Traffic was the worst I’ve seen it during my current job (rainy Friday afternoon at quarter til 5), so I got off in Cupertino. I guessed the correct garage, but didn’t see the SC on the way up. On the way down, I was more thorough. The SC location designation is “MA”, and is under Level 2. I guess M stands for Mezzanine. I lost track of what was under M, but ground level is G, and it goes down from there (underground); I didn’t get those level designations. This SC is not on level 2; it is on level M, which is up from level G (ground).
The SC plug pedestal area had 3 boys inside the work zone pealing the copper scrap. Maybe they were getting off work. I’d say that was a haul of maybe $1,000. A lot of work for a measly $300 each, but if you’re poor (as apprentices can be), I could see doing 3 hours of that grueling work for the “overtime”. They made it funner by laughing and talking the whole time, so I guess it works out.
There is almost no progress since other photos. I noticed a non-shored trench from the transformer to a switch box with its side cover off (letting rain sprinkle in a bit). It had ample conduit with pull rope, but no wire. The transformer and its pad are listing toward the area of the unshored trench. In the mud I wouldn’t be surprised if it fell, including while they work on it. I don’t understand why they have an unfilled trench there (the pipes look like they’re in, but I didn’t confirm by looking in the trench), and I don’t understand why it isn’t shored.
I did not see any rolls of wire for that run. There was enough scrap to do that run, so maybe they exceeded their scrap budget and didn’t measure properly. It’s always more expensive to need new wire because you cut it short than to cut it a bit long, but it does indicate to me they ran wire without knowing where it would be wired in, since they had double the scrap lengths I would think they normally need to finish wiring.
The Verizon meter socket is still empty.
My first theory that this is a weekend job for some busy person still fits these observations, but the unshored trench yells unprofessional to me, so there could be some reason for the delay consistent with that (unprofessional errors causing delays). I wonder if the inspector agrees and is part of the slowdown.
When I arrived, no EVs we’re charging at the J1772’s (ChargePoint), but when I left, just two Tesla’s were (and they seemed to know each other). There is an incentive in this garage to park in the EV spots since it is full for most the levels which take a long time to drive and the J1772’s on ground floor can skip the elevator or stairs. Hopefully level M is hidden enough and enough of a hassle that that phenomenon doesn’t transfer to the SCs.
