UNDERGROUND TRACING – What to use?
UNDERGROUND WIRE TRACING – What to use?
What works for you in tracing underground wiring?
Can you rent one somewhere? Dig we must for a better tomorrow.
We have an area lighting circuit with Wh, Blue, Yellow incoming at a dead light. Checking the combinations, one pair gives OL, one gives 2-3v, one gives a 120 flag on the Vol Con, a slowly rising voltage reading on the digital meter and will slooooly light a 15w lamp.
It doesn’t come on. It begins to glow and the glow grows. When you hook just the yellows together across the light, the gate light beyond goes on, but not the light in between.
Boss recalls someone else got the sump pump contact back when and ran a 2″ PVC line to the curb, crossing the path of this lighting circuit. Could they have?? Is there an underground splice box there somewhere? Got to trace this circuit.
Boss is willing to buy. Eyes kind of rolled back at the Greenlee at $830, but then I showed him one for $2300. He needed coffee after that. Would love to rent.
Had one on another job that was blue and came in a blue case. Seemed to work. Looked like a Chevy model. Can’t remember the name.
The ToolBear
“Never met a man who couldn’t teach me something.” Anon.
Replies
Check around and find out how to use the 2 wire divining rods. The rods will indicate the location of the two lines where they may cross. The rod will locate sprinkler,telephone,sewer, water lines too.
To make the device, get #12 copper wire or a continuous wire coat hanger. Bend it into an "L" shape with the short leg approximately 8" and 2'-3' on the long leg, make two of them. Get two 3/4" PVC pipes that are 6" long.
To operate hold the two pipes, one in each hand, perpendicular to the ground. Place the two short ends (of the wires)into the tops of the pipes. Hold the pipes so the wires are almost parallel to the ground but tipped slightly down so the wire are parallel and pointing in the direction you are walking.
As you walk, the wires will cross as it goes over a pipe, wire, etc.
Its hard to explain, it works for me but I cannot tell whether it is water, electrical or sewer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divining_rod
Edited 1/16/2007 7:02 pm by Sungod
I wanted to put in a drainline.I knew that it would be near the sewer pressure line from my sewer injector pump and my neighbors which feeds in to my line.Also there are electric lines run from each house to the pumps.I called the city maintance man that maintains there to see if he had any more infomration about the details of how they where run.I had some ideas, but wanted another head.So he said that he was good with a diving rod and proceeded to "trace" the lines.Well I knew where they where at the property line as there was a flush mounted access to a shut off valve. And the start of the electric lines where run (way too) close to the surface and I had exposed those. And he did not come anywhere never them.So I used the path that he said had the lines in them to run my drainline and it was perfectly clear..
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A-holes. Hey every group has to have one. And I have been elected to be the one. I should make that my tagline.
It seems the ability to divine depends on the pattern of blood vessels in your brain. Some got it and some don't.
I don't, but I taught one of my old bosses to to it and he was awesomely accurate.SamT
So much of the success of a company is not determined by degrees but temperature. gb93433 83537.46
I use a device for locating irrigation wires and valves. Don't have the name handy but out worked a few "pro" models. Even my sparky liked it better than his. It will not work on live wires!!!!
I can get it Wed?
Not to high jack this thread but could you e-mail me from my profile with the name and or picture??
I've a missing irrigation valve on a 9 hole golf course. (long story short?....... My father put in the golf course for a well to do guy here in Montreal and the grass has grown over the valve cover.) Now the valve is not working and I fear that the lines are full of water and it's -20 now. Gonna have to dig come spring."No doubt exists that all women are crazy; it's only a question of degree." - W.C. Fields
For the benefit of all I use a Progressive Electronics Wire and Valve locator Model 528.
It has found more valve boxes and bad splices than I care to mention. It has also been used on some commercial parking lots to find broken wires to the lighting under the pavement with pin-point precision. It did not do so great one day in a friends driveway trying to find a break in his direct bury feed to the house. It turns out the soil was very wet and it messes with the grounding requirement. It did get us in the area within 4 feet. My complaint was that I was used to dead on.
I also bought a smaller model that works better than nothing from the same company. It does not work as well but it does work.
Don't make the mistake of working on the wires while the tone generator is still active. It smarts.
Try a LOCATING service.
But I looked in the yellow pages and did not see any. They might be listed under contractor or exchevating. And excavators might know who to suggest.
The one that I know of in this area does all of the locating for residential state One Call utility marking servives. They do it all by tracing the lines.
You can try calling rental places.
But I suspect that a lot of this is specailized and the pro's know which type of system to use in which application.
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A-holes. Hey every group has to have one. And I have been elected to be the one. I should make that my tagline.
somebody on another board said they where able to rent one from sunbelt rentals
or something like this would work
http://www.toolup.com/productinfo.asp?pid=%7BA6B59D51-1B20-432C-9EE7-CEDB19205128%7D&AdCamp=Froogle_Feed&utm_source=froogle&utm_medium=froogle1&utm_term=Greenlee%20508S
Saw one that looked like what I had on another job - with 94 acres of area lights, all fed with # 8 or # 10 alum. UFer. It was about $700. Still under the Greenlee we are looking at.
The ToolBear
"Never met a man who couldn't teach me something." Anon.
I have a Fisher M-Scope. It's a two-part unit, one transmitter, one receiver. When tracing wires, there's a clip on the transmitter that is attached to the wire where it emerges from the ground. The transmitter also has a "ground plate", not really a ground but its some sort of antenna which is a flat piece of steel about the size of a pack of cigarettes. The steel plate is inserted into the ground (or laid flat if over pavement). This setup sends a signal into the wire which can then be followed with the receiver. The receiver is waved over the ground in the general vicinity of the buried wire. When the receiver crosses the wire, there is a null (or an audible change) in the tone that is emitted from the receiver. Usually works pretty good, unless there's a break in the wire. IMO, divining rods are voodoo. For those disagree, I have a pail full of brazing rods, uh, I mean divining rods, that I'll let you have for only $10/pair. Solid brass and fully customizable to the curves of your own hand, can use to locate potable water, pipes, gas lines, buried wires, underground tanks, or whatever. Accuracy guaranteed to within +/- half an acre. No skeptics please!
Usually works pretty good, unless there's a break in the wire.
I think we have a partial break and gomer repair underground.
Can I use brass plates steel curtain rods for dowsing? Or does it have to be full brass. <g>The ToolBear
"Never met a man who couldn't teach me something." Anon.
I once saw a set of divining rods that were telescoping, chrome-plated brass, with swivel handles and plastic bicycle handle bar grips. A friend bought these at the dowsing convention that is held every year in VT (Lyndonville I think). Saw another guy from a city utility department use straightened out coat hangers to locate a water main. It's like asking a bunch of carpenters which hammer is best, there's no one right answer.