Wooden utility poles are a safety critical element used to support overhead cables in the power distribution and telecoms industries the world over. Wooden utility poles have one major weakness and this is ground line decay. Ground line decay occurs in the upper 150mm or 6” of the ground and is the number one cause of wooden utility pole failure and replacement. Wood preservatives provide partial protection from low level ground line decay. This can start after only a few years in service, reducing pole strength over time, reducing safety and increasing the risk of pole and network failure in bad weather.
What is Polesaver?
A Polesaver sleeve is a heat shrinkable thermoplastic sleeve lined with a meltable thermoplastic bituminous line. Polesaver sleeves are heat applied prior to pole installation at the vulnerable ground line section of the pole to create a long-lasting air and water tight seal that permanently excludes all the factors necessary for wood decay to occur. Unlike wood preservative, Polesaver sleeves provide total protection, they make conventional ground line decay impossible ensuring pole strength is maintained over time whilst giving an expected service life of 50 years or more whilst reducing maintenance requirements. Please watch the video to see more.
Did you know that typically 1 gram of topsoil contains between 100 million and 3 billion living organisms?
Your poles are part of their diet. Believe it or not you are actually feeding them. Many of these organisms consume organic matter such as twigs, leaves and wood, but they also attack posts and poles that you put in the ground to support cables and wires.
Why Do Poles Rot?
Poles rot at the ground line because conditions for decay are ideal at this point, this is nature’s own natural waste disposal system for wood and leaves that also happens to like eating your utility poles as well. Adding extra protection from rot and decay at the mechanically stressed ground line section of the pole prevents this problem. Deeper in the ground it is too cold and there is not enough oxygen for the decaying organisms to thrive.
How Does Polesaver Work?
Polesaver Sleeves work by keeping out the wood destroying fungi, moisture and oxygen necessary for wood decay to occur. Polesaver, unlike other barrier systems is a total barrier to all the causes of ground rot that weaken poles over time and cause them to fail. Polesaver sleeves are made of high quality materials and are guaranteed for 50 years.
What Benefits Will Polesaver Bring Me?
Poles protected with patented Polesaver sleeves have an expected service life of 50 years or more, key benefits include:
- Substantial cost saving by significantly reducing pole replacement rate
- Polesaver maintains pole strength over time minimising pole failure and outages in bad weather
- Polesaver improves safety for staff who have to climb poles and the general public exposed to the potential danger of falling poles and live cables.
- The lowest cost pole solution; matches or betters the life span of alternative materials such as steel, concrete or composites at much lower cost.