REA Co op system maps

[Dbearman]

Wanted to check and see how many Co op linemen have access to system maps in their trucks. We have about 17,000 meters and still work from memory and pole numbers to find locations. It can be a real pain in the ass at times. We had a crew kill out a line and re-energize it without knowing another crew was working on it due to lack of information. Dispatch also had a trouble crew sent out when customers started calling in about the outage. Thankfully everyone followed the safety rules and no harm was done. Its very easy to get confused when one tap has 2 different numberings on it and only the trouble truck had the updated pole numbering sheet. Management says computers for trucks are too expensive. They must think that injuries are cheaper !

[wtdoor67]

Onliest place I ever worked that didn't have good maps was that friggin Muni.

Simplest thing in the world is to just keep the original construction drawings on file plus a few copies.

That Muni used to crack me up. Especially on URD problems. "Let's call old Fred, he's the one who put this stuff in." I said. "What y'all gonna do when old Fred dies?"

They had some duzie outages on underground. They used to jump them backyards looking for the NO as they likely didn't have them mapped or marked. I used to die laughing as some of them guys would jump in them back yards at night and fight them Rottweilers. Wonder they didn't get shot by a nervous home owner.

I remember one, thank God I didn't get in on it. Large addition and no-one could find ****. People were following them around as it was hotter hell in the summer and no air conditioning etc. Started out about dark and got it back on about daylite the next day. Old lady was out and of course didn't know how to get her garage door open manually. Kept following the hands around in her Cadillac and would periodically roll the window down and say. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

I went alone one morning to help the 2 call out guys. The goof ball who was senior couldn't figure out how to isolate it. He had looked in a few pad mts. and then went and put the bad phase on another feed blowing that fuse also. When I got there he had a kid up the pole replacing the fuse. That kid I expect had about 6 months experience. I started down the run opening pad mts. About the 4th or 5th one found an elbow burned off. Bystander said. Yeah there was a guy looked in there awhile ago. Goofball was so nervous it didn't register with him that he had found the fault.

SOB's. I remember once hanging a **** pot and when we checked the voltage in the meter base I realized it was paralled inside. I climbed the **** pole, pulled off the lid and put em in series. SOB's didn't have sense enough to mark anything. I got to where I checked secondary continuity before hanging pots. Gotta love them little Munis.

Sent me out a 480 pot once on a bad 120/240 bank pot.

[Trbl639]

The co=op I worked for didn't have any.....us T-men just went by memory ..more or less.............the Supt had a base radio at his house, and he knew that whole system like the back of his hand.if ya had trouble finding a single customer outage at night, Old Max would get ya there.........heard him tell one of the guys one night, turn down so and so road, 3rd hose on the right, got a green boat sitting in the yard...hello, everybody in this neck of the woods has a green boat sitting in the yard!!!!!

The outfit I retired from, all the T-men had 'mini-maps' (most crew trucks too), but they were like 1"=2000ft, and small as hell and last time they were upgraded was like in the late to mid 70's.......most of the T=men had notes scribbled all over ours, but they worked.........when I retired we had the computers in the trucks with all the maps on em...crews still don't, but the T=men do........I worked Arkansas, but if I went to one of our sister companies (MS, LA, TX) on storm, I had the maps for there too, and it sure was NICE!!! I good enter a TLN (transformer location number) and it would tell me how to get there, or what size and type pot/# of customers/phase/% loaded...on switches, fuse size etc........like I said it was Nice!!!

[Pootnaigle]

Ummmmmm Maps on urd aint as great as ya mite expect.......... specially when somebody else had a prollem a few weeks or months or even years ago n moved the normal open and isolated the bad span of cable n it was never put back to normal. In some cases it wuznt repaired neither. I jus hated them kind