Correcting some elses mistakes

[atgreene]

I seem to get alot of these calls.

Yesterday a new customer of mine called to say he had no water at his summer house that he had lent out to friends. He was 200 miles away and had called a maintenance guy, a plumber and a boiler tech, only to have them show up look it over and say they weren't sure of what the issue was, and leave.

So today I met my pump guy there and proceded to iron out issues. The well is 15 years old and obviously was homeowner connected by the previous owner.

The pipe was 100psi pipe, crap for Maine soil. Always leaks, rocks crush it and should be outlawed.

The buried wire was well wire, not rated for direct burial.

The entire line had been buried in rocks and gravel, not a stitch of sand. There was a 3' rock 8" above the pitless adapter.

The pump was too small for the depth.

And best of all, he had made the wire connections at the well head with out connectors. No tape, no heat shrink, no sealer, not even wire nuts. Bare wire twisted together and left buried. It didn't even match up to the proper colored wire!:Banghead

So tomorrow my customer is shelling out almost 5k for a new 3/4 horse pump and all the fixings. Properly installed of course.

It's amazing what people will do to save a buck. BTW, the previous owner was an industrial arts teacher! This explains why when I need to hire a sub for electrical work or plumbing I can't find one that has a clue!

 

[rino1494]

We get calls too about fixing other peoples messes. Most of the time we don't like to get involved with them. It makes you wonder how some of these contractors can sleep at night. :bash

 

[tylermckee]

We took over a house where the homeowner fired the GC he was using, they were over a year into construction and all they had was a framed house, no plumbing, electrical, roof, driveways, etc. for the downspout drains all they did was cut some short lengths of pipe and run them up along the foundation and burried it all. homeowner found out one day when it was a heavy rain and he was looking in his catch basin and saw NO water flowing. he then paid $13,000 to have the downspout drains installed correctly.

 

[CascadeScaper]

It's ridiculous out there, isn't it? I'm working on a job right now where a guy who installed utilities on an easement about 2 months ago didn't compact correctly in a large hole he had dug out. For some reason, he needed to make a 10' square hole, which is fine, but when he went to fill it up he just threw all the dirt in, packed the top by running his backhoe over it, and called it good. :Banghead :Banghead :Banghead

 

[D10N]

It's an everyday occurence in the mine to have to spend the better part of a day fixing the previous shift's screwups. Nobody takes pride in their work anymore, it's all about speed and production.

I fondly remember one of my early dozer trainers' words: "It's not about speed, it's about consistency and efficiency". Those words are now relegated to history, as instant gratification is the order of the day.

I used to have one "operator", that I CONSTANTLY had to follow and rebuild all of his work. In a 12 hour shift, this guy would have a minimum 3% downslope across the last 50' to the crest on his dump - dumping across a 500' wide area! The rule of thumb is a 2% upslope across 30' from the crest to compensate for settling. I'd never get any expansion done, since I was using all my trucks to fill holes.

 

[Bob Horrell]

I also end up doing this quite a bit. Last week I had a job fixing a porch. The homeowner wanted a concrete porch along the front of length of the house out about 15 feet. The ground slopes away from the front of the house about 7 or 8%. The contractor brought in fill but didn't compact it. It started to sag and had gaps of 3/4 of and inch. Of course the contractor never called back when contacted for repairs. A contractor I do work for got the job to fix it so we had to demo the old porch, remove the dirt and put it back properly compacted. I went down an extra 3 feet to make sure it wouldn't sag again.
This coming Saturday I have another fix it job. Another homeowner was getting bids to remove dirt from a slope so he could install a half court basketball court. There were some juniper trees to be removed as well. The dirt to be removed was to be placed on an adjacent slope to level it out. There was about 100 yards of dirt to be removed and replaced. The homeowner went with someone with a cheaper bid and it come out bad. When the cement contractor came out to form for the half court he told the homeowner that it was out by 2 feet. Unbelievable, 2 feet on something that small. Also the guy didn't put the dirt where the homeowner wanted it.
So Saturday I get to fix it. The other guy has already been paid. I told the homeowner when I looked at the job that if he didn't give it to me, to be sure whoever did it gave him a nice level compacted pad ready to form because that is what I intended to do. These kind of guys give us all a bad name.

 

[Bob Horrell]

I forgot the good part. There are numerous juniper roots (several inches in diameter) protruding from the ground in the area where the concrete was to be poured.

 

[Dozerboy]

I to have to fix other screw ups mostly from my fellow employees. It all blow and go, one foreman can never finish a job one so I'm always playing catch up.

 

[16H]

Yeah working on a mine site that runs 24/7 you get a few people who dont give a damn about their work, we are constantly fixing mistakes from the previous crew, it happens but no use jumping up and down about it we still get paid but it is very annoying when you take pride in your work.:Banghead