Articles from Jesse Lor

East River Electric's 'Hi-Line Guardian'

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Wed, 08 Apr 2020 02:25:09 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~4/7/2020: A video I came across a while back about the co-op's responsibility of maintaining reliable power from the 1960s: www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrsMIRQygP0

Severe Weather 5/24/18

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Fri, 25 May 2018 04:37:18 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~5/24/18:

I was out fishing with a friend earlier today for a while until we noticed the weather began to turn ugly within a half hour or so after seeing the severe weather warnings on our phones. No kidding-wind blowing dust all around us, distant lightning, and thunder drowning our voices forced us to pack up and head out. Didn't see any trees or branches down, just a lot of swaying and leaves flying around.

While driving back, I noticed a number of intersections, traffic lights, and a few neighborhoods were without power-all of which were powered by a long haul 34.5kv feeder running from Xcel's Afton Sub. A little while later, I arrived at another intersection (which is a mile and a half from the Sub. at this point) which was also in the dark along with the surrounding area. Not sure if the entire line tripped out or if clusters of customers went out. Either way, this 34.5 circuit does cover some serious distance.

Thankfully, my power did not go out as I am on the 13.8 system (the system I am on is fed via a 34.5kv stepdown, which is fed by a different feeder coming from the Afton Sub.) Should anything happen to that 34.5 feeder, Xcel could always switch us to another 13.8kv source which originates from the Oak Park Heights Sub.

One last thing I'd like to note is when I got home, I was listening to some music until I heard a loud "BBBBBBZZZZZZ" that came from outside my window. I looked outside only to see a distant, blue ball of light just down the street from my house. About 15 seconds later, I heard and saw it a second time and then a third before it stopped. Shortly afterwards, I checked Xcel's outage map and saw that 105 customers had just lost power down my street. We have a set of reclosers on the first branch pole on the 13.8kv line onto our street.

Some questions

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Sun, 14 Jan 2018 02:11:24 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~1/9/18:

Just some questions I've been wondering about for the longest time:

What would happen if a "normal open" loop was closed in a circuit and tied the two station transformers together. Would there be any drawbacks in regards to the transformers for having tied in two subs / sources together?

Other question: How many subs can a typical 69kv line supply power to? Recently, I've been tracking down some lines around my area to see where they go and I was quite surprised to see a single 69kv line feeding multiple substations along the way to the transmission source.

EDIT: I know this may seem like a very vauge question considering systems may vary from each other, but I would like to hear your thoughts.

New project

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Wed, 03 Aug 2016 21:25:01 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~8/3/16: I recently assembled my own "homemade" group operated switch out of various pieces of hardware and metal I had lying around. Since this is my first attempt ever at building such, it looks pretty crappy but I'm sure as time progresses I'll find better waves to improve such work. I will upload a photo soon to show what it looks like. I plan on putting the switch on a pole and using a "control pipe" to open / close the switch similar to real life poles.

Possible changes?

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Tue, 03 May 2016 03:32:11 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~5/2/16:

Seems that Xcel Energy paid a recent visit to this structure to update some equipment: www.ipernity.com/doc/331527/34174431

I have no clue as to what they did on this structure, but considering its age I hope they didn't replace it with a clamp brace & modern bank.

Will keep on the look out to see if anything happens. I wonder if this pole is in possible danger as well since both poles are literally a few spans from each other: www.ipernity.com/doc/331527/34174411

Aerial cable video

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Sat, 09 Apr 2016 21:31:51 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

Here's an old vid I found, I think some of you guys might find it interesting: www.youtube.com/watch?v=oz6z0xkCK3E

Neutral?

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Wed, 20 Jan 2016 23:55:17 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~1/20/16:

This has been a question that I've been wondering for a while, but why does one not become "shocked" when in contact with a neutral wire? After searching on the web only to find various answers, I decided to hear from what you guys have to say.

I had no idea what the purpose of a neutral was until about two years ago.

Winter Weather

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Mon, 14 Dec 2015 04:27:25 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~12/13/14:

Been a while since I did one of these articles.

It's quite a surprise to many of us about how warm this winter has been. The temp. here has been in the 30-40s recently. Much to my surprise, the ground hasn't froze yet, but I'm hoping it will be that way until next weekend since I need to do a pole replacement on my homemade line. Poles breaking and falling over is NOT the type of damage I run into very often. Plus, it's already difficult enough setting one in partly frozen ground.

-Be safe everyone.

July 17-18th Weather

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Sun, 19 Jul 2015 00:33:50 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~7/18/15: Anyone else get some severe thunderstorms from last night? We sure did! Thankfully, very little to no damage occurred where I'm at. Also, the reclosers on my neighborhood line did there job so there were no long term outages. However, friends in WI (same area where my "homemade" power poles are at) were not so lucky. There were reports of tornado like winds from last nights storm, which did lead to dozens of downed trees and part of my friends roof completely gone (Fortunately, everyone was fine, no injuries).

For my property in area, we only had a handful of downed trees. To my surprise, a number of trees and branches fell every which way and completely missed my poles. Some braches did actually get "lucky" and damaged some poles though (One pole fell over because a large branch caused the base to break, a cross arm ripped off another pole and leaving the pole top split, and one last pole were the wires got pulled off).

Side Note: According to Xcel, they stated around 240,000 customers in both MN and WI were without power during the early hours of this storm. Xcel and Co-Ops continue to work and restore power to their customers.

"Line chasing" Weather

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Fri, 13 Mar 2015 22:56:56 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~ 3/13/15: Surprisingly, all the snow here is just about gone. Temperature is in the 60s with clear blue sunny skies, just the way most of us prefer it! I plan on doing some Line Chasing myself soon. Thanks for reading!

Whoops!

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 01:53:30 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~ 12/22/14: Just a vid I came across on Youtube.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=440xnCjpnRU

That time of year again!

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Mon, 10 Nov 2014 19:24:58 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~11/10/14: I guess its time to get ready for the snow covered rooftops, dirty windshields, and icy conditions! As of today, its currently snowing out (even as I type), theres about a good inch that covered most of the ground over here, but the ground hasn't froze...yet. Its probably the "end" of the line construction season for my homemade poles for the year. Maybe if I'm lucky, the ground won't be completely frozen by nextweek.

Something New...

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Mon, 03 Nov 2014 21:35:21 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~11/3/14: Recently, I've been thinking about building a confusing / wtf structure. One of my poles has two down guys and it makes me a little nervous when I see someone driving an ATV near the down guys. I thought about putting in another pole and connecting them with a beam (to eliminate the guys), and adding some sort of "odd" details to it. Maybe I'll make a sketch of what I have in mind later on.

Line Safari for Nov. 1st

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Fri, 31 Oct 2014 20:08:15 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~10/31/14

Tomorrow I'll be heading to the Mankato area to pick up a delievery. I don't recall of any times when I had to travel southwest of the Twin Cities, so it'll be interesting to see what kind of lines I'll run into.

"What are those things called?"

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 21:18:03 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

~9/25/14: I can't put a number on how many times I've heard people's random guesses on what they think power lines are called. I've had people ask me before "What are those things that you like called? Those poles....uh lines....those towers and thingys. You draw them???". "Or what those strings and...electrical things". "You like those....road thingys or stuff right??" Truth to be told, I love hearing the guesses since its quite funny. This just came to mind and I was wondering about how many of us line geeks run into those questions.

I think we can all relate...?

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Wed, 17 Sep 2014 20:53:26 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

I'm sure everyone remembers that day when they logged onto Flickr and saw more of what they expected. On May 20th (day I saw the new layout) of last year in '13, I remember coming home and seeing all this junk / confussing mess of random photos all over the page. It's hard to believe that it's been nearly a year since most of us fled from our "home site". Anyway I'm still on Flickr uploading photos every few weeks or so. Thanks for stopping by!

Learning the differences...

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 03:05:48 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

with IOU and Co-Op systems. Back when I was a youngster, I had no idea what a co-op was and no idea it existed. I always thought utilities everywhere were IOUs, it wasn't until a few years later when I started to explore around the rural areas of Wisconsin. When the family got some property in rural WI I was excited to come along and see the utility system that was there.

I noticed that the all the poles looked almost the same, the spacing between the primary and neutral were spaced evenly on each pole. Unlike what I was used to seeing, the neutral being stretched under a transformer or riser. spacing between primary and neutral on the Xcel poles I grew up with always varied, while the co-ops always kept everything looking the same. My attention was also caught by the co-op's clamped insulator pins on arms, backwards ridge pins, guy wires being connected to the main neutral, no poles standing out, etc.

It took my a while to figure out that the property wasn't served by Xcel. Dunn Energy turned out to be the power company in the area.

Surprise during line work

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Sat, 06 Sep 2014 04:55:10 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

There has been number of times when I get these "surprises" when I carry out work on my utility poles. A very recent one was when I was working on a ladder (about 10-11' tall) on one of my poles. The ground was a little soft from rain storms the previous night, but I thought I'd be fine. I was on the third step to the top when I froze in shock realizing that one of the ladders legs had sunk into the mud and that I was tipping over on my left hand side. I thought I was going to end up in the mud, but thankfully one of my poles were in the way and stopped the fall.

Line Safari for 8/28/13

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Wed, 27 Aug 2014 05:42:55 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

This Thrusday I will be heading to Duluth to help a sibling move stuff into their new place. Not sure where exactly in Duluth I'll be visiting but it'll be interesting to return, the last time I was there was back in 2009 during a camping trip.

The fateful day has arrived

nobody@ipernity.com (Jesse Lor) — Fri, 15 Aug 2014 05:50:43 +0000

Jesse Lor has posted an article:

As of August 14th, I happen to be driving down a road not far from my place until I spotted some linework going on. Seems that Xcel is upgrading a 19.9 / 7.9kv (line gets stepped down at a trans. pole) branch line to a new three phase 34.5kv circuit on FIBERGLASS ARMS!!!!!!!! I've taken a lot of interest in NSP / Xcel's 34.5 system since it was always the type that caught my attention, and I was hoping that this day would never come. NOT a single pole with wooden arms or braces in sight!