Missing Pull Ropes And Mud In Cnoduits

mdshunk

Whoever installs underground conduits without leaving a pull rope installed ought to be drawn and quartered.

This happens from time to time, and today was my lucky day. An excavator installed the majority of the conduit from the xformer to some houses, and I finished the conduits to the meter cans. There was no pull rope installed when the pipe was laid, nor was either end capped in any manner. When I jammed a fish tape down either end, I discovered that the pipes were substantially full of mud. Without a pull rope, I couldn't even swab the pipes if I wanted to. I got a gigantic sewer auger and cleaned it out, after much frustration. I was nearly ready to call these conduits "abandoned".

Anybody run into this from time to time like I do? AND... what's your typical solution?

PipeGuy

Leaving the end of any buried pipe unprotected is just plain stupid. I've put in lots of conduit without pull-rope and I've blown plenty of pull-rope through empty conduit without difficulty. But leaving it unplugged is inexcusable - with or without pull-rope.
We have a fitting that'll go on the end of a compressor hose that jets backwards - towards the hose. It kind of pulls itself in as it blows dirt back. It won't work in mud. Flushing with [lots of] water is about the most effective means of clearing a blockage. That requires a good dewatering pump or being able to 'daylight' the conduit trench.

mdshunk

I did consider the flushing with water idea for a millisecond or two. In my case, I already had the conduits hooked up to meter cans at one end, and the other end was stubbed up inside of a live 7,200V padmount xformer. I didn't think that mixing muddy water with that would fall into the "good idea" category. It just an aggrivating situation that I should have never had to deal with.

hatchet

I've seen our electricians using an air compressor and a nerf ball to fish pull ropes through conduits... worked pretty damn good. For smaller conduits they just tie a balled up wad of paper to. Of course, that would be tough with mud blocking the way

__________________
Rich
WIT Construction Co.
Superior MT Contractor

mdshunk

Sure, blowing or sucking in a string is a fairly mundane task for an electrician. The mud was the unusual obstacle in my case.

Electricmanscot

My solution is to not let excavators install the conduits. Yes I learned the hard way too.

mdshunk

I really don't "let" the excavators do this. Sometimes the GC's let them or the excavator just does it. I'm not sure exactly how it evolves, but sometimes my conduits just "appear". I really don't care... except in the rare instance when they do the work in a manner that causes me trouble.