Monkeys with wrenches, Chickens with electricity, and other things that don’t make sense-A day in the life of an off-grid solar installer

[monkeyswrench]

"Hollywood Showers"?! I didn't see any prostitutes walking the trees

That's great that some of the long timers have shown up, and seen what you two were doing. Those generators have burned a lot of diesel over the years. Sadly, if they wanted to change out to a newer one, most that size are running egr coolers, and soon will be required to have DEF systems. This should help the existing generators live a much longer life.

 

[RichL]

I applaud your labeling efforts. Always considered that as a sign of professionalism.

 

[Mandelon]

So they had a ton of old batteries? Do you take those off for recycling or is that up to the camp?

The electricians around here are all about collecting any scraps worth recycling. Is that something you bother with?

 

[Willie B]

… I read this thread last night… for the first time… I am massively impressed… I built my own solar power system under the somewhat watchful eye of a German electronics engineer… He handed me a schematic… and kind of said … go for it… It worked flawlessly for 21 years…

…But… It was nothing compared to the magnitude of what you have done… A big big round of applause for U2… You should be very proud…

 

[The Chicken]

Thursday, week 4.
It seems obvious that the solar power system is done, running, and everyone is happy with it.
So it looks like we are done here and should be packing up and heading home today.

But wait, you are now asking yourself what was up with that excavator we hauled up a week or so ago?

Well, I’m glad you asked!
You did ask, didn’t you?

You may recall earlier that I posted a picture of the side of the building we’ve been working on and I mentioned there were some issues visible that sharp eyes might catch.
It looks like this.

The most obvious issue here is whoever did the dirt work for this building didn’t leave any room around the slab, and didn’t build any drainage, and perhaps worst of all, didn’t slope off the dirt, so it eroded and is piling up on the side of the steel building. It’s a recipe for a ruined building.
There’s other issues with the building in the picture too that anyone with steel building experience will spot…
Anyway-what does any of this have to do with off grid solar? Well, not much, but it does have a lot to do with us.
We had some equipment on site already, got to talking to the powers that be, and struck a deal to fix their fucked up dirt.
Now, we’re no excavation contractor, but we’ve done a lot of this kinda stuff before. And getting people to just show up at these remote locations is half the battle.
We’re here.
A customer needs some dirt work that nobody else wants to mess with-or it’s cost prohibitive to get someone else out there-and often enough, our equipment is already on site.
And so it happens that we often end up doing quite a bit of extra work for our customers.
And that’s what happened here.
First thing in the morning, I benched the excavator on the top of the cut, and started making room, moving dirt, and burning diesel.

Denise strapped into our skiddy, and started shuttling the material I was breaking loose to the other end of the structure where there were huge holes that needed filling.

It was a bit tricky digging out the dirt. I had to be real careful not to give the building a love tap, and most of the material was fragmented basalt, so it was no easy dig by any means. And I had to be careful as I worked my way up the slope to not pull myself over the edge.
At one point, I hit a patch of the dreaded blue basalt. When you see this blue/gray stuff, you know your day just got long. It’s hard, strong, and just nasty.

Here’s some pictures of the day in the dirt.

At one point the sky dumped.
Thank god for enclosed machines!

And here’s how it looked at the end of the day.
We moved a lot of dirt!

 

[monkeyswrench]

When do you start the retaining wall?


Bonus points for using "fragmented basalt"...never going to play Scrabble with you

 

[The Chicken]

When do you start the retaining wall?


Bonus points for using "fragmented basalt"...never going to play Scrabble with you

lol!
No retaining wall-we still have to cut the slope, but needed to cut the bottom without the slope first or the excavator runs out of reach, especially with such difficult material.
It’s hard to tell from the pictures, but the steep slope of the hill at the top was making the deepest part of the cut very challenging.
Would be most unprofessional to roll the machine off of a six foot cliff into their building.

 

[The Chicken]

So they had a ton of old batteries? Do you take those off for recycling or is that up to the camp?

The electricians around here are all about collecting any scraps worth recycling. Is that something you bother with?

One of the old systems had an early type of lithium battery setup that was barely functioning, the enclosure smelled of electrical fire, the battery disconnect didn’t work and quite honestly is sketchy as hell. I want nothing but distance between it and myself.
The other one has some old lead acid batteries that seem to be in serviceable condition.
The camp is going to deal with all of the old gear-they may sell it, scrap it-whatever they deem best.
If customers don’t want old equipment we may get it to keep or recycle or use for spare parts, but it’s the customers property so their choice.
Wire scraps would be a different story, but we really don’t keep those anymore because we don’t produce enough scrap copper to make it worth the hassle.

 

[monkeyswrench]

lol!
No retaining wall-we still have to cut the slope, but needed to cut the bottom without the slope first or the excavator runs out of reach, especially with such difficult material.
It’s hard to tell from the pictures, but the steep slope of the hill at the top was making the deepest part of the cut very challenging.
Would be most unprofessional to roll the machine off of a six foot cliff into their building.

I don't operate that stuff very well, as you've seen I can dig a hole with an old Case for a septic tank, and run trenches, but it takes me all day to do what operators can do in 15 minutes. Add a building within reach, a it will at least make for a good story

 

[The Chicken]

A little patch of blue basalt and the dirt moving misery it causes.

 

[The Chicken]

Friday, week four, all day, and Saturday too.
Friday morning walked back over to the dig to inspect yesterday’s progress.
I wish pictures did justice to how big of a hole we had to make.
In the light of a fresh day, it looked to me like that strip of very hard blue basalt was just going to be too high to grade the rest of this strip out and get proper drainage.
So while I serviced the machines that desperately needed fuel and grease after the previous 12 hour workday, Denise set up the laser to check elevations.

Sure enough, that strip of hard rock was 4 inches above finish floor of the slab. Plus, it was misery trying to drive over with the skid steer to remove dirt. There was really no option left but to bring out bigger tools.
First thing I did was expose the hard strip by removing all the soft rock and dirt around it at the end of it. It looked like this.

Then it was time for the bigger tool. In this case, a hammer. A really big really expensive hammer.
The hammer cost over 10 grand new. It’s one of those tools you hate to have to have, and hate to put on the machine, but when you need it, you need it. First, we had to change out the post driver bit that I had in the hammer from a previous job and put the breaker point in. To give idea of how big the hammer breaker point is here I am servicing it.

After getting the bit, cleaned up, lubed up, and put in the hammer breaker-it was hammer time!
( cue rap music, crazy baggy pants, and erratic dance moves ut-oh, ut-oh!)

Breaking rock is far more difficult than breaking concrete. A lot of the impact energy is either just transferred into the surrounding dirt, or the rock is so big and solid it can be difficult to get a fracture started.
Fortunately, the patch of basalt was pretty small and the hammer made fairly short work of it-reducing the lump of solid rock into manageable sized bits.

The rock was pretty once it was all broken up.
It would make a pretty-but expensive-wall covering or fireplace fascia.

Once that was all broken up, it was time to scoop it out and get back to exposing the foundation of the building so that repairs could be affected there.
Here’s what I spent a day and a half doing with the excavator. Extremely close proximity to the Steel Building.

To say it was stressful is an understatement. Fortunately, we pulled it off and after 2 1/2 days with two machines working right next to the building managed to never touch the building even once. Which is good, because even a little love tap would mean extreme damage to the steel siding.

Other than the obvious drainage and peril to the building, there were other reasons all this dirt had to be cleared away so carefully. Again, I’m not going to mention much about that for reasons I’d rather not get into, but here is a picture of one of the issues. Someone decided to quit using form boards and pour the concrete back into the native rock during the concrete process. Again, if you’ve ever put up a Steel building, the problem with this decision should be immediately obvious to you.

Here’s a couple of pictures of me breaking up the rock, and Denise shuttling the material out with the skiddy.

Now, I should say here that Denise was not merely just removing material with the skid steer and just randomly putting it somewhere else. During all of her removal, she was accomplishing multiple other tasks with the material. One-she was loading a dump trailer for the camp personnel who were hauling the dirt to other areas in the camp to affect road and drainage repairs. Two- some of the material was stockpiled for the camp staff to use for maintenance and road repairs at a later date. And three-she was busy working all around this Steel Building filling in holes, building approaches and driveways, and basically fixing the dirt work that never got done when the slab and building were finished. We are a little short on pictures here as it was crunch time, but here is one picture of her finished work building an approach to the south side of the building.
This approach was critical, as it is pedestrian access to the south end of the building.

Most of the pictures that we have showed you were of the north side of the building. But it turns out the east side of the building had all the same issues. Once again, as it was crunch time, and they were a lot of machines and equipment moving around so we didn’t get many pictures, but here are a few of us tuning up and finishing The east side.

The northside, where the bulk of the issues and work were, ended up being an 8 foot deep hole when we were done. Sloping it back ended up being quite the challenge due to limited reach of the machine and the terrain already being sloped into the cut. It’s fun when you’re digging on a slope and gravity and the bucket both want to pull you over the edge.
Additionally, in the corner, the material was nothing but large head size and bigger rocks that kept wanting to roll down into the building, forcing us to slope it off significantly differently in order to avoid having them roll into the building with future erosion.
This is what the final product looked like. The camp staff are going to build gabions to line the bottom foot or so of the cut as a decorative and erosion preventative measure.

It didn’t come out perfect, but it came out good, and gives access to the building for maintenance and gives them drainage control that they didn’t have before.
Considering that neither Denise nor I are “ operators”, I feel like we accomplished a lot, with acceptable results, in a time frame that was pretty impressive.
By my rough measurements and an online calculator, I estimate that in the end, we moved somewhere north of 150 cubic yards of material.
And every yard of that material went through the excavator bucket first. Assuming heaping bucket fulls, that means somewhere in the neighborhood of 900 bucket fulls of material. That’s a lot of scoops!

By 2 PM on Saturday, we have the job finished enough to shut it all down, pack up our stuff, and head home for some much-needed rest. After a long drive down the winding mountain road, and lots of traffic over the I 40 for the weekend, we finally arrived home at some point after 5 PM. It had been a pretty long week and it was good to be home!

 

[Mandelon]

I look forward to running the larger equipment. If I have to rent an excavator or skid steer, I know it will be a fun day. Using it everyday....maybe not. But being able to get so much done quickly is great.

 

[Melloyellovector]

If you don’t already have, get a ripper tooth for the ex. They will break up a lot more than you’d think. We use them pretty often in pool digs

 

[The Chicken]

If you don’t already have, get a ripper tooth for the ex. They will break up a lot more than you’d think. We use them pretty often in pool digs

I've thought about it.
I do have something that is pretty bad-ass and it's like a ripper with a bucket attached.
This is a Leading Edge Attachments progressive dig 18" wide ripper bucket.
Built from 1 1/4" Hardox steel, and modified by me with an X-change quick attach and additional rippers on the heel-it's a beast. We've dug a lot of hard rock trenches with this.

Seems like around here, when I hit stuff that's really nasty, if this bucket won't do it, it's just time for a bigger machine. Our excavator is around 13,000 pounds, so bigger than a mini, but not really that big. Every time I think I want a bigger machine, or a well set up backhoe, I then find myself in a situation like here-weaving in and out of trees and in tight quarters and I'm so glad we have this machine.

 

[The Chicken]

Today is an office day. Actually, office week.
I hate office days.
So nothing cool going on to show cool pictures of.
But the above posts about rippers and buckets got me to thinking about some other stuff we do that I think is cool.
One of those things is I do a lot of our own equipment repair, maintenance and even building.
Here are some pictures from several years ago of what I did to modify that LEA bucket.
Here is what the bucket looked like when I first got it. It was actually custom built for a bobcat 341, but it required removing the X-change and pinning it straight to the stick. A stronger solution for sure, but the bucket change out time was driving me crazy.
So I purchased a premade X-change quick change adapter, and figured out how to graft it to this bucket.

 

[rightytighty]

Thank you for the story. These are my favorite threads on RDP. Where I get to learn about stuff I know I'm not capable of doing, but it gives me desire to try something more bite sized.

 

[The Chicken]

So seeing as I’m cross-eyed from staring at technical documents and need a break, I’d like to share another bucket project we did awhile back.
Our 12” excavator bucket was pretty used up and needed some love.
I don’t have any good before pictures, but I’d been having troubles with the bobcat style bolt of tooth holders always coming loose and shearing bolts.
The bolt on tooth idea does make for a bucket that can be easily converted from a toothed bucket to a smooth bucket-but in this case it just wasn’t working.
Not to mention that the bucket had so much hard material run through it the cutting edge that would be a smooth cutter was more like a worn out scalloped edge.
Here it is with all the worn out junk cut off and a new cutting edge that I cut down from a bigger cutting edge tacked in place.

And here’s the new cutting edge and new tooth holders/shanks all glued together.

Then, because I like having a toothless bucket when I’m working close to other underground stuff, I made this pin on smooth “tooth “ with some new teeth and a fresh piece of cutting edge.

Another issue I have with the bobcat bucket design is the wear protection for the heel and bottom of their buckets consist of flat strap that runs the wrong way and IMHO sucks, especially in hard material.
I didn’t have a lot of time to properly address this, so I cut up some old cutting edge and made some side pieces that help at least stop the welded seams on the back side of the bucket from getting worn any more.

And here it is all glued up and the cheek cutters bolted back on.

And it was none too soon that it was repaired, because immediately after it had a trench to dig through about 150’ of caliche.

 

[monkeyswrench]

Is anyone else seeing that this is more than just you average chicken? The sparky stuff is cool and all, but I don't understand much more than the esthetics...I'd fry myself or burn it down. The welding stuff I know enough to be dangerous, same with heavy equipment.

What we have here, is

 

[rivermobster]

Glued together.

Noted.

 

[Mandelon]

Those are impressive welds. I recently bought a welder and have been learning how to use it. I can make some ugly but effective welds for what we do. Railings, gates, gussets and simple broken stuff. But I am light years behind your skills. Bravo !

 

[Melloyellovector]

The stepped ripper bucket works good, draw back is once the 2nd and 3rd tooth in contact in the bad stuff usually it will bite and start lifting you.
A single ripper claw, can break up permafrost, celiche, granite etc.. and tends to break it up with out jerkin you out of your seat, lol

your other bucket mods are legit, most earth work guys do similar mods. I think manufactures build for failures, there’s no sales in lifetime parts

 

[The Chicken]

Still stuck in the office today, and needing another break, so I’d like to share some more welding stuff-because who doesn’t like metal that’s glued together?!
When we got our Freightshaker, it was in terrible shape. I could fill an entire thread just on what we had to do to make that thing a useable truck.
But here, I’d like to just focus on its rear bumper.
First, what it came with.

It was terrible. Bent, rusted, falling apart, and when its receiver hitch started to part ways with the rest of the truck, I knew the time had come to rip it off and build a new one. Last thing I needed was to loose an equipment trailer loaded with our stuff on the freeway.
So I cut all the nasty crap that was jury-rigged on to hold what was left of the bumper to the truck and got it removed.

The outrigger tubes are a big structural part of the bed, bumper and hitch, so it got some love first just making sure it was sound.
Then the main bumper bulkheads were put in place. They are 3/4” thick plate, and tie all the way around the outriggers and bolt to the truck chassis.

Then the top plate of 3/8” steel went on.

An internal pass through was installed.

Once that was all welded up, the rear cover, made of 1/4” steel, went into place.
Note the big tubes clamped to the top to minimize warping during welding.

This has to haul some pretty heavy loads.
I consulted with a good friend of mine and amazing fabricator ( Douglas Main at Mainline Welding) who deals in big trucks and equipment on the regular and he set me up with some big boy hitch material. Here is some standard pickup truck class V receiver tube held in the space where our receiver tube will go for reference of scale.

Here’s our receiver tube with a reinforcement collar TIG welded to it.

And here it is all welded up with side doors, lights, etc.
the receiver sticks out for access to the hitch pin.

Now, it turns out you can’t just go out and buy slide-in pintle hitches. They have to be made.
So I purchased a 30 ton rated pintle and went to work.
First, I cut out a nice piece of 3/4” plate with the pintle bolt pattern.

Then it got triple-pass welded inside and out to the hitch tube and all bolted together.
No, I don’t have midget hands-it’s a big hitch.

And here it is ready to drag our crap all over the state-never to be this pretty again.

That receiver tube sticking out serves one more purpose: this truck doesn’t always tow the equipment trailer-sometimes it has to tow our RV.
And that presents a special challenge.
A word to anyone wishing to tow trailers with a wide vehicle like a service truck or motorhome-you WILL damage your RV or box trailer if you don’t have either an extended tongue length trailer or an extended hitch.
An extended trailer tongue is the preferred method, but that wasn’t possible here, and the trucks big enough that the extended hitch isn’t a big deal, even with a ten thousand pound RV.
And all of that brings us to this-the semis giant receiver tube has a reducer with adjustable lengths to adapt it down to your standard 2” hitch.
It will also accept the newer 3” hitches too.
And here you can see it installed in its RV towing position with a Shocker air ride hitch( to save the sensitive RV the beating that even an air ride semi dishes out). As you can see, I can now jack knife the trailer fully without fear of destroying the body of the trailer.

Alright bitches-that’s enough about hitches!
Everyone have a great day!

 

[rivermobster]

So you have a Lazer plotter/cutter??

 

[The Chicken]

So you have a Lazer plotter/cutter??

No, it’s actually a CNC plasma table with an engraving head too.
It also has a rotary tube cutter.
Which brings me to my next installment.
Even though I’ve been chained to my office for several days, I’ve been spending a few hours every night getting some beer/welding therapy.
It really helps after a long frustrating day at a desk.

But let me back up a step and explain what this pile of aluminum parts is for.
First of all, let me introduce you to a vehicle that some of you may have seen in Wash 11’s posts.
Over the years this vehicle has served many purposes-I originally built it as a prerunner for my now brother in law some 25 years ago. It served a rough life as prerunner and off road race support vehicle for years. Then it spent a number of years as an overlanding rig traveling and camping out all over the place. Then it ended up in our possession out here in the sticks as a fun truck/people mover. Most recently, it got another tent, a bumper, and has served as a big game scouting/hunting vehicle. It’s over 30 years old, has had the crap beat out of almost all its life, and just keeps going. Known by several names over the years, it is now affectionately known as the Mud Taxi because when the roads turn to shit up here, this is what we all use to get around and not get stuck or muddy.
I present you the Mud Taxi in its current trim all cleaned up:

One issue the Mud Taxi has is getting the thick gooey mud off the windshield. It lost its windshield washer reservoir long ago, and that doesn’t help.
For several years now, it’s been my idea to build it a new high capacity reservoir with high volume pumps and multiple nozzles to help the wipers clean the slop off the windshield.
I have finally started that project with mud season looming.
After finding a likely spot and taking some measurements, I built a quick cardboard, mock up reservoir to see if the idea would actually fit.

Here it is being test fit in its intended location. It needed a couple of modifications, but was close enough to build a CAD file from.

Once I had the drawing done, I turned the plasma cutter loose on a sheet of .063 aluminum.

After I cleaned the parts up and bent them, I test fit all the parts to make sure they would assemble and weld OK.

Then it got welded up, a filler bung added, and then I also added one of the mounting brackets.

And here it is being test fitted in the engine bay of the mud taxi. Now all it needs is another mounting bracket and some bungs welded on it for the pump outlets.

Hopefully, I can finish this project up in the next day or two after work.

 

[RichL]

You Sir, have some serious talent.

 

[lenmann]

And from the looks of it, some nice equipment. How about a shop tour?

 

[TimeBandit]

Mad skills indeed.

Owning the tools is one thing, results like that are quite another.

 

[rivermobster]

No, it’s actually a CNC plasma table with an engraving head too.
It also has a rotary tube cutter.
Which brings me to my next installment.
Even though I’ve been chained to my office for several days, I’ve been spending a few hours every night getting some beer/welding therapy.
It really helps after a long frustrating day at a desk.
View attachment 1423125

But let me back up a step and explain what this pile of aluminum parts is for.
First of all, let me introduce you to a vehicle that some of you may have seen in Wash 11’s posts.
Over the years this vehicle has served many purposes-I originally built it as a prerunner for my now brother in law some 25 years ago. It served a rough life as prerunner and off road race support vehicle for years. Then it spent a number of years as an overlanding rig traveling and camping out all over the place. Then it ended up in our possession out here in the sticks as a fun truck/people mover. Most recently, it got another tent, a bumper, and has served as a big game scouting/hunting vehicle. It’s over 30 years old, has had the crap beat out of almost all its life, and just keeps going. Known by several names over the years, it is now affectionately known as the Mud Taxi because when the roads turn to shit up here, this is what we all use to get around and not get stuck or muddy.
I present you the Mud Taxi in its current trim all cleaned up:
View attachment 1423157

One issue the Mud Taxi has is getting the thick gooey mud off the windshield. It lost its windshield washer reservoir long ago, and that doesn’t help.
For several years now, it’s been my idea to build it a new high capacity reservoir with high volume pumps and multiple nozzles to help the wipers clean the slop off the windshield.
I have finally started that project with mud season looming.
After finding a likely spot and taking some measurements, I built a quick cardboard, mock up reservoir to see if the idea would actually fit.
View attachment 1423161
Here it is being test fit in its intended location. It needed a couple of modifications, but was close enough to build a CAD file from.
View attachment 1423166
Once I had the drawing done, I turned the plasma cutter loose on a sheet of .063 aluminum.
View attachment 1423167
After I cleaned the parts up and bent them, I test fit all the parts to make sure they would assemble and weld OK.
View attachment 1423170

Then it got welded up, a filler bung added, and then I also added one of the mounting brackets.

View attachment 1423175

And here it is being test fitted in the engine bay of the mud taxi. Now all it needs is another mounting bracket and some bungs welded on it for the pump outlets.

View attachment 1423179
Hopefully, I can finish this project up in the next day or two after work.

This thread just keeps getting better and better.

I'm diggin the logo!

 

[stephenkatsea]

"Hollywood Showers"?! I didn't see any prostitutes walking the trees

That's great that some of the long timers have shown up, and seen what you two were doing. Those generators have burned a lot of diesel over the years. Sadly, if they wanted to change out to a newer one, most that size are running egr coolers, and soon will be required to have DEF systems. This should help the existing generators live a much longer life.

Hollywood Shower - First heard that term from a USN submariner. It meant a crew member was taking too long of a shower. Fresh water was in short, finite supply and had to be used sparingly. The more advanced newer “water makers”, which converted sea water into fresh water in much greater quantities, were a luxury.

 

[monkeyswrench]

Hollywood Shower - First heard that term from a USN submariner. It meant a crew member was taking too long of a shower. Fresh water was in short, finite supply and had to be used sparingly. The more advanced newer “water makers”, which converted sea water into fresh water in much greater quantities, were a luxury.

Makes sense. "Naval Shower" was the term my friends used for boondocks showering in RV's, to save water.

 

[The Chicken]

Hollywood Shower - First heard that term from a USN submariner. It meant a crew member was taking too long of a shower. Fresh water was in short, finite supply and had to be used sparingly. The more advanced newer “water makers”, which converted sea water into fresh water in much greater quantities, were a luxury.

Ding! Ding! Ding!
I have zero Naval experience, but my use of Holywood Shower is indeed a reference to subs, lifted from a Tom Clancy novel ( I believe it was The Hunt For Red October, and a "Holywood Shower" was used to reward the sonar operator, Jones, for doing a good job.) I read long ago.

 

[stephenkatsea]

Clancy’s books were excellent and well researched.

 

[stephenkatsea]

There was once concern about where Clancy was getting some of his information. His answer was straight to the point and, apparently, true. Clancy said - The Public Library. He had a way of compiling facts and putting them together to make some amazing fiction. Talented guy, for sure.

Enough about Clancy. Back to more amazing off grid solar installation and other stuff.

 

[The Chicken]

This thread just keeps getting better and better.

I'm diggin the logo!

Glad you-and a lot of others -like it. It’s nice to share some of this stuff with people who appreciate it.
As for the logo-we call it the Stick Chicken.
It started as sorta a joke as a simple chicken symbol that I could have the plasma cutter make on a project we were doing for Joel long ago-and it just kinda stuck.
There’s a huge sticker of it across the tailgate of our dump truck that you can see in my avatar picture.

 

[The Chicken]

And from the looks of it, some nice equipment. How about a shop tour?

We are blessed with a really cool well-equipped shop. It’s a lifetime collection of tools and some fun stuff too.
I’d love to do some sort of shop tour-but man I need to clean it first! Multiple frenzied repairs and projects with no time for proper cleaning have left it a mess.

 

[rivermobster]

Glad you-and a lot of others -like it. It’s nice to share some of this stuff with people who appreciate it.
As for the logo-we call it the Stick Chicken.
It started as sorta a joke as a simple chicken symbol that I could have the plasma cutter make on a project we were doing for Joel long ago-and it just kinda stuck.
There’s a huge sticker of it across the tailgate of our dump truck that you can see in my avatar picture.

We should add it to your website!

What format is it in?

 

[PaPaG]

After seeing your work and all your little different projects, I can honestly say I WISH I HAD 1/4th of your talent!

 

[The Chicken]

For a thread about a day in the life of some off-grid solar installers-there sure has been a shortage of solar stuff in here!
And that includes today.
As we wait for some project details to get finalized, we are staying closer to home base getting some other backlogged stuff done.
One thing I used to do a lot of is work on carwashes. In addition to doing regular electrical repairs or additions, it turns out my background in building custom mass production machines and fabrication are well suited to repairing, maintaining, and building car washes.
Today was a carwash day.
We had to wire in this rather large reverse osmosis unit.

Fun fact:the typical R. O. Unit in a Carwash used to help get your car a spot free rinse produces water of such high purity it’s actually dangerous.
You certainly wouldn’t want to drink it. And if it gets on your skin it’s an irritant. Plumbing the lines with anything other than plastic, high grade stainless or brass results is rapidly destroyed plumbing. The ultra high purity water is so devoid of anything it tries to fill that void by leaching out whatever it can from anything it contacts for any length of time.
We did some pretty decent conduit work today, but you can’t really tell in pictures because the entire area is so busy with all sorts of other plumbing it all just looks like a mess. And some of it kinda is. So no cool conduit pictures.
I can show you what happens to a mini motor control center that was only just barely big enough when it was installed, and around 15 years of additions, changes, and some questionable work by others looks like.

And that’s even after I have cleaned it up as best as possible with the limited down time it gets a couple times here and there over the years.
It’s a bit messy and crowded, but it does run day in and day out generally without issues.

 

[Waterjunky]

Sometimes it's an adventure, LOL!
Yes, we do RVs.
Here's a link to our work trailer for reference:

https://dre-solar.com/dre-work-trailer-we-do-rvs-too/[/URL

Hey Dan, Trying to get ahold of you..... PM sent. Say hello when you get a minute or two.

 

[Joe mama]

You are definitely a talented duo.

 

[The Chicken]

Hey Dan, Trying to get ahold of you..... PM sent. Say hello when you get a minute or two.

I just sent you a message. I'm sorry, I didn't even know I had any messages.

 

[The Chicken]

It’s another week of office work here, so another week of no solar in a solar installers thread. Lol.
Someone mentioned a shop tour awhile back, and then @wash11 had a neat idea-how about I show you guys how we ended up with a shop?
Seemed like a good idea, so without further ado, I’ll start the story of how our current shop came to be.
First, dirt work. It’s one of the things that newcomers that want to build their off-grid dream home out here in the sticks get their first dose of reality with. All over Arizona are lots of places that have, excuse my language-shit for dirt. If it isn’t huge rocks, it’s volcanic hardpan that eats excavation equipment for breakfast, and if it isn’t that, it’s volcanic based clay that has so much ground heave it isn’t buildable without importing a lot of decent material from somewhere else. And most of the time, you have more than one or all of these issues at one site. Add to that the cost of transport for heavy equipment and your dirt work bill can get real big, real fast. Pro tip-don’t decide to build your dream house on top of a friggin rock pile of a mountain unless you like spending cubic dollars on earth works.
We live at a place called Fort Rock, so you don’t have to imagine too hard what one of our big challenges is.
We were lucky in that we happen to know a local guy who is a heavy equipment contractor with all the right gear (pro tip #2-your little bobcat or old clapped out back hoe isn’t going to cut it out here. ). And we caught him at a slack time.
He ran his old D-8, and I rented his big wheel loader from him. He ripped and pushed material from the cut, and I shuttled it to three different spots, as we were building three building pads with the material.

This was my view for a couple days.

Not a bad place to spend your work day-air conditioning, cushy seat, nice view… but I ran my ass off in that machine. The owner running that 8 is a past master operator, and I’m just an amateur, and keeping up with the amount of material a D-8 can push had me running full tilt boogie.

Oh yeah, did I mention rocks?
You ever feel the ground shake when 70,000+ pounds of machine hits a boulder and is stopped dead in its tracks? It’s impressive. I’ve got some cool videos I’ll see if I can post a little later.

Anyway, after several days and a lot of diesel and grease, a pad big enough to put a shop on was complete.
While I tended to some other dirt work, Denise learned how to place a rock retaining wall with our excavator.

Fast forward through some stuff that’s just not that interesting and it was time to finally purchase a building. There were a bunch of problems with that process, and the county at one point made things really difficult, but we finally got through it and hammered out a building that we could almost afford and the county would sign off on.
And then Covid hit.
We were in a real pickle, prices had already jumped due to all the permitting delays, and budget wise we were in way over our heads. And how bad or how long the work stoppage we were seeing was going to last was a serious concern. But we knew we needed a big shop and we had three sea containers full of parts and tools needing a home and we just couldn’t continue to function without a real shop.
And so, after several stiff drinks we put it all on the line, again, and signed a contract to purchase a 70x80 steel building.
And then the race was on to get everything ready for the building when it arrives.
One thing we had to do was dig the footings, and while I’m pretty good on an excavator, a bad footing dig can really screw your concrete and building. Luckily for me, one of our neighbors digs footings for a living, and he is without a doubt one of the best, and one of the smoothest operators I’ve ever seen, so it was a no brainer to hire him to do our dig. (Bryan at Bubbas Hoe Service in Kingman)

I was fortunate enough have made a great concrete contractor contact on a recent job ( Azteca Concrete in Bullhead) and he agreed to do our slab.
These guys knocked it out of the park for us.
We double checked all the dimensions and bolt hole locations and templates and they were all spot on.
Here it is the day before the pour.

He said he’d be on site at 1am on the day of the pour, and he wasn’t kidding, cause he showed up right on time!
They fired up their light plant and got to it, probably pissing off every one of my neighbors for a mile radius. Which is like maybe three neighbors, lol.

Things looked like they were going smoothly, and they were.
Right up until the concrete pumping truck that was supposed to show up didn’t.
Turns out he “forgot “ and also conveniently turned off his phone.
I was pooping twinkies thinking there was a whole bunch of concrete on its way from 60 miles out that was about to have nowhere to go, but Azteca took it in stride and went straight to plan B, and dropped some form boards for the trucks to back in over, while I ventured out into the darkness to attempt to locate and guide the incoming tide of cement trucks to the right place.
You ever try to herd cats in the dark?
Yeah, it was kinda like that.

By sunup, all the mud was in the hole, and the crew got to finishing.

And by the end of the next day, we had a slab ready for a building!
Here I am trying to recreate a funny picture that happened with a dog when we were at this stage of construction with our previous shop in Havasu.

Neither the dogs nor my hair were cooperating that day.

 

[The Chicken]

Once the concrete was poured, there was still a lot to do to make sure we were ready for the building when it arrived.
One of our biggest challenges was manpower.
Steel buildings are generally pretty simple to put together. Just make sure your concrete and anchor bolts are spot on, then follow simple instructions and make sure everything is plumb and square as you go. It’s like a big kids LEGO kit.
But-you do need a bunch of sets of hands and equipment.
We are generally sort of just get it done ourselves people. I almost never ask for help. But this was one of two times in my life where I knew I absolutely had to have help (the other time was when we built our first shop. Well, there was a third time I needed help-our wedding-but that’s another story ) so I started calling in favors.
Of course, the first unlucky person I called was @wash11 He kinda had no way out of it, and so he decided if he had to help me, then so did a bunch of HIS friends. So he put out the calls and before you know it, we had a ragtag bunch of people who were willing to show up and work for several days with nothing more than beer and food for pay. We were blessed.
@Yarder a d his wife were among the first recruits, and would spend a number of days throughout the build helping us.
Phil Hatch, who I understand is a board member here but I have no idea what his board name is, showed up. Phil and I have known each other for at least 15 years and have done work for each other often-he’s who painted my first work truck Ol Yeller.
A handful of others showed up, I don’t think they are members here, but that doesn’t make their help any less appreciated, for sure.

Anyway, the big day finally came when the building actually showed up.

It always amazes me how compact the unassembled building is!

We got everything unloaded, checked in, and set up for the , uhhh, erection to come.

And I’m out of time now, so will have to continue the story later.

 

[Angler]

Once the concrete was poured, there was still a lot to do to make sure we were ready for the building when it arrived.
One of our biggest challenges was manpower.
Steel buildings are generally pretty simple to put together. Just make sure your concrete and anchor bolts are spot on, then follow simple instructions and make sure everything is plumb and square as you go. It’s like a big kids LEGO kit.
But-you do need a bunch of sets of hands and equipment.
We are generally sort of just get it done ourselves people. I almost never ask for help. But this was one of two times in my life where I knew I absolutely had to have help (the other time was when we built our first shop. Well, there was a third time I needed help-our wedding-but that’s another story ) so I started calling in favors.
Of course, the first unlucky person I called was @wash11 He kinda had no way out of it, and so he decided if he had to help me, then so did a bunch of HIS friends. So he put out the calls and before you know it, we had a ragtag bunch of people who were willing to show up and work for several days with nothing more than beer and food for pay. We were blessed.
@Yarder a d his wife were among the first recruits, and would spend a number of days throughout the build helping us.
Phil Hatch, who I understand is a board member here but I have no idea what his board name is, showed up. Phil and I have known each other for at least 15 years and have done work for each other often-he’s who painted my first work truck Ol Yeller.
A handful of others showed up, I don’t think they are members here, but that doesn’t make their help any less appreciated, for sure.

Anyway, the big day finally came when the building actually showed up. View attachment 1426575

It always amazes me how compact the unassembled building is!

We got everything unloaded, checked in, and set up for the , uhhh, erection to come.

View attachment 1426576

And I’m out of time now, so will have to continue the story later.

Great thread The Chicken!

 

[WTMFA]

Damn, you've come a long way since the last time I saw you (about 15yrs ago when I lived in Havasu)
You built a new rear engine cage for my buggy at your home/shop on the Southside. You were working on an old Blazer with an electric motor that had all kinds of ways to generate power to charge the batteries (including an air intake in the grill that would spin an alternator for regen purposes)
My BIL (at the time) and I went to the SEMA show and saw it there.
Congrats on making an honest woman outta Denise (she was just your gf at the time) and for making your off grid dream and business ventures come true!

 

[HNL2LHC]

Can’t wait to continue the building story. It reminds me of when the in-laws built their home off the 66. Where we still have out 40 acres. People were so willing to lend a hand to assist the neighbors. If there is ever a time that you are in the position once again post up as I‘d be willing to lend a hand. I always enjoy a good build and I am sure there are a few things that I could learn beyond my building skillset. It would be handy as we move into a build ourselves.

 

[Mandelon]

Oh, geez am I really looking forward to watching an erection?

 

[Activated]

Oh, geez am I really looking forward to watching an erection?

Son of a bitch…

 

[The Chicken]

Damn, you've come a long way since the last time I saw you (about 15yrs ago when I lived in Havasu)
You built a new rear engine cage for my buggy at your home/shop on the Southside. You were working on an old Blazer with an electric motor that had all kinds of ways to generate power to charge the batteries (including an air intake in the grill that would spin an alternator for regen purposes)
My BIL (at the time) and I went to the SEMA show and saw it there.
Congrats on making an honest woman outta Denise (she was just your gf at the time) and for making your off grid dream and business ventures come true!

That was awhile ago!
What buggy did you have that I worked on? I worked on a bunch back in the day.
That green blazer is still around.
In fact, the owner recently contacted me about possibly doing a whole new powertrain swap in it. Don’t know if that will happen or not, but you never know.

 

[The Chicken]

Ok everyone, the moment you’ve been waiting for:details of my big erection!

Over the course of the weekend of the big erection, we had somewhere between 8-12 people on site, depending on which day.
Something kinda cool about the people that showed up-with the exception of one guy that showed up for one day, nobody on our “crew” had any real construction experience. So it was kinda fun for them to get to do something new. And a little nerve wracking for me as we turned everyone loose with power tools, heavy equipment, scissor lifts, and heavy steel beams and I tried to make sure everyone was as safe as I could make it.
Here’s Phil, Eric, and Joel setting the first upright beam-always an exciting milestone on a steel building project!

Here’s @Yarder getting a crash course in big boy electrical, seeing as he normally only works on low voltage communications stuff-wiring up our temporary power station.

While 3 or 4 people were lifting the main uprights into place, plumbing and tightening them to the slab, others were getting a crash course in blueprint and construction BOM reading, and locating the correct smaller structural parts. Then those parts would be moved, often with our tracked skiddy, who several people got to learn to operate-to a location near where those parts would be ultimately installed.
By the end of the day, the main uprights were in place, along with a fair amount of the girts that tie them together and serve as the anchor points for the siding.

Day two is where the big changes would show.
Our , um, erection crew was now familiar enough with the tools, parts, and techniques that they were clicking right along.
The big spans are always exciting to see installed, and these were just big enough to be a little tricky and stressful.

While a handful of us were setting the big beams, others were setting the lighter end wall pieces by hand and kicking ass there, and suddenly this slab of concrete and pile of parts was rapidly starting to resemble a building.

It always helps to have a spare scissor lift around to act as a temporary beam support to stabilize the first span while the second is installed and some purlins connected to the pair.

Here’s some of the crew taking a much deserved beverage break under our “hospitality tent” set up.

Towards the end of the day, there were people with scissors lifts zooming all over the slab, attaching gurts and purlins wherever they were needed, the skiddy was bobbing and weaving around the reach lift out in the dirt as both of those machines and their newly minted “operators” retrieved and delivered and lifted parts to the building slab. Honestly, I’ve worked with a few local steel building contractors crews who weren’t this good or fast.

By the end of day two, a good chunk of the red iron was up, and against all odds, I’ll be damned if it didn’t look like an honest to goodness building was gonna actually take shape here. It must have been a lot of work-even the dogs were exhausted.

Now admit it, you’ve enjoyed looking at this erection.