[theaceofgates]

......is an issue around Albuquerque. We do a lot of these arms to prevent the electrical transformers from being broken into. The thieves will cut the incoming cables at the service entrance to the buildings, and cut the lines at the transformers, tie the cable to a truck or vehicle and drive off with it.

We fab. an arm out of 2"x4"x 11 ga. tubing with a lock mechanism that can't be cut with bolt cutters or a grinder. Of course people like us could get into it if we wanted to but scumbag thieves will usually take the path of least resistance, and hit a transformer with no security. If there are no bollards in the ground, which there usually are, we set some and fab. a hinged arm for access to the doors.

IMG_2954-2.jpg (57.72 KiB) Viewed 1189 times

PNM Transformer Security Arm.JPG (40.86 KiB) Viewed 1189 times

IMG_0253.JPG (91.88 KiB) Viewed 1189 times

IMG_0254.JPG (79.28 KiB) Viewed 1189 times

[Homemade]

Wow, thieves will stop at nothing. That huge transformer would be the last thing I would want to mess with, no matter how hard up
I was.

Course, they never said criminals were smart.

[Poland308]

As in most cases a lock will only keep an honest person honest. Nice preventative.

[Demented]

That's an awesome idea! Surprised my area doesn't do stuff like that. Copper and Aluminum theft is a big thing here too, has been for years, but nothing is ever done to prevent it. FPL and Comcast had some stuff stolen from neighborhood last night because they just left the spools sitting on the ground; work shift ends and the guys just leave all the materials where they stopped and leave for the day.