Locate Your Underground Services Before Excavation

Avoid unnecessary costs and delays

If you want to build a swimming pool or do any excavations in your property, you have to check the underground services or utilities first. This is to ensure that no cables and pipes will be damaged during excavation.

Unless you possess the skills and equipment for the job, it’s much better to seek help from a professional cable and pipe locator. Adelaide Hills is home to several reputable companies in this niche, such as SA Cable & Pipe Locating.

Do I Need To Worry About Where My Underground Services Are?

Don’t take underground services lightly. If you are not careful and you accidentally hit and damage an underground electrical cable, the results can be fatal. Shock, flames, and electrical arcs typically result in severe burns to the face, body, and hands even when protective gear is worn. Every day in Australia an underground gas pipeline is hit and/or damaged.

Usually, a cable gets damaged if it’s crushed by heavy machinery or cut by a sharp object. Electric cables that have been damaged in the past and were left unrepaired or unreported can lead to major disruptions.

Hitting an underground gas line or electrical cable can lead to serious injuries or even fatalities on the worksite. Innocent bystanders may also be injured by the damaged gas pipelines or electric cables.

Simply put, an error here can cost you a lot of money and even endanger lives. Hence, you should be particular about where your underground services are before commencing any excavations.

What Can I Do to Find Underground Services?

Be careful not to damage any underground services when you dig.

Seek help from someone who specialises in underground service locating. After all, these underground services are all enclosed in protective coatings or pipes. Cable locating experts such as SA Cable & Pipe Locating in Adelaide Hills effectively locate your underground cables and pipes while also managing any associated risks.

SA Cable & Pipe Locating fully plan their work scope prior to commencing any activity on your site. They also utilise data from Dial Before You Dig to give you a complete picture or where your services are located. This information can then be integrated through GPS mapping technology to produce a completed site plan for you to use. They use the latest cable locating devices including ground proximity radar along with the best industry standard practices.

Service cables are typically owned by a distribution network operators, such as water, electricity and gas companies. Make sure that you check for equipment owned by these organisations.

If you think that there are underground electric cables in your area, ask them for plans to confirm the location. You may ask an underground service locating expert to come to your area and locate the cables for you.

It’s necessary to identify abandoned or disused utility infrastructure so that they can be assessed for damage.

Oftentimes, abandoned lines are not marked, causing a lot of problems for earth moving and excavation contractors. When communities develop and grow, bigger lines and pipes are required. However, often the old pipes and lines are not removed before installing these new services. When these old utilities get struck, the contractor needs to stop working until the electrical or cable company arrives and evaluates the damage.

This is why contractors often deal with last-minute challenges, such as having to redesign the work site after an engineer assesses it.

Keep in mind that it’s vital to have an expert on underground service locating locate the cables using specialised equipment if you are digging or excavating near your electric cables. This way, you can avoid any accidents or unwanted incidents.

Risk assessment and careful planning are likewise necessary. You have to think of how you will do the work to ensure that you take local circumstances into consideration.

Don’t forget to obtain and review plans as well as other relevant information before you allow the excavation work to begin. In the event that you cannot find the plans but have to proceed to excavation, you should work as if there are live buried underground services in your location.

Then again, plans only tell you the number and the location of underground services. Hence, you should still seek help from individuals who specialize in underground service locating. Before any work is done, all underground cables should be located, identified, and marked.

What Can Happen If I Damage My Underground Cables or Pipes?

As you’ve read previously, you can hurt yourself and be injured. Even worse, your injuries could be fatal. Damaging underground services never leads to anything good. This is why utmost care is necessary.

Digging through the ground is an integral part of the construction process. However, each time the ground is broken, there’s a risk of destroying or damaging underground services. This can be both dangerous and expensive.

If you run a company and you lead the excavation team, this construction failure can also tarnish your reputation. Clients, investors, and important people in the industry may no longer trust you, causing you to lose your business.

Excavating safely is truly a vital competence for utility organisations and contractors. Interestingly though, as the world becomes more urbanized, more excavations occur. This means that more pipes and cables are used. Likewise, more problems with underground service locating may arise.

Aside from health and life endangerment, you might incur a lot of expenses. You may have to have such underground utilities repaired. There’s even the chance of having to hire and train new people, as well as spend money on strategies that can make your workers more productive and efficient.

If your workers or bystanders got injured or died in the incident, you might have to pay huge fines and insurance fees. Insurance companies can use opportunities like this to charge high premiums.

More often than not, damage occurs when detection tools are not used, good working practices are not sufficient, and on-site activities do not properly reflect ideal working practices.

This is why it’s important to use the right tools for the job as well as implement proper training and working practices. Likewise, you should make your workers understand and learn about the right on-site behaviour.

Do not hesitate to use the latest technological innovations for your objectives. Don’t think twice about working with the experts on this industry as well. You can contact SA Cable & Pipe Locating to inquire about their services and ask for quotes.

What Equipment Can I Use to Find these Underground Services?

It isn’t a good idea to rely on maps alone. You should always use the right tools in conjunction with these maps. Remember that it takes time, effort, dedication, and updated technology to efficiently and safely locate existing underground infrastructure in any area.

The digging process is not simple. Make it a habit to call underground service locating professionals before you proceed with this step.
State agencies would only locate public utilities. So, if you are dealing with private utilities, you have to use your own resources to locate them. You need to pay for radar and frequency locating technologies to get desirable results.

If you’re a contractor, you have to verify your lines with your own locator, along with a vacuum excavator for the soft-digging method.
One of the most basic and important tools for locating underground utilities is a utility locator. It narrows down the marked utilities and speeds up the process of locating them.

So, if you have to work on a manicured yard, you have to be careful not to destroy it with your excavations. This tool will help you achieve that goal as well as keep your restoration costs to a minimum.

You can choose a multiple-frequency locator or an audio-only locator. It is not advisable to invest in a single-frequency locator. Even though it can give you accurate readings, it might not be able to give you the other things you need to get the job done.

Can I Get Someone To Locate Cables And Pipes?

Again, if you’re not confident with your skills or you really don’t know what to do, seek help from underground service locating professionals at SA Cable & Pipe Locating based in the Adelaide Hills. Do not force yourself to do the job. Otherwise, you can end up with a much bigger problem. Chris has studied and trained for precisely these circumstances.

What Are The Benefits Of Using An Accredited Service Locator?

There are numerous benefits you can get when you use an accredited underground service locator, including safety, accuracy, cost-efficiency, and high quality results. You can minimize the risks as well as avoid wasting time and money.

All in all, it’s advantageous (and in many cases, necessary) to work with a professional cable and pipe locator. Adelaide Hills is home to firms that specialize in this kind of endeavour and are capable of ensuring that the entire process goes smoothly.

SA Cable & Pipe Locating, being among the most trusted of these companies, have the right knowledge, skills, and equipment for the job. And yes, they’re also familiar with the latest methods used in construction.