In field repair and service

I thought of this thread and had a little chuckle today.

Did a little welding in Renton and brought my trusty canopy because it was raining. I went to setup the canopy and right off the bat, one of the cross pieces broke. I managed to get it over the bucket anyway and turned around to get something and saw the dang thing flipping past me- little windy. Got it set back up and hung some chain on the leeward side.

Well, it kept me and the work dry. Fixed it when I got back to the shop. Should be good for another 3 years. I need to remember the chains next time.

koldsteele said:

Cutting edge ...just curious whats that heater doin in a tennis court ? I thought them folks only play in good weather ...Never seen them play in the snow , Like football ..

Click to expand...

Got to keep them balls warm ya know.

I've been doin field repair for three years now and love it. Though I do like some quiet time in the shop alone once and while to.
I thought about packing a canopy with me before. Currently I use and old canvas tarp to through over the top of me or down on the ground to crawl in the snow or the russian thistle.
Just found this site today. Been at it for 5 hours reading thru the different threads. I lot of field calls I get involve repairs to gett the cows fed or the hay baled.

quackattak, you've probably seen some our hay pass thru the dairy you work for.

This was my first winter in the service truck. I picked a hell of a year to start turning wrenches professionally! The first snowstorm of the season i spent 12 hours in the shop getting trucks ready, the next 12 hours plowing, and then the next 10 hours fixing busted plows and welding in the snow. Almost every snow storm this season was 20+ hours straight of wrenchin' and weldin'.

In those conditions i figured out that its the little things that make all the difference. A change of clothes, a thermos full of soup, and some strategically placed hand warmers make things much more bearable.

We went through 4 mechanics this winter, and 2 of 'em only lasted a week!

We work on the jobsite all the time in all kinds of weather, we are in Ontario, Canada and have just had one brutal winter here. you need to gear up like cutting edge and motrack say you have to be prepaired. but there is times when you have to make a decision cause some jobs in the winter can be done cheaper with the added expense of floating the machine in. I too am getting a little older now and feel the elements more than I used too. I have trouble hiring help because alot of new guys want to sit in the warm truck while I am out there busting my chops in a snowstorm. It is raining out now and if I got to go then I got to go. In the summer I would gladly trade the shopwork in for fieldwork. Remember some guys ( hydro line workers etc ) got to work outside all the time and if the hydro goes down in a blizzard they got to go work outsie in a blizzard

View attachment 74724[/QUOTE]
that looks like a jewell...dont see many of them

those little covers can be a life saver, winter or summer. keeps you dry in the winter and keeps your tools from gettin so hot you cant pick em up in the summer

its part of our job we just deal with it

Well my hat is off to u, I do just what u do,only in sebring florida and surrounding counties, when i find a bumper sticker that says " BE NICE TO A MECHANIC" But laying all jokes aside it has takin a toll on me too,hope your arms dont look like mine! I have scars on top of scars. and to top that off is someone gives u crap over crap that was caused by the chain reaction of the problems. Im 49 going on 79 , I got to where someone tells me that their a mechanic / I say sorry for your luck! I will babble some more if somebody will listen! they would probaly say are ya done yet! dont that aggrivate the crap out of ya! good luck! gotta go now that im depressed now, I thought I was the only one out there! NEVER BEEN IN SNOW COULDNT IMAGINE WORKING IN IT! LATER!

Thabull, some of us might be in snow and cold temps but last night on tv I watched the nature program on snakes in the florida everglades and the boa constrictors they are having problems with there, no way on earth would I work or live where there are big snakes, alligators, that many poisonous snakes of different kinds, spiders or a host of other things to contend with like you have to deal with, at least when its cold out anything that slithers or is poisonous is asleep for the winter and I don't need bars on my basement windows to keep the gators out of my basement,

I've had relatives that lived down there and they had a lot of problems with gators in the house and swimming pool. Anyhow welcome to the forum, pull up a chair and sit down to shoot the bull, there's always someone listening to a fellow wrench turner.

As for working in the snow, what gets me is the wind chill and for some reason, just before it snows when I'm out working in it, it always seems to rain first so everything is wet, damp, and windy then it snows, so I'm already chilled to the bone long before the snow makes it to the scene. One time I was out working and later when I got home I talked to a friend who was in a warm climate and we determined I was working in weather that was 150 degrees colder than where he was vacationing at, it was almost 90 degrees where he was and it was -60 below wind chill where I was outside working trying to get a machine running that had jelled up, one of the coldest days of working outside I ever had.

Randy88 said:

I've had relatives that lived down there and they had a lot of problems with gators in the house and swimming pool.

Click to expand...

I think I will steer clear of that place too!

Your job sounds like mine. I have been over the road tec for 23 yrs. It definately has its days ,but the pay is good and at the end of the day Im proud to say I did that job . When it is very cold you have to pace yourself and stay warm. A small heater is a must.For every bad job there is an easy job. We are part of a different breed of tecs.

I have no end of respect for you guys that pull wrenches in the most miserable weather Mother Nature can throw at you. I have seen you guys in the Arctic fix the darndest things at - 40 or worse with the wind howling. Meanwhile office staff think itès way too cold to go outside for a smoke! My hats off to you gentlemen...you deserve every penny you get and then some!

Thanks tripper_174

i've been wrenching for 25+ years from central fl to the windy city, and have been a field mechanic for close to 1/2 of those years.
ive welded in florida in 120* heat, had cover plates melt in my hood, and shattered filter plates from sweating on them.
coldest day i had was wind chill -60, broken key in an ign switch. that was the day they decided to get it repaired.... it had been broken for weeks
it was too cold for the operator to be outside, but it was just fine to call us out.
i'm on call 24/7 from dec1st - april 1st, those are usally some nasty conditions to be working in. calls are always after 6 or 7 PM, (after working all day) blowing & drifting snow, sleep, and generally f*cked up driving conditions.

i've had a couple service managers that didnt "get it", fortunately they didnt last long.
currently i'm training my service manager to take another service truck in a couple months,
them we'll have to train a new service manager


:drinkup

I traded in my summer job for a winter job this year and recieved the mildest winter I have seen in my life as an added bonus. Didnt have to put on insulated coveralls all winter long.

Randy88 said:

and it was -60 below wind chill where I was

Click to expand...

What was the real temperature though? Windchill is really misleading, as it's not really that cold, it only feels like it is.

If I recall that day it was about -20 temperature and the wind chill was -60, anything below zero with a 40-50 mph wind is cold when your standing outside working with wrenches and most times bare hands working with cold jelled fuel filters. That machine was out in an unprotected field where it died, the bad part on that one was it was about 500 feet from the road and the snow was too deep to drive up to it, I had to walk back and forth to warm up and get more wrenches out of my truck that was parked on the road. My friend called later that night to check on the weather back home and thats when we did the comparison, he was sitting on a sandy beach sweating getting a tan and I was back home trying not to freeze to death during a winter storm.

A couple years ago i was working in some -40 below weather and a oldtimer asked me were my parachute was as i was giving him the deer in the headlight look he explained how nice they work. That day i went and bought a couple from the military surplus store. All you do is throw them over what you are working on fire up the salamander heater and get to work with one less layer of clothing.

pipeline mech dont feel bad i had never heard of that either but its a necessary part of my truck in the winter now

Randy88 said:

If I recall that day it was about -20 temperature and the wind chill was -60, anything below zero with a 40-50 mph wind is cold when your standing outside working with wrenches and most times bare hands working with cold jelled fuel filters.

Click to expand...

I fully agree, my point was just that it wasn't really -60. If you want real fun, try working in an actual temp of -52 with a windchill that makes it feel like it's -78.