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Post by Magnus on Feb 19, 2021 1:49:22 GMT
...and back when I did it there was absolutely no way a kettleman could do both jobs of maintaining the truck and operating a handliner, especially when doing 'skips' aka the white traffic lane dividers or the 'double yellow' lines because the truck was constantly kept at a short distance just ahead of the liner operators, driving slowly and maintaining traffic control so the guys didn't get hit by any of the maniacs out there.
In my few years on the job I never witnessed anyone getting hit, although I did have a cousin who got dragged by a car when we were in uptown Manhattan. We were just a block or so ahead of the crew laying out crosswalks. One guy on each side, mark your measurements, pull the chain tight, and hold it there while someone goes across with a paint spray can marking where the thermoplastic lines will be applied...My dumb cousin just couldn't grasp the concept of WAITING until there were no cars that could potentially hit the chain while we gave it a 'wave' while tightening it up... Poor bastard ended up with a bunch of stitches and tweaked his elbow pretty good...
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Post by Magnus on Feb 19, 2021 1:57:20 GMT
The supervisor marks out new stuff with stencils like arrows, onlys, and other words. But I never used a stencil. I do numbers and words freehand after they are marked out with paint or go over old stuff. Yeah, your job is probably a bit more 'leisurely' than when I worked for my uncle, he was a slave driver and demanded a certain amount of work each day that was only achieved by all of us on the crew working like machines ourselves. If we didn't use stencils there was no way we could put out the productivity my uncle required. We used to load up in the morning (or evening) and then stop at a deli /diner on the way to the job to pick up egg sandwiches and coffee to eat while driving... from the minute we stopped there were NO BREAKS until the end of the workday.
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Michael
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Post by Michael on Feb 19, 2021 11:44:01 GMT
I would not say it's more leisurely. I push whole intersections myself while others are watching or directing traffic. No one where I work wants to learn or do what I do. They are lazy. If they watch traffic and use the blower I can handle it. , remember You did it in the 80's, the equipment has come a little way. How do You put a picture from a android phone on here? I work all day, it's not a cake job.
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Post by Magnus on Feb 19, 2021 12:48:15 GMT
I would not say it's more leisurely. I push whole intersections myself while others are watching or directing traffic. No one where I work wants to learn or do what I do. They are lazy. If they watch traffic and use the blower I can handle it. , remember You did it in the 80's, the equipment has come a little way. How do You put a picture from a android phone on here? I work all day, it's not a cake job. Typical day for us was when we did all of the ‘skip’ lines on what’s now called the ‘Korean War Veterans Parkway’ on Staten Island. Four and a half miles of skip lines in each direction, for a total of 9 miles of skips for the day. We did it with only one hand liner but the guy operating it was a beast of a man named ‘Ed’ from Lithuania, and he was in his sixties at the time. The guy always wore long sleeves and never drank water, no matter how hot it got. He had an odd habit of only drinking from his bottle of piss warm 7-up soda... I remember seeing his picture in the Daily News a few years later when he won a few million in the New York State Lottery 🤠
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Post by Magnus on Feb 19, 2021 12:49:06 GMT
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brothersteve
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Post by brothersteve on Feb 19, 2021 20:25:28 GMT
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Post by Magnus on Feb 20, 2021 17:50:19 GMT
.. remember You did it in the 80's, the equipment has come a little way. Michael, from the video's on youtube it appears that the basic equipment hasn't changed at all ? It's still a hand liner with a manually operated 'shoe' and a small 'hopper' mounted just behind the shoe to automatically eject the glass beads. As far as kettle trucks go, ours used the large propane cylinders as fuel for the ovens, although we did have one 'oil burner' that used #2 heating oil for fuel, but that one seemed to break down a lot. That particular oil burner set up is responsible for me eventually leaving that job and going back to school to learn my commercial HVAC&R trade. I was constantly having to make temporary repairs while the oil burner was in use, and when my uncle called in an oil heating mechanic to give it an overhaul the mechanic praised the repair work I did and recommended the HVAC field to me... About a year or so later I had enough of the daily screaming & yelling matches and brutal work requirements, so I just up and quit while making plans on going to trade school. That's when I went to work for the tree service in Brooklyn and learned a whole new 'brutal' form of work, but I loved it !
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Michael
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Posts: 5,288
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Post by Michael on Feb 20, 2021 20:16:01 GMT
.. remember You did it in the 80's, the equipment has come a little way. Michael, from the video's on youtube it appears that the basic equipment hasn't changed at all ? It's still a hand liner with a manually operated 'shoe' and a small 'hopper' mounted just behind the shoe to automatically eject the glass beads. As far as kettle trucks go, ours used the large propane cylinders as fuel for the ovens, although we did have one 'oil burner' that used #2 heating oil for fuel, but that one seemed to break down a lot. That particular oil burner set up is responsible for me eventually leaving that job and going back to school to learn my commercial HVAC&R trade. I was constantly having to make temporary repairs while the oil burner was in use, and when my uncle called in an oil heating mechanic to give it an overhaul the mechanic praised the repair work I did and recommended the HVAC field to me... About a year or so later I had enough of the daily screaming & yelling matches and brutal work requirements, so I just up and quit while making plans on going to trade school. That's when I went to work for the tree service in Brooklyn and learned a whole new 'brutal' form of work, but I loved it ! Yeah the handliner is probably pretty much the same but my truck is different than you described. Mine has a pony motor that runs off the same diesel as the truck. The pony motor is for the auger that mixes the material. You flip the switch on the back for the burners which heat the material up. We use 3 colors: white, yellow, and blue. Blue is used only when I do handicap parking spots. But on my truck there are two kettles, ones white and the other is yellow. To make the blue we have an extra hardliner that we pour white into and mix blue pelts that melt in the hot material. I know you felt you worked harder then any one but never think someone else's job is easy until you put on their shoes. When I do thermo I do whole intersections and sometimes parking lots sometimes by myself. I have a sign board on my truck and plenty of cones. It's also not the only thing I do during the week. Most people that work where I do don't want to work with me because they are young and lazy.
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Post by mr potatohead on Feb 20, 2021 20:20:25 GMT
I wish you two would get a room already.
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Post by Magnus on Feb 20, 2021 20:49:33 GMT
Michael, from the video's on youtube it appears that the basic equipment hasn't changed at all ? It's still a hand liner with a manually operated 'shoe' and a small 'hopper' mounted just behind the shoe to automatically eject the glass beads. ...I know you felt you worked harder then any one but never think someone else's job is easy until you put on their shoes. When I do thermo I do whole intersections and sometimes parking lots sometimes by myself. I have a sign board on my truck and plenty of cones. It's also not the only thing I do during the week. Most people that work where I do don't want to work with me because they are young and lazy. Michael, you're misunderstanding what I meant by more "leisurely", please don't take it the wrong way and let me explain I know you work hard, not saying you don't... But you actually keep making my point by saying that you basically do everything yourself where you work, and that the other guys aren't interested or are "young & lazy". A contracting crew where one man does most of the work wouldn't make any money for the boss, and the company wouldn't be in business for very long. I totally believe you when you say you do most of the work, such as simultaneously operate a hand liner while maintaining a kettle truck, and that type of complete inefficiency may fly when someone works for a township / municipality. As you seem to well know, in these 'township' jobs there's usually only a small handful of what are called 'key men' as crew leaders and the remainder are basically 'flunkies'... ...but working for a contractor is a lot different than working for a township / municipality, if the entire crew doesn't constantly produce, and is held back by someone on the crew who is "lazy", that lazy person(s) is quickly replaced by someone who WILL produce. I have first hand experience in this, because aside from doing the traffic lines for the township of Oyster Bay in Long Island we also did all of their street signs and corner marker posts. Believe me, they had their own full time maintenance crew, but when those guys were busy doing other things and my uncle would bid on corner marker replacements we were required to do approximately 4 times the amount of posts per day than the 'Oyster Bay' crew usually did... They also had their own line striping equipment and crew, and...umm.... you get my point
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Post by Magnus on Feb 20, 2021 21:32:11 GMT
I wish you two would get a room already. I like him but he works too hard and isn't anywhere near fat enough like Parker !
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Michael
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Post by Michael on Feb 20, 2021 21:46:29 GMT
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Post by Bruce Tackett on Feb 21, 2021 22:26:15 GMT
I do most of the work for my company myself.
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Michael
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He cuts down trees. He wears high heels, suspendies, and a bra?!
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Posts: 5,288
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Post by Michael on Feb 21, 2021 22:44:25 GMT
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Post by Bruce Tackett on Feb 21, 2021 23:40:26 GMT
Hey, Mags....do you know where Oceanic Ave on Staten Island is?
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