#26 Who you gonna call?

Our Ask Caleffi team encourages you to think outside of the box on that next service call.  They share tips that work at getting YOU to the root of a service problem without wasting time and money.  They share their favorite technique:  "Phone a Friend" and why it's so important.  You'd be surprised at how much WE learn from YOU while walking through a service concern.  

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Transcript

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[Music]

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welcome to ask Caleffi the podcast that

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dives into real life problems that

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plumbing and hvac technicians face in

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the field we're your hosts from the

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caleffi tech support team i'm greg tubbs

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and i'm dan firkus welcome we look

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forward to sharing some stories from our

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tech calls and using our background and

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expertise to make your days a little

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easier

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[Music]

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hey there welcome back we're coming at

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you here from the ask caleffi podcast

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studio how are we doing dan oh we're

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doing good thanks everybody thanks for

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letting us come back yeah

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so

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today we're gonna talk about thinking

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outside the box yeah a little

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random thinking you know little

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troubleshooting techniques and maybe a

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little bit of the advantage of calling

0:54

tech support yeah i mean

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we've all been there right you know hit

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on something

1:00

homeowner starts telling you what they

1:03

think is wrong you might start chasing

1:05

down a rabbit hole

1:07

and maybe maybe you went down the wrong

1:09

rabbit hole right maybe you chase that

1:11

rabbit hole a little too far and burn a

1:13

lot of time and make multiple trips back

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and

1:17

you know maybe a simple phone call i

1:19

always say phone a friend and yeah maybe

1:21

that'll make your life a little easier

1:23

yep phoning a friend most of the time

1:25

does make it easier because it allows

1:27

you to just take a break stop

1:30

stop what you're doing take a few

1:31

minutes think about it make a phone call

1:34

it's going to really help you out a lot

1:36

in the long run yeah it's easy to jump

1:38

in as a tech and have the homeowner tell

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you oh my zone valve is bad or my zone

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controls bad or my mixing valve has an

1:45

issue and you come in and you start

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working on that especially for a young

1:49

tech you know someone who

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hasn't had as diverse of a background as

1:55

someone somewhat more experienced you

1:57

know it's easy to come in and

1:59

and kind of follow that lead

2:01

the homeowner lead or

2:03

someone's lead and and take that a

2:05

little too far burn a lot of time end up

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you know maybe not being as profitable

2:10

on that project as you should be either

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right i mean you got to listen to the

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homeowner right you gotta absolutely

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hear what they what their

2:18

what they're thinking you know listen to

2:20

what the problem is

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don't 100 take everything for with a

2:25

grain of salt because

2:26

or do take it with a grain of salt

2:28

because you don't

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want to just go at one thing

2:32

you got to kind of you have to have both

2:34

eyes wide open right and think outside

2:36

the box outside the box

2:38

yeah so

2:39

assess the situation see what it's doing

2:42

or you know how long it's doing whatever

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it is for

2:45

and eventually yeah maybe it does do

2:48

that hiccup or

2:49

it does quit working right yeah a good

2:51

example i had a contractor call me the

2:54

other day and he was back for the third

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time replacing a mixing valve yeah

2:59

we've had that before we've probably

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shared similar examples before

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and initially started with you know what

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i installed this mixing valve and

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you know a month later the homeowner

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called me up and he's having an issue

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so he told me he thought the mixing

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valve went bad so i came out checked it

3:15

out yo thought well yeah it must be a

3:18

bad mixing valve so he replaced it um

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that worked for about a week and a half

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and he's back with the similar complaint

3:26

you know that he's having issues with

3:27

the mick with yeah he's actually having

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issues with temperature control in the

3:31

shower okay um

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he assumed yeah it's got to be that

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mixing valve again so you know was out

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there with the third one

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and was you know was still seeing issues

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so he finally called in and thankfully

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he did

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what's interesting is that the issue was

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just

3:46

it wasn't it was in one shower and then

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it was in a second shower it was more

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evident when the two were running

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together sure but he could go yeah but

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he could go to any of the lavatory sinks

3:57

or kitchen sink or

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laundry sink and and the thing worked

4:01

great sure small loads it was fine right

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when you put a real heavy load on it

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then then he would have problems

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controlling right and it was only in the

4:10

shower

4:11

okay so those had to be some pretty big

4:13

showers yeah well and what it actually

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ended up being it was old it was an old

4:17

home an old system and old shower valves

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and you know you take a water heater

4:22

down you take the water down you bring

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it back on and

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you know i think they ended up being

4:26

debris in the shower valves oh really

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yeah but taking it taking it through the

4:31

steps and and checking the lavatory

4:34

sinks while the showers are running you

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know and he's having temperature

4:37

differences in the

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in the showers but he's not at the sink

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right next to it you know i start to

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weed out you know is it

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is it a mixing valve problem or is it a

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fixture problem and that and that one

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ended up being a fixture problem sure

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yeah it's crazy

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you know you go from plumbing water

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how it flows

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what what can cause a problem with

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interrupting flow to you change hats and

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go to being a heating guy and trouble

5:03

shooting electrical yeah there you go

5:05

troubleshooting electrical i can tell

5:07

you from our experience right along with

5:09

me here right knowing the sequence of

5:12

operation

5:13

is going to be a huge feather in your

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cap absolutely knowing how it works what

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it's supposed to do and what steps to

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take right and it's easy to get kind of

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lost because some of this stuff is

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overwhelming you have

5:27

you know take a zone system for instance

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zone system with dampers you know if

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you're a forced air guy or a zone system

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with actually yeah zone actuators sure

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so you got a furnace or a boiler you

5:40

have

5:41

zone dampers or zone valves

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you have the master control or the zone

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control that

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tells things to turn on and open and

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close right your zone relay board your

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relay board and then you have

5:54

thermostats and you have a lot of wiring

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and a lot of wires and a transformer and

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maybe even a couple of sensors in some

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cases right and relays and transformers

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and you've got a lot of components there

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are a lot of things going on and for a

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new guy

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popping the cover they see lights they

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see wires and immediately it's very

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overwhelming

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yeah so you know you can't never have

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enough training on this stuff right

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right well and that's you know again the

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advantage of get calling into tech

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support is we're going to help you

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through the troubleshooting step by step

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um and as we're doing that we're we're

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talking about the sequence of operation

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okay this is what's happening as you

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turn the thermostat on this is what you

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should see happening test for voltage

6:37

here are you getting voltage here no

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okay

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it's kind of a flow chart right you know

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we can get you through it yeah

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yeah absolutely and the other thing with

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thinking outside the box is that

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you know it's we talk about you know

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chasing in a certain direction on a on a

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service call or repair you know where

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you and i have the advantage of talking

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to contractors homeowners and engineers

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across the united states and canada so

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you know

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we learn a lot from you guys certainly

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every day because you know you'll call

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in with an issue like like i gave the

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example with the mixing valve and you

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know walking walking you through the

7:15

troubleshooting

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and helping you get to the root problem

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and and ultimately the solution

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we learn a lot from that on a

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troubleshooting aspect so then when i

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get the next call it's like okay well

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i'm you know ding ding ding up in my

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head here's a call i had three weeks ago

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with another contractor and he had a

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similar issue and these were things we

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tried and these were steps we took and

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you know

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ultimately are able to uncover other

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problems whether they're with the

7:44

product with the installation or with

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other components in the home i mean

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it's it's

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fun in that respect right you know that

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we learn a lot from you guys yeah i mean

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we have a whole catalog of knowledge

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really because of talking to people from

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coast to coast into canada

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with some really some cases some really

8:05

unique uh systems yeah unique

8:08

applications from applications from

8:11

solar solar thermal you know

8:14

geo to wood boilers

8:17

yeah

8:18

forced air adding it in wanting to use

8:21

you know some of the stuff with the

8:22

forced air combined integrated systems

8:25

right and just some of the some of the

8:27

questions i've got about using our

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hydronic controls can we use it with a

8:32

forced air

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well this is how you're going to have to

8:35

wire it or you know it's pretty

8:37

interesting sometimes right but that's

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been great because we've learned from it

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well and we learn because there's a lot

8:43

of creative a lot of contractors and

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homeowners and engineers are creative

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yeah you guys are really creative and we

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were there you know you try to come up

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with integrated systems and tie things

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together and create you know i had a one

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call from a guy who wanted to he was

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down in arizona and he wanted to put a

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freezer in his basement and remember

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that yeah and he wanted to put a water

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coil in the in the bottom of it and fill

9:08

it with ice and have

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water a chilled water coil and an air

9:12

handler and

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run a pump you know pump off a

9:16

thermostat through a water coil in the

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bottom of a freezer filled with ice and

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use that for cooling his house and it's

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like okay i mean yeah it's creative

9:26

that's creative sure now you got

9:27

instantly work but

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you know i mean air conditioning is

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moving heat so how are you going to

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reject heat

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into the ice and maintain it and there's

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just a lot of logistics that come

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involved with with doing that but that's

9:41

just an exam not promoting to go do that

9:43

but that's just an example of some of

9:46

the stuff some of the creative calls we

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get and guys with solar guys with solar

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get really creative i mean

9:53

we used to offer that line of control

9:55

yeah and and package systems and guys

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would maybe just take the control or

10:00

take certain parts right and try to

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build things out of them it's

10:04

unconventional really right can it do it

10:06

sure oh sure absolutely it can as long

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as you can understand the sequence of

10:10

operation and that's a great example of

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when we get the call and

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you know guys you'll promote your ideas

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to us and we're able to listen to it and

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kind of help figure out if that control

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is going to do what you need it to do or

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that you know mixing valve is going to

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work in that application or yeah you

10:29

know it's just

10:30

i mean we learn a lot from you guys we

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certainly do that's why we appreciate

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the calls because that helps us you know

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what we learn from you on one call

10:39

in arizona

10:41

may help a contractor in florida the

10:44

next week right yeah i mean we can keep

10:47

beating on sequence of operation it

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always comes back to that right yeah

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don't knowing how things gonna work

10:53

right how they need to work how they're

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working currently

10:58

and once you wrap your mind around that

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sometimes

11:01

you guys in the field need to call

11:04

somebody i get it a lot you get it a lot

11:06

yeah hey thanks for just being there

11:08

listening to what i'm dealing with here

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because i've had it too where before i

11:12

even say anything they figured it out

11:15

right but they just needed someone to

11:16

talk to about it's that next step of

11:18

reassurance you know to acknowledge that

11:21

they're headed in the right direction

11:22

yep and most of the time i don't hear

11:25

back from those guys right on occasion

11:27

we do

11:28

you know yeah but then you know what

11:29

we're one step closer to solving the

11:31

problem because you know they're

11:33

thinking

11:34

about it we've gotten off the phone with

11:36

them

11:37

and we're still thinking about their

11:38

project and what maybe it could be so

11:41

um if we don't get it the first time

11:43

when you call us back and you've tried

11:45

this the steps we've talked about we'll

11:47

get it we'll get you there absolutely

11:50

i got one

11:51

quick little story when i first became a

11:54

service tech i think the first call i

11:56

got sent on was a

11:58

makeup air unit the size of a tractor

12:00

trailer

12:02

it wouldn't wouldn't stay running right

12:04

so

12:05

those were an interesting animal because

12:07

you had this monster burner in there a

12:09

huge blower that was probably the size

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of a diesel engine

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and

12:15

the thing wouldn't work it just

12:17

okay there's no instructions on it it's

12:19

all been it's probably been spray

12:21

painted like the third time green uh

12:24

you open up the cabinet the john deere

12:27

green craig it was john deere green in

12:29

fact

12:30

you open up the cabinet and every wire

12:33

in that cabinet was black and there was

12:36

yeah there was a whole bank of

12:39

relays it was relays and contactors so

12:43

it's 483 phase

12:45

and

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you know so a monster contactor for that

12:48

a huge transformer so basically just

12:50

follow the black wire right yeah follow

12:52

the black wire yeah all of them and i

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remember getting that you know phone

12:56

call i'm picking at it for like an hour

12:58

service manager calls yeah we need to go

13:00

on another call how you doing there um

13:03

i'm not doing so well i'm not even sure

13:05

how this thing works because i've never

13:06

seen one right oh well you know you're

13:09

just gonna have to keep picking at it

13:11

but hurry up because we need you we need

13:12

you to go to the next one

13:14

okay well another one nothing more

13:17

frustrating than that yeah and so that's

13:20

another thing that's going to help you

13:22

you know getting back to it again

13:25

you're there for half an hour you can't

13:26

figure it out call somebody right phone

13:28

a friend own a friend phone a friend so

13:30

you're not getting phoned by the office

13:32

or having the homeowner or business

13:34

owner peeking over your shoulder going

13:36

what's taking so long right we're here

13:38

to help i mean there's there's always a

13:40

situation where hey things are just

13:42

something really major is going on and

13:44

we're not even sure what's going on

13:45

right well and that's greg's right i

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mean that's the thing to remember where

13:50

you know maybe you're experiencing it

13:52

for the first time you know we've we've

13:54

maybe seen it two three five ten other

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times across the united states and

13:59

canada and

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you know we're happy to to share that

14:02

because we want you guys to be

14:04

successful

14:05

you got it well i think we covered that

14:07

pretty well yeah yeah that was fun yeah

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so tune in next time

14:12

look forward to hearing from you

14:14

thank you for tuning in if you ever need

14:16

help please feel free to contact our

14:18

tech support team anytime at

14:20

techsupport.us

14:23

kaleppy.com

14:25

or call us during our business hours

14:27

at 7 30 a.m to 4 30 p.m

14:31

central time

14:32

at 414-238-2360

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[Music]

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you