Fibre Cable . Telco's Guidelines said , not to machine dig within 6 metres of the cable .Boss man said dig , and don't hit it

[245dlc]

Yeah they should of done more with the hydrovac truck when they exposed those lines as we had to often re-dig them as the hole would cave in. They didn't want to have to pay more to the company with the hydrovac truck so it got pretty frustrating and scary sometimes.

[Muz]

Digging around services is always interesting. Hopeing that they were put in properly ,danger tape /sand etc .
I did a job a while back Locating a Fault in an Optic Fibre Cable . Telco's Guidelines said , not to machine dig within 6 metres of the cable .Boss man said dig , and don't hit it

And you know why eh ? .. cos you cant repair or joint it ?

[ianoz]

And you know why eh ? .. cos you cant repair or joint it ?

Maybe you Scotsmen can't . But Aussies can ..Did a job for them,A guy had dug a hole and went straight through the Optic fibre cable . i had to expose it back 6 metres each way, they then park their van beside the trench and splice the cable ,They add a piece to one end , then move the van to the other end and splice the added piece to the broken end the spliced ends are put into a box and sealed off .Those boxes then have a pit put around them ,if it ever gives trouble again .

[v8druid]

Digging around services is always interesting. Hopeing that they were put in properly ,danger tape /sand etc .
I did a job a while back Locating a Fault in an Optic Fibre Cable . Telco's Guidelines said , not to machine dig within 6 metres of the cable .Boss man said dig , and don't hit it

Six metres FFS - what you supposed to do ...... swear at it 'til it jumps out the ground !!!! Vac ex presumably?

Did yer hit it?

[v8druid]

Maybe you Scotsmen can't . But Aussies can ..Did a job for them,A guy had dug a hole and went straight through the Optic fibre cable . i had to expose it back 6 metres each way, they then park their van beside the trench and splice the cable ,They add a piece to one end , then move the van to the other end and splice the added piece to the broken end the spliced ends are put into a box and sealed off .Those boxes then have a pit put around them ,if it ever gives trouble again .

How the hell do they decide which fibre is which to join to?

[Muz]

How the hell do they decide which fibre is which to join to?

I thought they have to back to a 'node' and replace a whole section ... I certainly didn't know any other repair was possible Ian ?

[ianoz]

Yep , Watched the guy do it .Fibres are ided, cut , cleaned put into the splicer , i think any electric charge is is put into the fibre as they are are moved together ,and it fuses the two ends together .. Then the Splicer tests the joint and if ok , do the next one , if not cut and resplice .

[v8druid]

amazing ....... HTF do they ID them???????? must be hundreds in a bundle

[ianoz]

The splicing process .