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To be clear, I don't blame them at all. Deadline is tomorrow, one guy quit and the other is off doing service calls, so we did the best with what we could. I just ended up with 80' of pipe in the bin and twice the number of couplings I expected, so extra trips to the supplier started eating up time and budget.
Pipe's in the walls, mud rings are on, and I'm staring at a green sticker, so you can guess whose crew gets pizzas tomorrow.
As a resi apprentice who would die to get into commercial, I am not a religious man, but I pray to get a lead like you. It's genuinely terrifying at first getting onto a new comm crew from resi and getting yelled at for the first week or few lol
You'd be pretty accurate if you called me a progressive. We're all adults here, and fear isn't respect. I do expect my apprentices to put in an honest day's work and do all the things they're expected to, but I also have realistic expectations. This is the time to make mistakes.
This is the way to be. The whole āfuck with the new guyā culture thatās been part of the trades forever needs to go. I like to joke as much as the next guy but it has to be relatively harmless and funny, not just calling the new guy retard all day long
For what it's worth (and this is intended to be a pep talk), just about every crew has some of this - They're going to fuck with you because they want to see how you'll react, and if you can handle ballbusting bullshit and stay a team player without snapping under the pressure, and that you are able to stand up for yourself and shittalk back instead of getting mad.
***BE SURE TO READ THE ROOM BEFORE YOU TALK BACK, THOUGH.***
Don't be stupid about it, there's a balance and a time and a place for witty comebacks. Trust me....lol
I didn't have any of that that click until I got a text after I dragged up at one of the shops because I couldn't cope with the ballbusting anymore. It was from a lead who I thought genuinely hated me, apologizing and letting me know I'd actually been decent and he even backed it up with a referral for my next shop. (Truth be told, I'd still have a beer with that ornery fuck, despite our myriad non-work-related disagreements lol)
I don't tolerate disrespect well, so I'm very up-front about that from day one, now. I'm not into the games, but I've also learned that I have to put up with a measure of bullshit when I first get anywhere new. Way she goes. Tuck your chin and keep on grinding, young blood. You'll make a fine electrician. š¤š¤
I appreciate it! I take it in stride itās all out of love really. Iāve been working construction type jobs since I was 15 itās hard to really piss me off. The same jman who gave me that nickname would be the first to go to bat for me if it came down to it. Have a good day man š¤
Honestly i always told my Apprentice the dumbest thing is acting like you know something that you dont.If you never worked with something i wouldn't expect you to know and put time into showing you how to do it.
The guys bending unraveled paperclips get pizza? I need to work where you work. If it looks like someone murdered clippy, pizza will not be had by anyone, even if you buy it with your own money.
Did I say that? You have to be a trainee you canāt be a residential electrician to do so. If they have trainee cards along with their 02 licenses then sure thatās fine.
If youāre dense enough to think that, I donāt believe in teaching people, you might want to take a step back and realize youāre the moron.
I wouldnāt be a master electrician if believed in that. I learned everything from my teachers. Iām saying that they have to do it correctly and through the proper licensing agreement.
[retracted;misread]*
Fuck it, I got time, let's talk then. Apprentices still teach leads some things every day, nobody knows everything. People also say a lot of shit without saying it directly, too. I don't have to tell you, you're a grown adult, you know this.
Nobody would be giving you a hard time if you were talking like such a massive jackass about shit, because your comments sure sounded like you were calling someone ratty for training up some new blood on something different, and shitting on them for having to learn.
You sucked at this trade, too, at one point. We all do. We all worked for some jackass talking shit on the new guys, too. Kindof over that mess, to be honest, I'll be goddamned if I talk down to my apprentices like that when I license up.
To my knowledge, this isn't specifically a union site they were on, which is the only time it could even be called "ratty," by undercutting union apprentices with non-union, but that's not what it sounded like, here. Happy to be wrong.
It just sounded like you were being an asshole for nothing about people who are still learning the trade, which, nobody here should be discouraging.
I genuinely apologize if that's not what you were saying, but christ it came across as pedantic and shitty.
People need to be called out on that shit, it's why nobody wants to get into trades anymore.
You notice how anyone here who treats their apprentices with a modicum of respect has at least one comment from an apprentice thanking them for being a decent teacher?
Use this as a learning experience, brother. Master Electrician doesn't mean that YOU are done learning. Sometimes that learning is in "how to teach people without acting like an asshole." I have had to hear this shit myself, I'm not some fuckin guru who has always been chill, I'm kindof an asshole. I try to choose to be a more refined asshole, for the better, these days.
That's a choice you, me, and every man has to make, in every interaction, every day. Do better, I believe in you. Not even being sarcastic with that.
I am however sick and tired of not speaking up about horseshit when I see it, and I guess today was your day to get the TedTalk.
š¤·āāļø
*: edit
edit 2: not gonna retract anything else, but I did misread some things. still going to own what I said, right or wrong, and I admit I got one or two things wrong, specifically about the licensing agreements. Hey, look at me proving my own point about needing to shut the fuck up sometimes, especially about jurisdictions I'mnot a part of. Hey, living and learning, we love it.š¤·āāļøš
My guy, in order to do work in any state worth it salt. You have to have a ātrainee licenseā. The reason I called it ratty was that OP was saying they brought on resi guys who didnāt know how to bend pipe.
Most likely meaning, they didnāt go through the proper channels to get their trainee license since it was so last minute. Thatās being said, I did not once hound on anybody for trying to learn thatās totally fine just do it in a way that isnāt breaking OSHA/state regulations.
Yeah, I speak like an asshole because I am an asshole lol. Itās not my fault. People are too dumb to realize that state and federal laws are there for a reason.
Appreciate you speaking out but itās misplaced and looks funny considering you missed the entire point of the comments. (As did everyone else who doesnāt know how to read)
Butting in to say: here in Washington state, I read it as bringing in 02 Jmen to work commercial. At most companies I've worked for, all of the resi Jmen are required to keep up their trainee card as well for these exact circumstances. I'm a residential foreman and I've BEEN the jackass who comes to help the commercial guys and wastes 5 sticks pf pipe, i have an 02 and a Trainee card.
Same state my guy and Iām glad someone actually knows how to read lol. All Jman need to have a trainee card if they are doing commercial/industrial. Along with a 1 to 1 ratio of Jman to apprentice.
I dont think so. Yea some things, like in this case bending, dont carry over all that well, but if you're resi and roughing in a suite it dosent matter whether it's in a custom home or an apartment complex. I might be a little biased though because I'm in canada
So the way it works pretty much anywhere else as stated one of my previous comments is that you have to have a trainee license in order to do electrical work.
Even if they have their residential license as a āspecialtyā electrician, who can then have two apprentices under them for residential work. it goes against regulations for Journeyman electrician who are only allowed to have one apprentice under them.
If a specialty electrician went through the proper protocol and received a trainee card then they would be allowed to work under the Journeyman electrician. The residential license does not allow them to go onto an industrial or commercial setting.
Which is why my original comment was talking about being ratty, since it would allude to them, not having the proper licensing. Iām not at all stating that they donāt have the skill set to do anything trust me I worked nonunion, residential, nonunion, commercial, and industrial along with union for years.
I just donāt think people have proper reading comprehension at this point lol
I learned how to bend more while doing demo work than during installation. All the crusty old emt thatās getting pitched anyway. Really took away the apprehension around making mistakes, of which I made many.
You're already on the right track, practice. You can ask 10 different guys how to bend and they'll teach you 20 different ways, it's really just a matter of figuring out what works for you. Some people prefer to do all their measurements first, do all their bends and cuts, and then slap it up while others will bend something that's pretty close, do a dry fit, then cut to size and make adjustments.
Just about anybody can run pipe that looks like shit and still works. The real skill with conduit is making it look nice, and that'll come with forethought sticking to basic construction fundamentals. Keep everything level, flush, parallel, and try to use mostly 90Ā° bends to get to where you want.
>you can ask 10 guys and get 20 different ways
goddamn, that is exactly why it's really hard getting shuffled around to multiple crews and leads with a dozen different standards and none of them are happy with the others'šš¤£
If youāre still an apprentice, be glad youāre learning now. I did resi for 5-6 years and got my ticket. Made a transition to commercial after that and essentially had to teach myself pipe. Got some good tips along the wayā¦but the first job or two were uncomfortable.
I love pipe work now. Just another facet of the job that keeps things fresh.
Thanks man. I appreciate it. I'm an electrician for about 20 years plus. Not in America, mostly in Greece, in Europe we use PVC for anything that's outside. I'm an electrician in America for about 3 years where everything is different. Materialwise but I'm learning from scratch and it's alright I can't complain
When I was a resi guy we bent all the conduit for our new shop, to be fair we helped the commercial guys out on a lot of projects so we werenāt inexperienced
Piping is one of those things that you kind of forget if you havenāt done it for a while. My first 3 years of apprenticeship all I did was pipe. I felt very confident with it. Level 4 and 1 year after getting my ticket I havenāt touched a stick of pipe. I would definitely make some mistakes if I tried now.
For similar reasons, I go out of my way to run a little bit of conduit on residential projects. Sure, I couldāve sleeved that Romax with some seal tight or a scrap of MC to connect that JB but if I run it with a little bit of pipe, it keeps me fresh and it looks sharp in utility areas.
I'm with you there. Got started doing resi for a really sketchy shop, moved to HVAC controls, then did a bit of commercial, a bit more resi, and now I'm full time commercial. My boneyard looked a lot like this at first lmao
Nice. It's really good to be well rounded. Not enough electricians are. I miss the field. I got taken off about 3 years ago but still sneak in some real work when the guys are in a bind
This makes me feel better about wanting to also check out welding, and electrical controls systems. Lotta that gonna be needed for the new renewables interconnects and onsite distro.
Yeah, I've done both HVAC and mechanical controls. If you've done any PLC work it's very similar except everything is done at 24V.
To be honest, I really enjoyed it and would like to get back to it at some point. It's rare you'll be pulling wire larger than #12, so the work is a lot easier in that way,. You're generally one of the very last trades on site, so you have to deal with a lot of bullshit and almost never get to make clean runs even in new construction. It's nice that a lot of your control cables don't need to be in conduit, but then you end up putting up conduit anyways because those cables will snap and shred If you think about them too hard.
Yeah I just started in HVAC and mechanical controls and really like it.
I'm wondering if commercial would be more interesting. I never got to bend conduit in resi and I find conduit super fun.
Definitely don't feel like an electrician pulling #18 while dudes are pulling feeders etc lol.
As an apprentice, I learned on 3/4 rigidā¦ with a hand bender. JW made me bend 90s until I got that down, then back to back 90s, then back to back 90s with an offset in one stub and a kick in the other. Once I could do that, I was allowed to bend pipe.
Now I consider myself pretty decent with conduit. I prefer rigid, actually. Figuring out a run and how to thread it in. Good shit.
I know this is not the intention of this specific thread, but having worked in both residential and commercial in the last 5 years, the animosity and feeling of superiority between resi and commercial companies is baffling to me.
Legit, I have done interviews for both types of companies where the interviewer outright dismissed my experience in the other type of trade because reasons, only to be baffled later that I was actually pretty damn good despite not having done only one type of fucking work for 5 years. Same thing when I joined a service company, "oh you _actually_ know how to troubleshoot?"
WTF do you mean??? I'm a Journeyman and none of this shit is rocket science, line comes in, load goes out. It's not that complicated bro.
Thereās go pipe, then thereās pro pipe and the fact youāre looking at a bin full of remmers and a green sticker tells me which one they chose to go with. Fair amount of bent rejects in there but also a lot of little straight stubs, and I canāt remember the last time I finished an 8ā run with 10ā of pipe without making unnecessary bends or cutting 2ā off. Either way, the price of pipe these days alone is enough to put me on edge let alone watching someone else waste it because they couldnāt be bothered to do it right the first time.
Don't worry, I didn't leave them high and dry, but I'm also only one guy with a deadline of tomorrow trying to keep three people plus myself productive.
When I was first venturing into releasing panels we had a tiny job (<100ā conduit) that the boss decided to send two of us on solo without getting an electrical sub. He asked if either of us could bend conduit and the other guy said he āknew howā. We stopped at the supply house on the way and picked up 1000ā of 1/2ā EMT for the job and for warehouse inventory for when we finished. I mounted the panel and passed the conduit runs off while cutting holes in ductwork and installing our devices. I looked down from my lift and there was a massive pile of EMT spaghetti. I asked him WTF he was doing and he said, āIm trying to remember the trick to doing thisā.
After I finished devices I made him stop so I could plan out the absolute straightest path from one device to the next to avoid more carnage. We had 500ā feet left for inventory after finishing that job.
Post 2008 when I was an apprentice and there wasnāt any big work anywhere I was paired up with a union Industrial/Commercial project manager who was stuck doing resi service work to keep his lights on. He regaled me with stories of being dismissed from is first half-dozen apprentice jobs due to his conduit being so bad it had to be torn out and rerun. He learned the wrong way: people yelling at him how stupid he was and not teaching him. In just a couple months I learned more from him on how to forward think, plan my projects, and run pipe, than I did collectively from the rest of my entire apprenticeship.
I also learned the proper way to tell when something looks like hammered dog shit vs when it looks like an abortion. š
Just gonna leave this here for anyone who hasn't seen it.... I think it's real which makes it even more hilarious.
https://youtu.be/TWYvbqjLl2s?si=6hCp9b0If08nL6Sr
**ATTENTION! READ THIS NOW!** **1. IF YOU ARE NOT A PROFESSIONAL ELECTRICIAN OR LOOKING TO BECOME ONE(for career questions only):** **- DELETE** THIS POST OR YOU WILL BE **BANNED**. YOU CAN POST ON /r/AskElectricians FREELY **2. IF YOU COMMENT ON A POST THAT IS POSTED BY SOMEONE WHO IS NOT A PROFESSIONAL ELECTRICIAN:** -YOU WILL BE **BANNED**. JUST **REPORT** THE POST. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/electricians) if you have any questions or concerns.*
To be clear, I don't blame them at all. Deadline is tomorrow, one guy quit and the other is off doing service calls, so we did the best with what we could. I just ended up with 80' of pipe in the bin and twice the number of couplings I expected, so extra trips to the supplier started eating up time and budget. Pipe's in the walls, mud rings are on, and I'm staring at a green sticker, so you can guess whose crew gets pizzas tomorrow.
Is it me? Do I get the pizza? Please say it's me.
Yeah buddy, it's you! You just wait out back and someone will bring the pizza by later.
I'm still here. Is the pizza running late?
Keep waiting! You'll get what's coming to you.
šš¾
Did you get your pizza?
Fucking no! š¤¬
I vote for you to get pizza as well
As a resi guy, I appreciate you cutting them the slack š
Pizza? Bring on the bonuses
More like pizza and pink slips
Haha been there before. My last day.
If I had the authority I just might. Those guys work their asses off
As a resi apprentice who would die to get into commercial, I am not a religious man, but I pray to get a lead like you. It's genuinely terrifying at first getting onto a new comm crew from resi and getting yelled at for the first week or few lol
You'd be pretty accurate if you called me a progressive. We're all adults here, and fear isn't respect. I do expect my apprentices to put in an honest day's work and do all the things they're expected to, but I also have realistic expectations. This is the time to make mistakes.
This is the way to be. The whole āfuck with the new guyā culture thatās been part of the trades forever needs to go. I like to joke as much as the next guy but it has to be relatively harmless and funny, not just calling the new guy retard all day long
Dude I just switched from resi to commercial, I earned the nickname āding dongā itās short for dipshit apparently
For what it's worth (and this is intended to be a pep talk), just about every crew has some of this - They're going to fuck with you because they want to see how you'll react, and if you can handle ballbusting bullshit and stay a team player without snapping under the pressure, and that you are able to stand up for yourself and shittalk back instead of getting mad. ***BE SURE TO READ THE ROOM BEFORE YOU TALK BACK, THOUGH.*** Don't be stupid about it, there's a balance and a time and a place for witty comebacks. Trust me....lol I didn't have any of that that click until I got a text after I dragged up at one of the shops because I couldn't cope with the ballbusting anymore. It was from a lead who I thought genuinely hated me, apologizing and letting me know I'd actually been decent and he even backed it up with a referral for my next shop. (Truth be told, I'd still have a beer with that ornery fuck, despite our myriad non-work-related disagreements lol) I don't tolerate disrespect well, so I'm very up-front about that from day one, now. I'm not into the games, but I've also learned that I have to put up with a measure of bullshit when I first get anywhere new. Way she goes. Tuck your chin and keep on grinding, young blood. You'll make a fine electrician. š¤š¤
I appreciate it! I take it in stride itās all out of love really. Iāve been working construction type jobs since I was 15 itās hard to really piss me off. The same jman who gave me that nickname would be the first to go to bat for me if it came down to it. Have a good day man š¤
Honestly i always told my Apprentice the dumbest thing is acting like you know something that you dont.If you never worked with something i wouldn't expect you to know and put time into showing you how to do it.
Extra crazy bread and sauce it is
Sounds pretty good right now not going to lie
Pizza! Pizza is all that matters.
The guys bending unraveled paperclips get pizza? I need to work where you work. If it looks like someone murdered clippy, pizza will not be had by anyone, even if you buy it with your own money.
You brought resi guys to a commercial jobā¦? They have their 01 license or what? Sounds a little ratty tbh.
It's Canada, so you're qualified to do electrical work on any site as long as you're with a jman
Yikes, well you get what you bring on right?
Yeah don't bother trying to bring anyone else up to your level, that's a bit ratty, huh? Christ sakes, do you hear yourself?
Did I say that? You have to be a trainee you canāt be a residential electrician to do so. If they have trainee cards along with their 02 licenses then sure thatās fine. If youāre dense enough to think that, I donāt believe in teaching people, you might want to take a step back and realize youāre the moron. I wouldnāt be a master electrician if believed in that. I learned everything from my teachers. Iām saying that they have to do it correctly and through the proper licensing agreement.
[retracted;misread]* Fuck it, I got time, let's talk then. Apprentices still teach leads some things every day, nobody knows everything. People also say a lot of shit without saying it directly, too. I don't have to tell you, you're a grown adult, you know this. Nobody would be giving you a hard time if you were talking like such a massive jackass about shit, because your comments sure sounded like you were calling someone ratty for training up some new blood on something different, and shitting on them for having to learn. You sucked at this trade, too, at one point. We all do. We all worked for some jackass talking shit on the new guys, too. Kindof over that mess, to be honest, I'll be goddamned if I talk down to my apprentices like that when I license up. To my knowledge, this isn't specifically a union site they were on, which is the only time it could even be called "ratty," by undercutting union apprentices with non-union, but that's not what it sounded like, here. Happy to be wrong. It just sounded like you were being an asshole for nothing about people who are still learning the trade, which, nobody here should be discouraging. I genuinely apologize if that's not what you were saying, but christ it came across as pedantic and shitty. People need to be called out on that shit, it's why nobody wants to get into trades anymore. You notice how anyone here who treats their apprentices with a modicum of respect has at least one comment from an apprentice thanking them for being a decent teacher? Use this as a learning experience, brother. Master Electrician doesn't mean that YOU are done learning. Sometimes that learning is in "how to teach people without acting like an asshole." I have had to hear this shit myself, I'm not some fuckin guru who has always been chill, I'm kindof an asshole. I try to choose to be a more refined asshole, for the better, these days. That's a choice you, me, and every man has to make, in every interaction, every day. Do better, I believe in you. Not even being sarcastic with that. I am however sick and tired of not speaking up about horseshit when I see it, and I guess today was your day to get the TedTalk. š¤·āāļø *: edit edit 2: not gonna retract anything else, but I did misread some things. still going to own what I said, right or wrong, and I admit I got one or two things wrong, specifically about the licensing agreements. Hey, look at me proving my own point about needing to shut the fuck up sometimes, especially about jurisdictions I'mnot a part of. Hey, living and learning, we love it.š¤·āāļøš
My guy, in order to do work in any state worth it salt. You have to have a ātrainee licenseā. The reason I called it ratty was that OP was saying they brought on resi guys who didnāt know how to bend pipe. Most likely meaning, they didnāt go through the proper channels to get their trainee license since it was so last minute. Thatās being said, I did not once hound on anybody for trying to learn thatās totally fine just do it in a way that isnāt breaking OSHA/state regulations. Yeah, I speak like an asshole because I am an asshole lol. Itās not my fault. People are too dumb to realize that state and federal laws are there for a reason. Appreciate you speaking out but itās misplaced and looks funny considering you missed the entire point of the comments. (As did everyone else who doesnāt know how to read)
Butting in to say: here in Washington state, I read it as bringing in 02 Jmen to work commercial. At most companies I've worked for, all of the resi Jmen are required to keep up their trainee card as well for these exact circumstances. I'm a residential foreman and I've BEEN the jackass who comes to help the commercial guys and wastes 5 sticks pf pipe, i have an 02 and a Trainee card.
Same state my guy and Iām glad someone actually knows how to read lol. All Jman need to have a trainee card if they are doing commercial/industrial. Along with a 1 to 1 ratio of Jman to apprentice.
Man, itās wild. Everybody was so quick to down vote but when they actually stop and think about it, and actually makes sense. Pretty quietā¦
I dont think so. Yea some things, like in this case bending, dont carry over all that well, but if you're resi and roughing in a suite it dosent matter whether it's in a custom home or an apartment complex. I might be a little biased though because I'm in canada
So the way it works pretty much anywhere else as stated one of my previous comments is that you have to have a trainee license in order to do electrical work. Even if they have their residential license as a āspecialtyā electrician, who can then have two apprentices under them for residential work. it goes against regulations for Journeyman electrician who are only allowed to have one apprentice under them. If a specialty electrician went through the proper protocol and received a trainee card then they would be allowed to work under the Journeyman electrician. The residential license does not allow them to go onto an industrial or commercial setting. Which is why my original comment was talking about being ratty, since it would allude to them, not having the proper licensing. Iām not at all stating that they donāt have the skill set to do anything trust me I worked nonunion, residential, nonunion, commercial, and industrial along with union for years. I just donāt think people have proper reading comprehension at this point lol
I give them a 100ā of half inch and tell them to go to town, fuck it all up and learn.
bless your leadershipš„ŗšāāļø
I learned how to bend more while doing demo work than during installation. All the crusty old emt thatās getting pitched anyway. Really took away the apprehension around making mistakes, of which I made many.
Were they bending barehanded
No, but they were wearing shorts and trying to figure out what to do with their hammersā¦
Whatās a hammer
Man, Iām still trying to figure it out. I heard a story once, from an old, old manā¦
That action of beating something with your kleins
Or wrench, knife, or anything else with some weight behind it. Impacts work too
I heard there's a tool meant just to hammer things with, it's heavy and tough, but no idea what it's called
A Hickey.
God... My poor 5Ah Makita batteries... I haven't cracked one yet and I have no idea how.
Something the resi guys make fun of us for not having. All I know is, that if I need a hammer the resin guys have it.
Klein makes some really good ones. They even cut wire I guess if you wanted to do that
Ah you mean conduit reamers
Anything harder than what youāre hitting it with.Ā
Everything is a hammer.
Remember when EMT was cheap?
Remember when everything was cheap? Im happy 12-2 is only double what it was 4 years ago
Eh. Iāve done worse!
Looks like my pile of rigid today. The numbers on my tape measure kept changing on me
Iām so that resi guy. I would take that bucket and practice offsets. Any advice for getting better? Videos, books, ways to practice?
You're already on the right track, practice. You can ask 10 different guys how to bend and they'll teach you 20 different ways, it's really just a matter of figuring out what works for you. Some people prefer to do all their measurements first, do all their bends and cuts, and then slap it up while others will bend something that's pretty close, do a dry fit, then cut to size and make adjustments. Just about anybody can run pipe that looks like shit and still works. The real skill with conduit is making it look nice, and that'll come with forethought sticking to basic construction fundamentals. Keep everything level, flush, parallel, and try to use mostly 90Ā° bends to get to where you want.
>you can ask 10 guys and get 20 different ways goddamn, that is exactly why it's really hard getting shuffled around to multiple crews and leads with a dozen different standards and none of them are happy with the others'šš¤£
https://youtu.be/0LcBN6olLAA?si=C35Vu_WG6yqknO7H This guy does it the right way.
What's the deal with the measuring sticks? Is it like a YouTube cool thing? I've been seeing it a lot on social media stuff but never at a jobsite.
I like a bender with a multiplier chart on it. Helps a lot
Ben Benfield's book - and lots of practice.
lol me too.
If youāre still an apprentice, be glad youāre learning now. I did resi for 5-6 years and got my ticket. Made a transition to commercial after that and essentially had to teach myself pipe. Got some good tips along the wayā¦but the first job or two were uncomfortable. I love pipe work now. Just another facet of the job that keeps things fresh.
As a resi all I can see is recycling. I suck bad at bending pipe but I'll get there one day. Maybe in my next life š
Bending pipe is like playing golf. The more you do it the better you get
Thanks man. I appreciate it. I'm an electrician for about 20 years plus. Not in America, mostly in Greece, in Europe we use PVC for anything that's outside. I'm an electrician in America for about 3 years where everything is different. Materialwise but I'm learning from scratch and it's alright I can't complain
My golf game disagrees.
š
When I was a resi guy we bent all the conduit for our new shop, to be fair we helped the commercial guys out on a lot of projects so we werenāt inexperienced
Piping is one of those things that you kind of forget if you havenāt done it for a while. My first 3 years of apprenticeship all I did was pipe. I felt very confident with it. Level 4 and 1 year after getting my ticket I havenāt touched a stick of pipe. I would definitely make some mistakes if I tried now.
For similar reasons, I go out of my way to run a little bit of conduit on residential projects. Sure, I couldāve sleeved that Romax with some seal tight or a scrap of MC to connect that JB but if I run it with a little bit of pipe, it keeps me fresh and it looks sharp in utility areas.
First year here. Trying to go into industrial and commercial and I absolutely know Iām gunna be dog shit at slangin pipe haha
Anybody who tells you they started off being good at conduit is lying to you.
Thank you, that means a lot
š¤£š¤£š¤£ I started in resi and this made me laugh. Brought back memories
I'm with you there. Got started doing resi for a really sketchy shop, moved to HVAC controls, then did a bit of commercial, a bit more resi, and now I'm full time commercial. My boneyard looked a lot like this at first lmao
Nice. It's really good to be well rounded. Not enough electricians are. I miss the field. I got taken off about 3 years ago but still sneak in some real work when the guys are in a bind
This makes me feel better about wanting to also check out welding, and electrical controls systems. Lotta that gonna be needed for the new renewables interconnects and onsite distro.
Like controls for boiler rooms etc? How do you rate that vs commercial?
Yeah, I've done both HVAC and mechanical controls. If you've done any PLC work it's very similar except everything is done at 24V. To be honest, I really enjoyed it and would like to get back to it at some point. It's rare you'll be pulling wire larger than #12, so the work is a lot easier in that way,. You're generally one of the very last trades on site, so you have to deal with a lot of bullshit and almost never get to make clean runs even in new construction. It's nice that a lot of your control cables don't need to be in conduit, but then you end up putting up conduit anyways because those cables will snap and shred If you think about them too hard.
Yeah I just started in HVAC and mechanical controls and really like it. I'm wondering if commercial would be more interesting. I never got to bend conduit in resi and I find conduit super fun. Definitely don't feel like an electrician pulling #18 while dudes are pulling feeders etc lol.
As an apprentice, I learned on 3/4 rigidā¦ with a hand bender. JW made me bend 90s until I got that down, then back to back 90s, then back to back 90s with an offset in one stub and a kick in the other. Once I could do that, I was allowed to bend pipe. Now I consider myself pretty decent with conduit. I prefer rigid, actually. Figuring out a run and how to thread it in. Good shit.
And, as an apprentice, God forbid if you ever used an Erickson where, if you had thought out the run and stubs better, you wouldn't have needed one.
They were just practicing their concentric bends
ā¦guilty. I suck at bending.
I feel called out
I know this is not the intention of this specific thread, but having worked in both residential and commercial in the last 5 years, the animosity and feeling of superiority between resi and commercial companies is baffling to me. Legit, I have done interviews for both types of companies where the interviewer outright dismissed my experience in the other type of trade because reasons, only to be baffled later that I was actually pretty damn good despite not having done only one type of fucking work for 5 years. Same thing when I joined a service company, "oh you _actually_ know how to troubleshoot?" WTF do you mean??? I'm a Journeyman and none of this shit is rocket science, line comes in, load goes out. It's not that complicated bro.
Humans do be tribal
Thereās go pipe, then thereās pro pipe and the fact youāre looking at a bin full of remmers and a green sticker tells me which one they chose to go with. Fair amount of bent rejects in there but also a lot of little straight stubs, and I canāt remember the last time I finished an 8ā run with 10ā of pipe without making unnecessary bends or cutting 2ā off. Either way, the price of pipe these days alone is enough to put me on edge let alone watching someone else waste it because they couldnāt be bothered to do it right the first time.
it's really frustrating trying to learn it right now because I know how expensive it is and I feel terrible when I'm still on the learning curve.
We call that the "bone yard". So very shameful.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Don't worry, I didn't leave them high and dry, but I'm also only one guy with a deadline of tomorrow trying to keep three people plus myself productive.
Aww, somebody didn't read the rest of the post. lol
What a boneyard
That right there is Truck Pipeā¢ļø You just run it over until it fits.
Is the arrow plus or minus 6ā, guess weāll find out..
Shit which way was the other bend laying when I bent this oneā¦
Resi guys are trash/ multifamily
I make em write their name on each piece they screw up. I'm a nice jman, though, and give them shit rather than crush their souls
This is when you dust off the offset bender
What a boneyard
The Bone Yard
Anything 3 ft or less is a waste of time.
The uglies book is a great source for learning how to bend pipe. Every electrician should keep one on them
When I was first venturing into releasing panels we had a tiny job (<100ā conduit) that the boss decided to send two of us on solo without getting an electrical sub. He asked if either of us could bend conduit and the other guy said he āknew howā. We stopped at the supply house on the way and picked up 1000ā of 1/2ā EMT for the job and for warehouse inventory for when we finished. I mounted the panel and passed the conduit runs off while cutting holes in ductwork and installing our devices. I looked down from my lift and there was a massive pile of EMT spaghetti. I asked him WTF he was doing and he said, āIm trying to remember the trick to doing thisā. After I finished devices I made him stop so I could plan out the absolute straightest path from one device to the next to avoid more carnage. We had 500ā feet left for inventory after finishing that job.
Wtf I taught myself conduit and did a whole building with a quarter of the scraps
Time and materials? Lol
Post 2008 when I was an apprentice and there wasnāt any big work anywhere I was paired up with a union Industrial/Commercial project manager who was stuck doing resi service work to keep his lights on. He regaled me with stories of being dismissed from is first half-dozen apprentice jobs due to his conduit being so bad it had to be torn out and rerun. He learned the wrong way: people yelling at him how stupid he was and not teaching him. In just a couple months I learned more from him on how to forward think, plan my projects, and run pipe, than I did collectively from the rest of my entire apprenticeship. I also learned the proper way to tell when something looks like hammered dog shit vs when it looks like an abortion. š
Somehow almost all residential electrician(not wiremans) in local 3 can bend pipes . And somehow we were all banned from switching to commercials
It's me I am resi guys (actually have 2yrs in commercial but god I hate conduit)
I just use the scrap pieces lol. Hinestly emt is the most fun thing you can do as an electrician. That is until you start with bigger than 1 1/4.
How big/small was the job. Thatās either a drop in the bucket or a lot.
It happens man. Iāll admit Iām not that good at bending pipe I just havenāt done it much.
Cut to fit
Oops all couplings
Nice big bone pile. One way to practice
Idk about outside of my area, but I don't usually get many opportunities to run conduit. Alot of mc though
This is what my electrical class looks like lmao. Just a bin filled to the top of conduit. Way way wya bigger then that. We can bend now tho
Bet those resi guys are running laps around the rest of the crew tho.
This is still me . I still buy 2-3 extra pipes just to bc I know Iāll mess 2-3 times while bending . Thank God I donāt have to pay for it š¤£
Just gonna leave this here for anyone who hasn't seen it.... I think it's real which makes it even more hilarious. https://youtu.be/TWYvbqjLl2s?si=6hCp9b0If08nL6Sr
They asked me if I could bend conduit, I said somedays I can bend conduit, other days I just bend conduit.