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Modified Valve Operator Enhances Safety and Portability
Author(s) -
Doucette Leon
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
opflow
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1551-8701
pISSN - 0149-8029
DOI - 10.1002/j.1551-8701.2002.tb01647.x
Subject(s) - truck , operator (biology) , pickup , automotive engineering , software portability , swing , computer science , engineering , simulation , operating system , mechanical engineering , biochemistry , chemistry , repressor , artificial intelligence , transcription factor , image (mathematics) , gene
The city of Bloomington, Minnesota, had owned a pickup‐mounted valve operator for about 10 years. Because of the way it was mounted on the truck, utility crews had to stand in a traffic lane while operating it. Also, it was “semipermanently” mounted on one truck, while the operators wanted a valve operator that could be moved easily from one vehicle to another. To address these issues, a new valve operator system was designed and has greatly improved the safety, usefulness, and efficiency of the operation in three ways: crews can avoid standing in street traffic while operating the valves; the equipment can be mounted on any pickup truck in about 10 minutes; and, crews can park in front of a valve and quickly swing the operator into position.