@Chase P. Quoting you: "
And don't even start me on ice machines. So dirty."
You mean like when the crew bring in a disgustingly dirty cardboard case of 24 from the bed of someone's
pick-up and stash it out of sight on top of the ice in the ice machine's hopper to chill for after the takeout?? How many other questionable containers have you found tucked out of sight in an ice machine's hopper??
As an aside you sound like you'll appreciate. I was on the original crew of a brand new
venue when it opened in the fall of 1973. An outside vending machine contractor had installed approximately half a dozen vending machines in the enclosed truck dock gobbling up most of the available utility duplex receptacles. As soon as an
FOH manager was hired he was appalled to learn there were not only any ice machines anywhere in the
FOH at any of the four
FOH levels but there was no ice machine anywhere in the twin
venue complex. The city had a contract in place with an ice vendor to supply ice WEEKLY thinking a week's supply could be stored in the refrigerated garbage room adjacent to the two original truck docks. As I'm sure you understand, refrigerated garbage rooms are not refrigerated to freezing temperatures thus I'm sure you can imagine how well this plan worked.
The somewhat abridged version:
The
house manager purchased an ice machine.
The crew muscled the vending machines and created space for the ice machine.
One of the part time crew was a fitter (not to be confused with a plumber) and he ran potable water to the ice machine.
As one of two
IBEW licensed electricians it fell to me to organize
power for the ice machine. There was a choice of two 120 / 208 volt panels nearby, one was normal
power and the other was
fed via a Robonic (Brand) auto-transfer
switch from the building's V12 diesel 347 / 600 volt three
phase backup generator. Since both panels were equidistant and both had spare breakers, I chose to
power the ice machine from the generator supported panel. The first time we had a major storm and
power outage, the generator proved its worth. Not only were we able to have lights in our lobbies,
power our sound systems, dimmers and run our performances BUT WE HAD ICE for the bars as well.
You don't want to see an ice machine that's melted to a mass of water then FROZE SOLID a few hours after
power has been restored.
@Chase P. I'm sure you can appreciate this.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard