Speaker 1: On this episode of Master the NEC, we're gonna talk
about why the electrical industry desperately needs certified thermal electricians
and how misinformation from untrained thermographers is actually hurting customers,
damaging trust, and in some cases putting people at risk.
Speaker 2: Okay, so we're gonna give you some.
Speaker 1: Real examples, some real numbers, some real scenarios, not hype
on today's episode.
Speaker 2: Go ahead, folks, let's go on and roll that intro music.
Speaker 3: Welcome to the Master of the NEC podcast, the ultimate
destination for anyone passionate about the electrical trade. Whether you're
a season electrician, an eager apprentice, were just someone who
wants to dive deep into the world of electrical work,
you've come to the right place. Join your host, Paul Abernavi,
a true authority in the industry with over thirty eight
years of trade experience, as he electrifies your mind within discussions,
expert tips, and valuable insights that will keep you ahead
of the curve. Each episode, Paul will illuminate the complexities
of the trade, decode the national electrical Code, and share
the latest industry trends, all while empowering you to take
your electrical career to the next level. So gar up,
plug in, and get ready to supercharge your knowledge because
with the Master of the Neez podcast, the power is
in your hands.
Speaker 2: Now get ready. Here is your host, Paul Abernafi's.
Speaker 3: What Up? What Up?
Speaker 2: Everybody?
Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of Master the NEC Podcast. I'm
your host, Paul Abernathy, and today we're going to be
deep diving into a subject that is absolutely shaking the thermal
imaging world. Look, if you're an electrician, whether you're a
maintenance electrician, industrial electrician, even residential and commercial, if you
don't know what thermography is, or if you haven't figured
out how to incorporate that into your business, you need
to think about doing that. Look, we've been doing this
type of stuff for nearly forty years. Most people know
me as the guy who teaches the National Electrical Code.
But y'all obviously know that I have forty years coming
up on forty years in the trade. I've done thermography.
I have troubleshoot a lot of things through my years,
and obviously when I'm teaching, there's no way that I
could teach these topics without being intimate with them and
understanding them. And so when I set out to create
the Ultimate Thermography for Electricians type program, I was really
looking at what was missing in the industry and a
couple things. And y'all know me, those that listen to
me regularly know that when there's a problem and I
see a problem, I usually go after it with both
guns blazing. And one of the things that I started
to see was that thermography is not new.
Speaker 2: It's been around for a while.
Speaker 1: And of course the cameras today have gotten amazing. And
if you haven't heard, we just did a partnership with Milese,
and so you know we are going to be doing
a extreme deep dive into their thermal imaging cameras. I've
used their cameras. They're a great piece of equipment. When
they're in the right hands, we're in the wrong hands.
They basically can give false, misleading information and basically it
hurts the industry if you don't have proper training. So
when I decided to create a program, one of the
things I want to do is one explain thermography from
an electrician standpoint, because there's a big difference between somebody
just saying they're a thermal imaging expert they are level one,
level two, level three, but they don't all They're not
always electricians. And that's a big deal for me because
majority of what I teach and what we go through
in our programs, you have to understand in.
Speaker 2: The electrical basics.
Speaker 1: You have to understand the loading and amps and current
draw and duty cycles, and there's so many things that
you need to understand.
Speaker 2: Voltage drop and how.
Speaker 1: That can play effects on poor terminations or heat migrations
and all those things are critically important. And so when
I set out to create a program, one of the
core things was to say, look, I want to take
electricians who may not understand what thermography is. They may
not even have ever added it into what they do.
In fact, you could have been working in electricity your
entire career and you might not have never put the
thermal imaging camera in your hand. And you know, I
tend to say that the electricians that don't embrace thermal
imaging as a tool that they should have on their
truck just like any other tool they have, then you're
missing out on being able to reduce time and troubleshooting
trying to find and be proactive and things. Is that
your customer needs to be aware of. It can be
an extremely helpful diagnostic tool. Obviously, it can't predict failure.
That's why you're trained to look at something and look
at the condition of use, and look at the exposure
and try to educate your customer. But at the end
of the day, these are all tools that help you
give get a better picture of a situation. And so
I set out to create a program because you know what,
even today and I just experienced it today, there's so
much misinformation. And when I got into this and decided
I wanted to create a very detailed program on this
with a bunch of examples for motors and transformers and
give you some temperature examples. Again, you know, thermal imaging
cameras are not brain surgery.
Speaker 2: And understand it.
Speaker 1: Once you learn distances and reflection, emissivity, and understanding how
to set these things and how to adjust for angles
so that you're not actually reading it wrong, which may
be you know, body heat or radiation or sunlight or reflection.
Speaker 2: And once you start understanding.
Speaker 1: Things like breakers and what their temperature normally would be,
and so that you're not kind of crying wolf when
you see something that's a little higher than normal. You're like, well,
it's still maybe within the realm of the operation of
the breaker. Understanding that the insulation' rating on conductors, you
may see a temperature and you're going to go crying
wolf and you're really not anywhere near the volatility of
the insulation. We want you to understand those things without
having to cry wolf. But we also want you to
be able to identify things that you can tell your customer.
And if you're in maintenance prevented a maintenance, these are
things that you want to document for ongoing preventive maintenance.
And that's why NFPA seven d B is now really
making it something that thermal imaging is an important component
of that document and it's now an enforceable document rather
than just a a voluntary document. So all these things
are changing, and of course with the advent of data
centers and large equipment and large motors, the uptime is
extremely important to the client. So being able to look
at something and try to be a little predictive and
help that customer is something that you need to learn
and all electricians should embrace it. If you think you
know it all, you don't. And I promise you that
you don't know thermography unless you've been involved in it,
that type of thing. And I've been involved with it
for years, uh, and it's part of my practice. And
then when I sold all my businesses, you know, I
never thought that I needed to teach somebody thermography or
introduce a program. But of course y'all know I teach programs.
So it just dawndled me.
Speaker 2: Let's go on and.
Speaker 1: Create what I feel is the best, you know, program
out there. And I did not want to create a
program that we teach building envelope, that we teach uh
things like insulation.
Speaker 2: That's not my deal.
Speaker 1: I'm an electrician, okay, I'm gonnalectricians electrician. I create stuff
for electricians. And so that's what we did, and that's
when we came up with the Certified Thermal Electrician. The
trademarks are already filed. Uh. It's a program I think
that's not going away. Just recently we SILE signed a
partnership with Milesy Tools, which makes some amazing sets of
thermal imaging cameras that we'll be talking about more in
the future, even doing some videos on them so you
can really see the difference, uh in what's difference between
low tier professional grade and how you can even use
a much higher detailed unit for more stationary things like
switch gear that allow you to get really high images.
Speaker 2: That you can use in reports.
Speaker 1: But we'll cover all that stuff, But what I wanted
to do was talk about some issues that I'm seeing
and how misinformation can be spread by people that don't
have the proper training.
Speaker 2: And look, I'm not bashing.
Speaker 1: I'm not here to bash somebody who says they're a
thermal expert and they've been through level one, level two,
level three thermography training. It's some other program. I'm not
here to do that. I'm just sitting here to say, look,
those training is always great, and you know there are
some amazing educators out there in thermography world.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying we tend to.
Speaker 1: Want to deep dive in electrical I support the CTEs
okay in that, because I am always going to be
here to answer questions for them and give them the
support as being part of our program.
Speaker 2: So there's more to that.
Speaker 1: They get an NEC consultant, and they get somebody that
can bounce things off of and review and look at
images and give them feedback those type of things. That's
what we wanted to create the program for. So let's
kind of look at some things. We want to talk
real numbers, real examples, real scenarios, no hype here, that
type of thing. So let's break this down. It's okay,
number one one, let's look at this. Here is the
rise of thermal experts. Now in today's world on TikTok, Instagram, eBay,
whatever it is, everyone has a thermal imaging camera.
Speaker 2: They can just get them.
Speaker 1: And now they they've really in the last couple of years,
the prices have really come down. It was a time
when a thermal imaging camera of any decent quality was
going to cost you three and four thousand dollars and
that's just not the case anymore. And in fact, many cases,
it's a total waste of money to go with something
that is that expensive to do what we do in
the electrical world, it's just unnecessary. But there are certain
features that are beneficial for like, for example, I highly
recommend the tr twenty pro which is from Miles, because
it's a dual camera setup and that type of thing,
so it's actually going to have two cameras, one for
the visible image and one for the infrared image, and
that's going to be great for your reports.
Speaker 2: Not all cameras have that. Now.
Speaker 1: Of course, you can do a thermal picture and then
take a regular picture with a camera that is also
doable as well. But at the end of the day,
if it's already built in, then it just makes life
a little easier, right, So that's what we're going to
talk about.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Everybody and their brother can get a thermal imaging camera today,
but not everyone has the knowledge to use it. Now,
all you've got to do is spend about an hour
on TikTok, Instagram, whatever and see people that are pushing
the thermal imaging cameras and you know, usually they're affiliates
for the manufacturers, but they're pushing these cameras and they're
just you know, shooting it around the room, taking pictures
of their hand, looking at certain things, you know, and
they're trying to get you to buy it, and you
look at it and you go, that's coolest shit. I
want to have something like that, because, again, is this
technology that for years was out of our price range
from most technicians, and so now they're available. The problem
is nobody knows how to use it. They don't know
how to use it. They don't know what the color
patterns mean, the options and the color patterns with the heat,
and how it transfers down a conductor, or where to
actually the angle to actually take the actual image, and
they don't understand it. And so what happens is they
get values that are misleading. They might not be high
enough or they might be too low, and they give
this information to their customer and then they start saying
things like, look, you see this here, this is a
loose termination. Because of that, you're wasting energy because over
time it's arcing and it's energy, and they start to
take this customer down this and that's misleading to me. Okay,
so today thermal cameras are cheap and more available than ever.
If you go to our website thermal Electrician dot com,
you will see under the info tab you will see
the ones that we recommend, and you can even get
a ten percent discount if you order. You're not going
to be a bye through me, so don't worry. You're
not giving your credit card to us. You click on it,
you will automatically get a pop up that'll tell you
about you getting additional ten percent off, and if they're
running a special, you get ten percent off that special. Okay,
so always keep an eye for the specials that I'm
just saying. All right now, people buy one and suddenly
they think they're thermal experts. They really look at it
and say, oh, obviously this is easy, right the red
or the white depending on the scale, And they look
at it and.
Speaker 2: Go, oh, that's a hot spot. That's a problem.
Speaker 1: They don't understand they're taking readings and they're not even
removing covers. They don't understand how to adjust the emissivity
based on the material that they're scanning. They don't understand
black body theory in what happens with the emittance of
this energy. That they don't get it, but yet they'll
hold themselves out as a thermal expert. Now, look, I'm
not here to tell people how to do their business.
But what I am here to do is say that
I can promise you that we want to make sure
that again it's not brain surgery, but we want to
make sure you have some viable examples, some temperature differentials,
the delta tea's, things like that in our course that
you can actually use and all you're doing is substituting
what you experience in the field with the information that
we give you. And if you make it very plain
and simple, keep the lessons short in our courses because
we really want to focus on the material, because I
believe reading comprehension is extremely important. You can look at
an image all you want, and you can go get
your own images, but you have to understand temperatures.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Colors are one thing, okay, but you have to understand
temperatures highs, lows, and how to do a peer review.
All these things are extremely important. Not just look at colors.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Social media is again y'all know my love hate relationship
with social media, but that amplifies this issue. People post
thermograms and they make bold claims without understanding electrical science.
Speaker 2: They don't get it right.
Speaker 1: So look, just because somebody buys a three hundred dollars
thermal camera does not make them a thermographer and absolutely
does not make them an electrial diagnostic professional. Now you
already have a leg up. If you're listening to this
and you're a licensed to electrician, you already have a
leg up on most thermographers.
Speaker 2: Okay, because you're an electrician.
Speaker 1: Remember a lot of these thermal cameras are used by
home inspectors. Home inspectors are in no way are they
electrical experts. But you have people that specialize in thermography
that went through a level one level to a level
three that never held an electrical license in their life.
And do you really want that person making judgment on
things and not understanding why this might be what it is,
or look at a conductor and see the consistency, or
understanding when you may have a phase in a three
phase it's overloaded, and why there's so many things that
you're really not going to get Unless you've been in
this trade, you understand it. And so that's why we
cater to electricians because we believe that they're in the
perfect situation to be thermal imaging experts. And all we
want to do is give them some examples in thermography
to help spawn them into that career and add these
services to their business. Okay, So look, you wouldn't hand
somebody a megameter and suddenly call them a motor specialist, okay,
Or hand them a megameter and all of a sudden,
or give them a thermal insulation tester and all of
a sudden, they're an expert. Okay, same thing here. A
thermal camera is a tool, not a qualification. You only
get better as you work it, as you get used
to seeing the images, as you get used to it,
you will get better.
Speaker 2: And it takes time.
Speaker 1: It's not instant, right, So just because they buy a
camera does not make them an expert. That's what we're
going to try to do in our Certified Thermal Electrician program.
Now here's a problem, the problem with this industry right
now from what I've seen and the reason that I
spawned the creation of this program and even the program
that I made for the everyday consumer, because we have
a thermal imaging Beginner's course that's just for anybody that
buys a thermal imaging camera, because you know what, if
you're going to buy one and you're not qualified enough
to be an expert, you at least need to know
how to use one. And none of the manufacturers anywhere
give you a very detailed course to understand emissivity and
how it plays a role in distance and position, and
they don't.
Speaker 2: They don't give you any of that.
Speaker 1: So I felt it was extremely vital for me to
create a basic program for people as well, so that
somebody's going to buy that low end one hundred and
thirty dollars thermal imaging camera, that they at least get
some basic understanding. And so we created a very extensive
basic program that's available as well over on fasttracksystem dot com.
So anybody that you don't have to be an expert,
but let me tell you what. If you're just wanting
to get into this, you should get that. It's like
sixty nine to ninety five and it's basically over thirty
lessons or thirty modules. I mean, it's it's massive, and
you'll get a lot out of it, I promise you. Okay,
all right, so here's the deal. Let's use some real
world examples. So recently I saw someone post on a
social platform and they made a claim that a point
one ome loose connection. Okay, so it's point one of
an ome a loose connection was wasting you ready. He
made a statement that it was wasting eighteen thousand, seven
hundred and twenty dollars a year in energy. Okay, just
a point one owme loose connection. Now, I want you
to think about that. How would they even know that
to make that claim, because you know what. To know that,
you'd have to know how to measure the current. You'd
have to know the log the duty cycle. You'd have
to know if they quantify the voltage drop across that
point one ome connection. No, they simply took a picture
and made up some numbers. Right, So look, a thermal
camera shows heat, it doesn't show amperage, doesn't show power,
doesn't show kill.
Speaker 2: A WoT our costs doesn't show any of that.
Speaker 1: Without knowing the load, you cannot calculate the ice squared
are losses a very predictable formula. Amps times amps times
are okay, I square it are. You can't know these
things unless you know what the measured current is, what
the log of the duty cycle is, what the vaultage
drop is across that point one om of loose connection.
If you state it otherwise, all you're doing is misleading somebody.
You cannot convert temperature into dollars without real electrical measurements.
Now when people do that or and I'll be honest
with you, In our programs we go out of our
way to explain how you explain things. In fact, we
spend multiple modules explaining how to work with the customer
how to make sure you're providing them with accurate information
and not snake oil.
Speaker 2: Really, because you know what, the moment you do in this.
Speaker 1: Industry, the customer loses trust, contractors are misled, legitimate thermographers
look unprofessional, and electrics electricians start thinking thermal imaging is
snake oil. And that's when you all of a sudden
get people on mic wholt forums and other forums all
talking about it's snake oil and they having a clue
either how you use thermography. But they're easy to start
jumping on that naysayer's bandwagon because there's so many people
out there that post things that aren't posting accurate information.
Speaker 2: The facts, the facts. Okay, Now, what makes.
Speaker 1: A CTE or certified therminal electrician, what makes them better?
Speaker 2: What makes them different?
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about that for a second. A certified
therminal electrician through our program, first of all, they're an electrician. Second,
it's trained in both thermal science and electrical science, and
they have people to reach out to to assist them
at any point that they're confused in the two Okay, right,
not one, not just thermal science education, but electrical science education.
Speaker 2: Okay, not one, but both.
Speaker 1: Now, CTEs understand loading characteristics, ANYC based principles. I squhere
are heating voltage, drop resistance faults. In our program, they
also learn about thermal maintenance with NFPA seventy B and
we also talk about conductors and terminal behavior under various loads. Okay,
so the CTEs don't guess, they calculate, they measure, and
they confirm the data before they make any outlandish claims.
Speaker 2: Now, again, I'm.
Speaker 1: Not here to scare other thermographers out there that do
a great job, and there's many them out there that
understand these basic core fundamentals. But if we don't get
back to making sure that we don't make outlandish claims
without information. Now, temperature differentials or delta te's and all
that's that's a proven science. We cover it. It's important
to give them a heads up. It's also important to
know when temperatures above and operating temperature of a piece
of equipment. That's all great, and even on our website
we give you some free tools, free calculators that you
can use in the field.
Speaker 2: A delta TE calculator.
Speaker 1: It looks for the difference in the and we talk
about that is all included, but we give you some
calculators to help that along the way, so that you
make sure that whatever you're telling your customer is accurate,
because at the end of the day, it's if you've
got to make things up in order to get the sale,
then you're going about it all wrong and you're liable
to get that one sale. And somebody points out that
that's just not how it works.
Speaker 2: And then the.
Speaker 1: Next thing, you know, it's almost like engineering, right, how
many times have you heard the person say, well, you
know what if we just take a car and we
put motors and generators on the wheels, and two in
the front and to the back, and when it's running,
it's charged. The front wheels are charging one battery and
the other one's charging the other. Or or how about
the person that says, well, well, let's put a wind
turbine on it and as you're going down the road,
it'll spind the turbine, it'll charge. No, there's diminishing losses here.
So you're burning energy to make energy, and you're burning
it at a higher rate than you're producing it, and
so it's it's it's the basically it's the science of
diminishing return. And so when people look at certain things
and start making outlandish claims because it seems like it's
plausible and it's not, then that's just what gives everybody
a bad name.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm just saying.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's look at some realistic, defendable, defensible examples.
Speaker 2: Okay, so let's set up this scenario. Okay, So let
me walk you through a realistic example.
Speaker 1: And it kind of thermal certified thermal electrician would evaluate properly. Okay,
So let's do this. So we've got a commercial pain aboard.
We have feeder lugs running hotter than its neighbor. Okay,
so we're doing peer review hotter. We got lug that's
hotter than the one that's next to it.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: So the CTE investigates finds loose terminals. Okay, so finds
a slightly loose terminal. They measure the resistance around point
zero two homes. The load is approximately eighty amps is
what's being loaded on it, and for twelve hours a day,
that termination was loose. Now, let's walk you through the
electrical math. Okay, so we can plug in some numbers.
Remember that i squared are ratio. Okay, let's talk about it.
It's it's not Internet magic. Okay, it's not Houdini's smoking mirrors.
We know what the loads are, Okay, So it's eighty amps. Okay,
so eighty amps squared. That is I squared amps squared.
So I squared are. So eighty ams squared is six
thy four hundred. Multiply that by point zero two because
that's your resistance. In homes, you're gonna get one hundred
and twenty eight watts so daily, that's about one point
five three six kilowad hours annually. That's about five hundred
and sixty kill a widde hours. Okay, so from one
point five to three six killo white hours to over
five hundred and sixty kilo white hours over the year. Now,
if your rate, or your power rate or energy rate
was utility rate, was zero point one four cent per
kill a wide hour, then that's going to equate to
about seventy eight dollars and forty eight cent per year.
Speaker 2: And look, that's.
Speaker 1: Nothing to sneeze at, especially if you've got a bunch
of those going on. I mean, that's that's just that's
pissing away money. Okay, but that is nowhere near the
example that the gentleman used online that was like point
zero one. Here we're talking about point zero two and
we're based on an eighty AM load, and we're talking
seventy eight dollars a year. It's still nothing to shake
a stick at. Okay, it's still wasted. Now there's something
bigger though than just that. It's again nowhere near eighteen thousand. Hell,
it ain't even where near eight hundred. Okay, it's basically
seventy eight dollars and forty eight cent.
Speaker 2: But the money's not the problem. It isn't.
Speaker 1: The real problem is what the heat does over time.
Because heat rises a little bit, time goes on. As
time goes on, as the heat it continues to build
up that heat, and what happens is you'll get to
the volatile point of maybe not as much the lug,
but the insulated conductors around it, or any of the
material that may be exposed to the heat around it.
Maybe what the lug is mounted against creates other issues
over time, and of course then you have a runaway
or a breakdown. Okay, So the real problem is don't
focus on the money, Okay, focus on the fact that
this could be a future problem that's going to cost
a lot more than seventy eight dollars a year. If
this system were to melt down, then we're talking thousands
of dollars to fix an issue. So that's the kind
of diagnostic curculating. You're not saying when it's going to fail.
You're not saying that it's failing next week. You're not
into that. You're not a notredamous. But what you can
tell them is this temperature is rising, and if they
do proper maintenance and they do six month reviews where
they take a picture of it and they take the
different temperatures, or if it's really elevated, you make them
aware of it right now so they can potentially mitigate it.
Then you're saving a potential issue down the road. Now,
when is that going to happen? You? I don't think
you can predict that, but again we do know that
over time, the heat is going to be the problem. Ultimately,
things circumb when it's put to a certain level of heat.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, let's do another one.
Speaker 1: So a real danger we're to look at, so let's
talk about it's really the risk, isn't the dollars. The
risk is a heat. That's what you focus on. But
you got to do it within the context of not
blowing smoke. I mean, you need to understand what an
overcurrent device operates at, or what an AFCI or GFCI
operates at or or or you know what the normal
operation temperature is or what's considered acceptable.
Speaker 2: You need to understand that. Before you do, you know,
start calling out cry wolf. Okay, so let me walk
you through it.
Speaker 1: So there are different things that can cause heating at
that termination. Okay, you could have progressive oxidation. As the
heat rises and continues to rise, the oxidation will get
heavier and heavier, insulation degradation, especially near the termination. And
today I can tell you as a person that is
very much into the WIR and cable industry. I've served
as an expert to this industry for over a decade.
I'm going to tell you that all the data centers
and everybody wants that insallation brought all the way up
to the lug, all the way up to the terminal,
the connector or whatever's going on. They don't want to
see any of the conductive material. Well, the more you
move that towards the lug. The more that the heat
on a poor termination can transfer down and you'll start
having insulation degradation, whether it's thermal plastic and it starts
regressing and you start seeing little clear bubbles on it
that is the plasticizer migrating out of it, or you
start seeing it browning or turning discolored or really opaque.
When it comes to thermoplastic, I mean, excuse me, thermal set,
which is like a cross link polyethylene.
Speaker 2: There's things that can happen.
Speaker 1: It doesn't melt, but it crystallizes on that cross link
polyethylene okay XLPE. So degradation is going to reduce the
lifespan of that insulation. Also, the heat, the elevated heat
is also going to be transferred in. I mean, these
are overcurrent protective device and so they're going to have
a trip setting. And again when you overload it and
you're putting too much heat on it, you're going to
start getting breaker tripping, equipment failure, internal parts melting down,
and devices breaking. How many times have you heard stories
of a breaker looks great from the front, in the back,
it's already melted all down. That didn't just happen overnight.
That takes time. And you might say, well, why didn't
the breaker trip right away? Well, because, as I said,
you could have a very low arc, a very low
resistance arc, but over time the heat builds up, but
it's it's not significant enough to clear the overcurrent device.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Also, as components heat up, the potential for failure creates
the greater potential for an ARC flash potential. And we
know how everybody's freaking about an NFPA seventy E and
ARC flash and all this kind of stuff. You just
run the greater risk if your terminations, if your connections,
if your equipment is not in optimum running condition, so
you have to be aware of those things. There's a
fire risk associated with the elevated temperatures as well.
Speaker 2: Now for most people.
Speaker 1: Today, like data centers and big commercial the big money
issue for them is really two things. One is the
potential for equipment replacement, but the big one is costly downtime.
This is why preventative maintenance is so key in taking
records and documentation, and we plain how you have a
regimental program to go in there and take readings on
a monthly basis. If it's very volatile equipment that must
stay optimized, you want to make sure you do frequent
thermal inspections and document it, document.
Speaker 2: The value, make sure you do it.
Speaker 1: This is why we use a lot with the TR
three eighty four C. Why we use that thermal limited
camera because it's actually a twenty five hurt so it's
not as spiffy as like a TR twenty pro, which
is like fifty hurts. The lower hurts means it's not
really designed to do, you know, moving things as much.
That's because on that one, that's the one you put
on a tripod and you put it on here and
you take some readings as you know, ramp up some
loads and you take really high definition readings. The issue
here is in those data centers they need to stay
up and run, and there are ways to find weaknesses
in the system circuits that were overloaded because they didn't
calculate it out for the various servers that are going
to be on it. And you can't see it.
Speaker 2: Are you what are you gonna do? You're gonna wait
for the thermally break down.
Speaker 1: I know this because one of the reasons that I
even ended up at on KOWIRB was because of a
data center that was in a big issue plasticizer melting down.
Speaker 2: It was a big deal.
Speaker 1: And I was asked to step in and solve the issue.
And ultimately it was an engineer's design issue. But we
would not have found that if we didn't do a
detailed analysis. Now, I did not do thermal imaging on
that one because I wasn't on the site. I reviewed
the drawings and I reviewed data that they supplied. In
that alone, I could find where the problem was, and
I re engineered the entire installation and was able to
identify it. Did that make the engineer happy? Absolutely not.
Did the engineer finally admit he was wrong? Absolutely? But
I know that it got us as a wire and
cable manufacturer off the hook because it had nothing to
do with our wire. Okay, so impactful. A seventy eight
dollar energy problem can turn into a seventy eight thousand
dollars shutdown or worse if you ignore it.
Speaker 2: So that's not a cry wolf.
Speaker 1: That is understanding how a problem can start and how
it could potentially escalate if you don't make people aware
of it. I'm not gonna tell you it's gonna fail tomorrow.
But if I'm seeing values based on our training that
are high, I'm telling you it's going to fail. I
can't tell you when, but it's gonna fail because the
heat doesn't lie. Okay, you just need to understand how
to understand the heat pattern, how it moves down the conductor,
what's acceptable and what's not. You need to understand how
to do the delta t You need to understand how
to do a peer review, quantitative and qualitative review. You
need to understand these things in order to make a
really good.
Speaker 2: Report for your customer. That's your responsibility.
Speaker 1: That's what you're You should have a responsibility to do
that properly as a professional. So other examples that electricians
will deal with when there is that heat rise. Let's
ignore the seventy eight bucks because that guy who posted
it on social media is full of crap. There's no
eighteen thousand, no point zero one home of resistance point
over a year. You know, nowhere near is that the cost? Now,
could it cost way more than that eighteen thousand dollars
if the equipment goes down or something breaks down. Absolutely
it could, But that's not how he conveyed it.
Speaker 2: That's how you should convent.
Speaker 1: So you've got burnt lugs, you've got melted buses, you
got failed breakers, You've got motor starters that fry because
of loose terminations and loads. You got variable frequency drives
that burn out prematurely because of loose connections or heat
build up up ups. You've got C and C machine failures.
These are very volatile sensitive equipment that need to make
sure they run at a certain value, and you know,
at a certain voltage as well, so you have voltage
drop issues because of poor terminations. So look, it's not
just a matter of throwing a thermal imaging camera on
a situation. Electrician understands how to not only use the camera,
but how to use a vaultmeter, how to use an amprobe,
how to be able to read that data just as
important as a thermal imaging camera, and a lot of
times that's what separates the true electrical thermography expert from
just somebody who has basic thermography training. And it's some
of it out there is really good. Okay, don't don't
get me wrong. I'm not here to bash other training programs.
Speaker 2: They're great. They've been probably been doing it longer than
I have.
Speaker 1: My point is tailoring it for the electrician is a
lot different than taking a course and then trying to
learn about thermal envelope and then trying to learn about.
Speaker 2: Water and HVAC.
Speaker 1: It's a little different, folks, and that's what we only
cater to and I don't care about those other things,
to be honest with you, now, our basic thermography course
does get into some of those things, because obviously people
are buying these cameras, the low end, the more affordable ones.
Speaker 2: They're buying them. Well, I think they should know how
to use it. I don't want you to waste your money.
Speaker 1: But if you're somebody who wants to be a certified
therminal electrician, you're beyond that.
Speaker 2: You're focusing electrical. That's your focus.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's look at some stories, you know, just kind
of real world examples.
Speaker 2: How about this.
Speaker 1: There's been a situation where you've been to it, and
you might have been to I've been to a job
where the breaker looks totally.
Speaker 2: Fine until it didn't.
Speaker 1: How many times you heard people say, well, it's it's fun,
and you know that place has been like that. It's
been like that for forty years until it burns down,
until something happens, and then it just happens. I mean,
people are so complacent today, like, well, I've been doing
this for thirty eight years, and I'm like, yeah, well,
until something happens, it happens. A skydiver done twenty thousand
jumps until his parachute doesn't open, Then he's a greasy
spot on the ground. You get what I'm saying. When
it's gonna happen, it's gonna happen. So you know, a
breaker face looked normal. Thermal imaging showed a forty degree
above ambient behind the handle panel had to be de energized.
Once it was pulled, the lug was almost charcoal.
Speaker 2: Would have burnt the.
Speaker 1: Building down probably within months or the only hope is
that it was contained within the enclosure. Thank god, that's
why we have the enclosures, so normal cameras see what
the human eye cannot see. Now, there are literally videos
out there now on YouTube. I've seen them where people
have done it offering how to use thermal imaging cameras
for electrical folks. I'm not lying to you. Go and
look on YouTube and things like that. There are people
saying that you're doing it. And they don't even pull
off the cover. They don't mention, They just hold the
camera there. They don't pay attention to the distance their way,
which is very important. They don't pay attention to the angle,
and they just put it up there and they see
this red and they go ooh, it's hot. That needs
to be fixed. They have no clue that breaker may
be underload right now. There's a reason why it's running hotter.
But is it running too hot?
Speaker 2: Do they know? But what I can tell you is
you're going to see something hot.
Speaker 1: Your ass better be pulling that cover because the thermal
camera can see what the human eye cannot. Okay, And
in our case, I've seen plenty of breakers where the
front looks perfectly fine, the back is totally melted out
of it.
Speaker 2: It's still running for now. I'm sure you've seen it.
Speaker 1: I am more than sure everybody in their career have
had a breaker. The back ass end of it is
totally burnt away, and you're wondering, like, why the hell
didn't it trip because it was a low current draw load.
Over time, the arc built heat. It grew and grew
and grew and grew and grew, It still wasn't enough
to clear the overcurrent device, but it grew and grew
and grew until it started getting past the volatility point
and things started melting down. Eventually, hopefully it would blow.
That's the hope I'm just saying. Now, there was a
data center that had a feeder. It had a small
resistant fault. The customer didn't want any downtime. They didn't
want to shut it down, so the CTE logged the
data showed changes over weeks.
Speaker 2: And this is where it's really good to you U.
Speaker 1: The TR three eighty four C is to do ongoing
high quality imagery. Of course the TR twenty pro will
do it as well, but this is a prime example
for the for a higher end specialty camera. Okay, so
over weeks they kept it and they would take these
readings and they would get heats heat Rise was trending
same loads. It just kept going up and up, and
it's running the same load characteristics. At that point, the
customer authorized a shut down. And when they went and
looked at that location that kept giving in this constant rise,
there was a lug that was nearly melted all.
Speaker 2: The way through.
Speaker 1: Now they customer authorized a shut down so they could
take data centers offline and support them other ways. They
didn't just take customers offline, they re routed it so
that they could have this authorized shut down and then
they felt this problem. What do you think would and
I'm going to tell you from my experience data centers
when they're down. If you just recently saw this issue
that happened with Amazon and it was all down the
cloud flare or whatever cloudfare due to one person's issue,
even with him as programming, we're talking hundreds of thousands
of dollars it cost them. From a mistake, folks, every
single data center in the country should be doing thermal
imaging on every volatile feeder that's going to this equipment,
and they should be documented and they should be able
to be able to look at and what you'll see
is a heat characteristic that either stays consistent based on
the loading that is consistent, or it will rise. And
when you start seeing a signature of a rise, that's
where the preventative maintenance folks look at it. So again,
if for you data centers out there who are saying, look,
we'll just ride that luck train until something breaks down, Okay,
you keep doing you boot, but eventually you're going to
have that problem. Okay, So one understanding electrical knowledge creates
predictive maintenance, not preventative maintenance, predictive maintenance.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: They were able to shut it down without any customers
losing their uptime, fix the issue, and then get it
back online because they had a plan of attack.
Speaker 2: Okay, cost them.
Speaker 1: A lot less, a lot less than it would have
been to have it all of a sudden just shut
down in the middle of the night, and all of
a sudden, all these uh they start getting his calls
because the Walmart's and and and to Google, all these places,
all of a sudden their websites go down. If you
don't think it won't happen, it did happen. In fact,
ours went down. Our websites went down because of that
Cloudfare shut down. Okay, it happens, and you lose revenue,
you know, and and and hopefully you don't lose data.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, let's sit here.
Speaker 1: No, so a customer where we had a customer that
were the contractor who the over sold the savings. Okay,
so the thermographer told the customer they were losing ten
thousand dollars a year and that they needed to have
a thermal imaging evaluation done because they're losing it. So
the customer actually brought in somebody that was an expert
in thermography and electrical specifically to verify and at the
end of the day, the actual loss was about sixty
dollars a year, not ten thousand. Okay, So you trust
the first contractor all of that was now destroyed.
Speaker 2: The trust is gone.
Speaker 1: Now you better hope because if it was me and
I paid you ten or you were lying like that,
I may sue you, especially if I'm a big data
center and I listened to that and I shut it down,
only to have somebody else say that's not the problem.
It wasn't nowhere near that. Then I'm going to recoup
my investment. I'm suing somebody.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: So misinformation in this case cost the reputation of the
thermographer because they were trying to sell fear in hype
when again it was nowhere close to saving them ten
thousand dollars a year, not even close. They just made
it up. They just made the number up. Okay, I'm
just saying. So why the CTE standard protects the industry.
Why am I pushing so hard for this CTE? Why
did I seek out partnership with Miles C one. They
have over four hundred patents in all different types of
thermography equipment measuring equipment. That's one I wanted a partner
that I knew we would have. They would have our back.
That was the first thing. Now the CTE having a
Certified Thermal Electricians credential ensures professionalism. It protects the customer
and ensures that the thermal imaging can be trusted, no
crying wolf. It keeps the untrained people from misrepresenting data,
and it strengthens the electricians value when it comes to thermography.
Now you've heard me say it. We have the CMECP
program that from Master Electricians, that's a certified Master Electrical
co Professional. Because it elevates your brand. It lets you know, hey, folks,
I'm better than the guy next door. Why Because I
didn't just stop at the gatekeeper to get my masters.
I continued my journey in knowledge to become more proficient
in my profession. That's why doctors become specialists rather than
general practition Same here with our CMECP program. Same here
for the CTE Certified Thermal Electrician Program. If you want
to offer it, sure you could go out and get
a level one, level two, level three.
Speaker 2: What is that going to give you?
Speaker 1: Because do you if you're an electrician, you're not going
to be beating down the home inspectors to try to
do building envelope and water mitigation and I no, you're
an electrician. Specialize folks, specialize in what you do. Okay,
it brings more value. Remember the camera itself doesn't make
your professional. It's the training that makes your professional. So look,
at the end of the day, if you want to
separate yourself from the pack, if you want to elevate
your career, if you want to provide thermal imaging to
the customers and you want to be trusted resource, stop
trying to promote it as a fear tactic.
Speaker 2: That's not what it's all about. A CTE will never
do that. Now, the ct program is where you need.
Speaker 1: To be because thermal imaging is not a guessing game.
Speaker 2: It's not entertainment.
Speaker 1: It's not Instagram or TikTok hype's. It is electrical diagnostics
powered by science, training and understanding of the National Electric Code. Yes,
Sir understanding of a conductor and opacity in loading. The
National Electric Code is a minimum safety standard, but it
is a gold mind of knowledge if you know how
to maneuver that gold mind. Look, if you want more
information on becoming a certified thermal electrician, if you need
a thermal imaging camera, come to us. We can make
sure that you get ten percent off the best sale
price out there. We can recommend the camera for you
if you really are serious, if you want to go
buy this cheap thing for one hundred bucks, you do you.
The one problem with those is you're not going to
get dual imaging. You're not going to get the higher
refresh rate. You're not going to get the bigger LCD screen,
you're not going to get the higher refresh rate, you're
not going to get featured laiden.
Speaker 2: Different pallettes, a high level of pallette, and.
Speaker 1: You're not going to get the resolution and it's not
going to be digitally or faked like digital Zoom resolution.
You need higher resolution, and we offer cameras across that
full spectrum. And again we negotiated ten percent all off,
not the MSRP, ten percent off of the best price
that they offer, and they offer specials all the time,
you're gonna get an additional ten percent off of that.
That's what we do. That's the negotiation. That's what we
try to do with our partners. Okay, all right, hopefully
you got something out of that. Again, misleading, let's stop.
If you want to get into thermal imaging, do it right,
do it right. Don't sell snake oil. Don't try to mislead.
Don't try to earn somebody's business by them saying, oh,
we're going to save you ten thousand a year or
ooh that problem costs you ten. No, so far off
the extreme scale that if somebody's buying because they thinking
they're going to get a return on investment, then you
have high expectations to live up to.
Speaker 2: That's not what I'm here.
Speaker 1: What I'm here to do is to see whether or
not we can offset potential failures down the road by
doing some predictive maintenance and understand the temperature curves of
what we have now versus an ongoing analysis. If you're
in if you're in the maintenance field, if you're an electrician,
it's going in for service costs. You're looking for things
right now that have a problem. If you're in commercial
work or motors, you're trying to make sure that you're
going to keep these motors running at optimal performance, that
you don't have any predictive problems that you could prevent
by getting ahead of the curve. It's all about the uptime, folks,
It's not about the money you save at the end.
Don't sell your customer that they're going to make money
on it, right. Don't say, look, this will cost you
fifteen hundred bucks, but it's going to save you ten
thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: That is not the right approach, folks, not what we're
here to do.
Speaker 1: No, we're worried about the bigger picture, the equipment failure,
the downtime, the replacement costs, the potential fire, the potential hazards.
That's why we're using thermal imaging. We're trying to get
ahead of that curve. And it's not just as easy
as looking at a bunch of colors on a screen.
You have to understand how to do it properly, and
you need great examples, and in our course we give
you examples that you can use. And all you got
to do is plug in your real world examples into
the same examples we give you in the course. We
keep it simple and light. It's not like you're reading
an encyclopedia. We also have what's called fast Tracks Interact
built into it, so for the lifetime of the program
or you're in it, you get to ask us questions
and share images with us. Right in the fast Tracks Interact.
You can even share one of your thermal images and say, hey, guys,
can you take a look at this?
Speaker 2: You see you think this is a problem, and we
will give you advice on that.
Speaker 1: We'll ask you a bunch of questions because we are
hoping that you know how to do all that, and
we show you what you need to find out before
you do any of that, because you need all the information.
But God's sakes, don't make it a money thing. Don't say, oh, well,
this resistance is costing you this over a year. No,
it's a different. Focus on the safety, focus on the hazard,
focus on the downtime, focus on the replacement costs if
it does happen. That's where you need to be. Don't
try to sell them on something thinking you're gonna save
them a bunch of money that you know, because that's
just that's snake oil.
Speaker 2: And that gives everybody a bad name in the industry.
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, folks, hopefull you got something out of that.
Until next time, stay safe, God bless and we'll catch
you on another episode of Master the NEEC piece.
Speaker 3: Thanks for tuning into another electrifying episode of the Master
the ANT podcast. We hope you're feeling more powered up
and ready to tackle the electrical world with the knowledge
and confidence you need to succeed. Remember, in the electrical grade,
knowledge is power, and we're here to make sure you
stay flooded into the latest inside chips and code up.
Speaker 2: Dave.
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us a review, and share the podcast with.
Speaker 2: Your fellow electricians and industry pros.
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