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Ryan,
You’d probably do a triple-take if you saw a phone man looking for a leak in a pressurized cable…
They use a parabolic mike and just listen for the HISSSSS. Looks like a 12″ DSS-like dish on a pistol grip (with amplifier built in), and an earphone.
The troubleman/splicer will just walk the section of aerial cable that’s been losing pressure. One guy I saw doing just that told me that the little dish was his favorite tool.
I’m guessing that’s because it allows him to find a weak spot in the cable and fix it on a nice dry, sunny day, and not during a winter storm with a dozen people reporting no dial tone or heavy static on the line…
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Today, I saw something that made me scratch my head.
Chained to a telephone pole in a residental neighborhood, there was an air tank. One of the type that looks like a welding bottle from a blow torch. This tank was brown, had a regulator attached and had a hose that went up the pole and was attached to some sort of manifold with hose or wire or something leaving the manifold and going off in both directions to the next set of poles.
I was in my truck and went around the block again to make sure I really saw what I though I saw.
Does anybody know what this was?
*Now you know what causes that hissing sound you so often hear in the background when you make a phone call.
*RyanProbably nitrogen, but could have been Argon, etc. A lot of phone lines were/are insulated with paper to save space. The stuff draws moisture, and causes the "crackling" you can often here on a phone line. They'll use dry air or nitrogen etc to disperse the moisture. See, there is a little truth to the prank of telling people to cover their phone overnight with a bag because you're gonna "blow out the static" at nightScott
*The line men use it to make sure all the connections are tight. You've certainly heard the term "had a hissy fit"? A tight connection means no hissy.
*I work at a Telco. The main trunk bundles are all sealed in pipes and pressurized with gas to detect damage to the cables. If the pressure drops there's a problem. It's not usually the kind of thing that extends out to residential service lines though. What you saw might have been some additional early warning equipment installed for a particularily important run of cable or fiber.Modern residential wiring is usually protected from moisture with a grease like substance which is encased with the wire in the manufacturing process of the cables. Installers lovingly refer to it as "hand lotion". Better them than me!
*Ryan,You'd probably do a triple-take if you saw a phone man looking for a leak in a pressurized cable...They use a parabolic mike and just listen for the HISSSSS. Looks like a 12" DSS-like dish on a pistol grip (with amplifier built in), and an earphone.The troubleman/splicer will just walk the section of aerial cable that's been losing pressure. One guy I saw doing just that told me that the little dish was his favorite tool.I'm guessing that's because it allows him to find a weak spot in the cable and fix it on a nice dry, sunny day, and not during a winter storm with a dozen people reporting no dial tone or heavy static on the line...
*"One guy I saw doing just that told me that the little dish was his favorite tool"Think he might be listening in on ______________ ? The neighbor having a argumentThe conversation with your girl friend............
*Maybe the lines were sagging, they were just blowing them up.............
*He's HOT, he's on a roll.....................
*We have one of those lines a block away, and did see a guy walking down the street with a headphone, a parabolic pickup, and a distracted look on his face.I could not resist and asked, "Excuse me, but ... what the hell are you doing?" (actually I yelled it into the mike ... just kidding.) Yes, looking for leaks. Not a job I would want...
*I'll bet you anything our kids will be sayin' to each other someday "...yeah, and do you remember when phones used to be hooked to wires?" Pretty soon all phones will be wireless, I bet.
*Ha! What phone? They'll communicate by neural implants or some such...
*My dad spent 40 years with the power company. They had a transformer once that needed some oil. As they were adding it, he overheard an elderly man sitting on the porch say to his grandson, "See I told you there wouldn't no such thing as electricity. That oil runs through them hollow tubes to the house and burns in them there bulbs!"