It has been a long break waiting for winter to end but I think spring is finally here. We did manage to get some work done on a few good days here and there over the winter but not much. Now that April is here we have pretty consistently been getting work days in on weekends and a little in during the week weather permitting. We were super wimpy when the temps were in the 30's and below so we had a nice long rest December thru March.
Time for hibernation to end!
We have finished off the last of the electrical projects needed for connecting to the road. Mr. Dometastic finished the last step last night in time for our inspection today. The inspector just came and....... WE PASSED!
This means we will be put on the power company's list to be connected and we can button up all the walls with insulation and plywood. We somehow managed to figure out everything we needed to do to set up the power connection to the road without an electrician. If you decide to do something similar the best advice I can give you is: the power company does not volunteer any information so ask them questions like they are a child. Always ask if there are any other steps that must happen before they issue the next work order. It is similar to trying to get a young child out the door for school. Even though they do it EVERY DAY you still have to ask them: Is your hair brushed, are your teeth brushed, where is your coat, where are your shoes, put on your shoes etc etc. NEVER ASSUME IT IS A GIVEN even if it seems like it is a dumb question. Even if you ask a lot of questions we still found them to be frustratingly inept. Our building inspectors on the other hand are wonderfully helpful people that don't seem the least bit fazed that we are doing all this ourselves.
On a side note. We were almost completely derailed by a small metal disc. It was one of those amazing moments when something small accidentally happens and a ton of hard work and money almost goes down the drain.
Mr. Dometastic had a SPECTACULAR hole in one happen while trying to install the compression joint on the meter box. He was hammering out perforated metal disks on the box. These come out creating openings for the conduit. They are perforated but require some serious force to remove them. He was wacking away on the thing harder and harder. It was stubbornly not coming out and all of a sudden it flew up into the air. In slow motion both he and I saw it spinning in the air and swooooooosh! A hole in one that didn't even touch the edge of the hole! It swooshed down the main power conduit and then rolled to an unknown depth down the 400 ft. tube. It was a truly amazing shot. We stood there speechless just staring at the hole. Then the realization hits. If we can't get it out they can't use it for the power.
The power line is very thick and they pull it with so much force it melts right through the plastic conduit. That is why the 90 degree turns have to be metal. The metal disk can't be there to potentially cut into the power line.
Over a few days, Mr. Dometastic and I tried to remove it from the already buried conduit. We tried everything we could think of and eventually resigned to the fact that we would have to use our extra conduit that we ran in the trench. This is not how we wanted to use the extra. It was supposed to be there for future emergencies not from the start. I decided to go over by myself while he was at work and try my magnet idea. He didn't like my magnet idea pitch since part of the conduit was metal so we never tried it. I admit that I originally pitched a "fishing with string" idea but we never explored it further. I felt like there was something there....it just needed a modification. At this point I decided that it was worth a try. I collected a few super strong fridge magnets, a roll of duct tape, some string and went rummaging through the random stuff in our back barn to find the magic item that would make my magnet idea work. I decided on a garden hose. It is flexible but stiff enough to push it down the conduit. I pushed it down the conduit as far as I could and slowly pulled it back out....... drumrolllll please!
I texted Mr.Dometastic the above picture of my shiny metal catch and after much cheering he replied "You should have told me you were going to use a hose. Of course that would work."
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