Shoutout to the old school guy who showed me the right way to set a rail

I was on a job in Cincinnati last year, and the crew was using laser levels for every single rail alignment. It was slow, and we kept having to recheck the floor plates. An older mechanic pulled me aside and had me try his method with a tight string line and a 6 foot level. We got three rails perfectly plumb in under two hours, something that took all morning with the laser. The string doesn't lie and you can feel the tension change if something shifts. Has anyone else found that some new tools just overcomplicate a simple job?

3 comments

3 Comments

simonk9829d ago

So what's the trick for keeping the string tight, @logan_wood?

jenny_lane1229d ago

My buddy had a similar thing happen on a commercial site. They were using some fancy digital angle finder to set pipe supports, but the readings kept jumping around. A retired fitter told him to just use a basic torpedo level and a speed square. They finished the whole rack a day early.

logan_wood29d ago

That's just how it goes with tech sometimes. It adds steps instead of cutting them, like when a simple app update makes everything harder to find. The old way often works because it's already been figured out.