"Holy (bleep)!!!" Topic

I have just received about the worst news, pending worst case scenario, that a homeowner can get. I was reading on the Net, when my 'puter suddenly went down; the fridge turned off at the same instant; standing up, I could see out the window that my wife's water feature had stopped pumping water. "Power outage", I said. Nope.

I turned away and saw that the oven clock was still working. Yet the fridge to the right of it, and the micowave oven clock to the left of it, were off.

I went to the circuit box and found no breakers thrown. I heard the drier and washing machine going.

Going about the house I discovered that half of it was "on" and half "off".

I tried turning all the circuit breakers off and on.

Then I called Rocky Mountain Power. The trouble shooting guy was here in ten minutes.

Half an hour later I have discovered:

1. We have a bad line coming under our property to our house.

2. We do not actually "own" the ten feet inside our property line.

3. After Blue Stakes has done their thing tomorrow sometime, an L&R (locate and repair) crew will arrive and dig down to the bad spot in the line that they find.

As my wife's flower garden, concrete garden path and water feature, and sprinkling lines, occupy over 90% of the length of said-power line, I am looking at a total disaster.

Right now, the house has 110 power only. I thought that the clothes drier would not get hot, but I just checked it and it is very warm inside.

If my wife's yard gets torn up, I will be considering selling and buying an RV and traveling each time a problem crops up. Enough of this !…

They may be able to dig two holes and run new cable. That is what we did when we had the sewer line replaced. Also, check your homeowner's insurance as it may pick up some of the cost.

Today go out and take pictures of everything as it is today. You will need them for your own rebuilding if not for the insurance.

Sorry for your problems.

Vince

Have you told the wife? Evidently not, you're still breathing well enough to type. Sorry for your misfortune, I second the picture taking step.

I second the two holes and run a new line. We had to do that with a sewer failure some years back. Talk to the work crew as that might actually be cheaper and faster than tearing everything up. Then take lots of pictures and tell your wife.

How did I know that the DH would result?
Probably the front page announcing that The Editor got his computer back, and was "catching up".

I concur with Carter and Shagnasty. See if they can use a 'mole' to dig between the two points.

Don't know if it'll cost more, but gotta be worth the cost if it prevents you and your dearly beloved either getting upset or killing each other and the work crew.

Thank goodness for overhead power lines….

Happened about 2 years ago that my house lost one leg of the incoming power. My brother spent a few days running extension cords around from the good outlets to what he thought he needed power to. Good thing the furnace is gas with a 110 volt blower.

At any rate when I got back from out of town I checked out the breaker box and determined one side was dead. Called the power company and they came out and repaired the tie in to the main line. While they were at it we noticed that the line over the roof had a bit too much sag and one of the conductors was half worn through where it had rubbed on the tile roof. Got that fixed as well.

All that I had to do to the shrubbery/landscape was prune some branches.

It may be too late now, but you can relocate the most valuable plants and flowers to another part of the yard so that they aren't completely destroyed by the digging crew. Likewise, dismantle what you can of the water feature before they get there.

"We do not actually "own" the ten feet inside our property line".

Actually, that sounds like a good thing to me, since if that's where the problem is, then Rocky Mountain Power gets to foot the bill for any repairs/replacements/labor/upgrades, etc. to your wife's flower garden, and all the other stuff.

Sorry to hear that Doug, best of luck!

On a more trivial issue, sorry about the DH too.

On Friday (that would be a week ago) the L&R crew came in the morning while I was out on my walk. By the time I got back, they had a big hole dug down to the sprinkler pipes and electrical line underneath said-pipes! The location was instantly a huge relief: only under grass, the patch on the inside curve of the garden path leading up from the shed to the deck stairs. Whew! it could have been so much worse, I can't tell you the visions of carnage I was imagining those couple of days. Man! Anyway, within half an hour of my getting home, they were done and gone; rather like the Lone Ranger and Tonto, heheh. Apparently the cable was damaged putting in the sprinkling system; the trencher must have nicked the insulation in several places and it took a decade to fail….