Pride in your work

[Koga]

I guess this is in response to Trampbags' post about doing just enough to get by. I dont consider myself one of those that just slaps it up anyway I can. Im not the fastest, but Im far from being the slowest.And I don't claim to be the best Ive ever seen , he retired about 5 years ago. I was lucky enough to have apprenticed under him and watched him closely.(Thanks Walter !) He didnt brag about it ,he did it,did it right and made it look so easy. What I do have is pride in my work. Take a minute and shape that wire up, nail that pole ground back down,cut all those old connectors out and clean it up .Double check everything before I come down .When I finish a pole and come down I will be glad to say I did it. Its what I learned from him and what I try to instill in my apes. Some get it some dont .

Koga

[BigClive]

Ever noticed that the guys who really know the technical side of things sometimes seem a bit slower than the dumb bang-it-up monkeys. I can think of a few companies that have dumped all the technically capable guys in favour of the fast ones. It shows.... Especially when things go wrong.

A while back I was dong work which involved terminating a lot of cables into control systems. I was doing the job properly. Stripping the cable, twsting, folding and filling the terminals with copper so the clamp got a good bite. I suddenly realised that the guys who were just stripping and ramming the wires in without any consideration for connection quality were obviously much faster than I was. In the end I compromised and had to strip and clamp like the others but with a bit more care. Otherwise I risked being laid off for being too slow.

The number of connection faults down to loose wires and clamped plastic were high on their jobs. But what can you do. The suits don't know the difference between a good and bad job until it burns later.

[Squizzy]

Its funny that you say that Clive while i was doing sparky work at the local utility i was wiring protection panels. When you finished a QA guy came and checked you work. You would have to re-make all connections that had been stripped with pliers and had been twisted with pliers.
But i know what you say about doing a job properly and neatly they just changed around all our crews and we have going around for the last 2 weeks fixing all their work that has been deemed not to comply with constuction standards so at least the job will done right in the end it just pi$$es me off fixing other peoples errors.....

[BigClive]

I can appreciate the stripping with pliers bit. It does tend to nick the wire if not done carefully. I tend to twist by hand to put a light twist that keeps the conductors together during insertion. I also give the wire a good pull after tightening the connection to make sure it's solid.

If over twisted then the connection can come slack with modest cable movement.

There's a science to terminal block you know. :)

[Squizzy]

Yep all our cable ends were eighther simply stripped and put in a compression terminal or if the terminal was a screw type we use one of those lip blade lugs. Wiring harnesses or lumes they were a art and a science! Keeping them all straight and making the loops coming out all even and enough length to get a clamp meter on....

[Stinger]

Amen to that. I want to walk away from my jobs knowing that it was done right the first time. In the contracting business we can not afford to back to the same pole twice, we are in business to make money, not lose money and that is what happens when QA comes out with a punch list. Simply follow their specs, and do the job safely and with pride, if we do it right, we never have to go back to that pole again. Safe quality production are easy goals when you take pride in your work and workmanship.

[Trampbag]

I had to go back and read exactly what I said before I commented. I surely never said that linemen, or myself, don’t take pride in their work, except possibly the 15% of the guys that aren’t worth a fig or are incompetent. Those include the shirkers, slackers, drinkers and drugies and just the plain incompetent.

There is no way anyone can operate 100% all the time; flat out, teeth bared. Just the constraint put on a hand by the company doesn’t allow it. Hell, if I could do linework like I believe it should be done everything would look better, last longer, be more customer friendly and be easier to work on, but I have to do it the way I am told as do all of us. That’s how I get paid, following orders. Unfortunately I have had to, and probably continue to, work under supervision of shirkers, slackers, drinkers and drugies and the plain incompetent. Not to mention the engineers who have these brilliant ideas, at times, that just don’t add up to efficient linework.

I will continue to do linework the way I was taught, building it as if I were going to be the one to have to work the pole again.

But I did say, “Why not stop talking sh*t and say it like it really is, about 99.75% of us do what is necessary and not one bit more on most days, as little as possible on a few days and are on fire once in a while.” And I meant it then and do now. Anyone who has been around for any length of time knows exactly what I mean.
Do it once, do it right.