D-I-Y Flood lighting

[bert]

Any one any suggestions as to how or where we might obtain a few used telegraph poles for the above project? United Utilities have not been helpful

[JimK]

EBay?

Jim K

[Nightjar]

If you only want a few, you might do better buying new. Used are cheaper per pole, but not if you only want four and have to buy 50.

These people sell them new and used:

[Tricky Dicky]

Your local authority are a good source for old redundant lamp posts. Might be a better bet from the point of view of wiring up.

Richard

[alan_m]

Depending on how many lights on top, of the pole would a scaffold pole meet the requirement?

[Bill Wright]

If it's just for a normal light and it isn't too high, steel scaffold poles are a possibility. Not for cameras though as the slight movement in the wind is annoying. Alternatively small steel lamp posts can be good. Builders' merchants have them. They have that useful little door near the bottom.

Bill

[Nick]

How high do you wish the floodlights to be?

[John Williamson]

Has anyone mentioned that the only reason wooden line poles are normally replaced is because they are going rotten and aren't expected to last through the next Winter? Concrete and steel ones aren't so bad, but may not last much longer.

Or are time expired, which amounts to the same thing.

Old street lamps sound like a much better idea, especially if wiring along the length is involved, as the only way to wire a telephone pole from ground to top is to add either a channel or use wire clips at short intervals.

[bert]

Possibly. No great weight involved - we're not lighting up a football ground!! Thanks for that idea.

[bert]

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. Will talk to the chap who wants to set them up tomorrow. They're to illuminate a sheep dog training ring so we can carry on training through the winter evenings.

[Dave Liquorice]

You reckon telephone poles don't move in the wind? Both the 11 kV power pole and the telephone pole can be visibly seen moving in the wind up here. I'd say the top of the telephone one moves a good 6", maybe more.

[Jabba]

John Williamson wrote

Don't the utility companies saw them up to stop old poles being reused? I know farmers had problems getting poles for 'pole barns' some years ago.

[Bill]

In message , bert writes

I would also go for scaffolding tube or if you have the money, proper lampposts.

Telegraph poles need proper planting to be secure, you've seen the BIG augers on the back of tractors, or BT/Openreach installation vehicles? It's not just a case of digging a hole and dropping it in. They are also blooming heavy!! Lampposts are slightly easier, but still require a hole and a bit of concrete. Also rather heavy.

Will you have machinery on site, or is it all to be done by hand?

Scaffold tube would be quick and easy, also more easily moved if you wanted to re-arrange the layout. A very quick fix would be a length of tube knocked into the ground, I use putlogs which are designed to go into the gaps between bricks when building (so I am told, I have never used them for that) A large sledge hammer is most useful here, and someone who can swing it! The ones I use are about 5' long, 3' below ground and 2' above.

2 of these with a gap between them for your main pole and a pivot would be simple enough. You could then pivot them down for maintenance. If you were sure of the locations then possibly one short pole concreted into the ground and a couple of swivel clamps.

I use them, with just one putlog, for temporary loudspeaker installations on grass, but only with 3m poles and only for a week or so at a time. They remain remarkably firm. i.e. "can be a bugger to pull out at the end of an event!

Have you sorted out an electrician, a supply point and cable suitable for the job too?

[Brian Gaff]

How yer gonna change the bulbs. Also, a guy down the road once put up a pole like this and the council told him he had to take it down for two reasons, one it was too tal, funny when about 2-0 feet away was a telegraph pole, and 2 because there was light bleed to neighbouring premises.

Brian

[Tim Lamb]

In message , Jabba writes

IME they are sold locally by the operatives doing the work. Last ones here were full length, price negotiable. Marconi Systems?

Not just rot. There is a minimum height where the cables cross the highway which required a lot of extra poles 10 or so years back.

Routine maintenance seems to involve digging away soil at the pole base and treating with some aggressive fungicide. I have an idea that the electricity poles sometimes have *Boron* nails hammered in at ground level.

>

[zaax]

I used this for mine, concreted into the ground

[bert]

In message , Bill writes

We're talking farmers here.

[bert]

In message , Brian Gaff writes

Use tractor fork lift as cherry picker.

Not a problem

[spuorgelgoog]

You mean electric fence wire with some plastic water-pipe as insulators?

Owain

[Nightjar]

Held in place with baler twine.