The End

Setelah beberape ketika akhirnye bersemangat balik nak menulis kat sini. Sbb dah takde lecturer nak tgk, jadi boleh la tulis cincai2 sket heh. Untuk training ni patut nye ade 59 hari tapi mampu buat smp 34 hari je! haha mmg gagal. Tibe2 lak hujung2 tu ade pegi outstation terus hilang momentum nak update. Tapi ok la tu kan 1st time kot tulis blog.

Entri kali ni kirenye sbg penutup rasmi la utk blog ni, mcm tak best lak kalo tinggal tergantung mcm ni je kan. Jadi saya sertakan video (slideshow gmbr bermuzik sbnrnye hoh) yg saya hantar pade lecturer utk mendptkan markah sbyk 5%, walau pun gred die pass dgn fail je. Smgt plak. Terima kasih kpd semua yg melawat blog ni, maaf sbb tak update. Ade ke pelawat? Ade kot.. haha. Sape2 yg ade soalan boleh lah tujukan ke hadi_gan at yahoo dot com.

So long Hadigan's Internship! you have served me well :)

The Thirty-Fourth Day

Unfortunately, there is nothing significant to be written today so I'll just leave a random picture from my TNBR folder for you to ponder about, heh.

Rubbish House

The Thirty-Third Day

I am scheduled to go to TNB Ipoh next week (24-27 May) for the pilot cable fault detection and today, I helped my co-supervisor which will be the leader of the trip to prepare the required documents and equipments.

Several forms to record data were printed and we set aside the equipments and tools that we are going to bring there such TDR, IR tester, and multimeter. Early preparations are the way to go. You never know..

Our very own TDR

The Thirty-Second Day

If you have been reading my posts, you would have some idea about the project that I'm currently involved in which is the "Pilot Cable Fault Detection". The equipment used to detect the fault is known as a Time Domain Reflectometer (TDR). This equipment injects a waveform inside the cable and the waveform will be reflected back to the equipment, processed and then displayed. From the reflected waveform, the type of fault can be determined. This is an example of how the displayed waveform looks like:

The large jump at the end indicates the end of the cable while the small jumps in between can be joints and faults. There is this equipment vendor that would like to sell their TDR to the Cable Unit and they are offering a demonstration on the new TDR. I, together with my supervisor and co-supervisor went to PMU KLIA to attend the demonstration that is going to be done on a pilot cable there.

This is where the electricity of KLIA originates

Demonstration being done

Overall, my supervisor which is the head of The Team is quite fond with the new TDR and is now considering on getting one. Too bad I won't be around when the new TDR arrives, heh.

The Thirty-First Day

This is what I have dug up from today's Monday Buzz. As an employer, you don't just come to your workplace everyday, doing the work that you are asked to do, received your salary at the end of the month, and then repeat the same thing over and over again. There will be no meaning to your life and you are no different than a robot.

So how do you make it more meaningful? One of the top executives of the company has suggested that first you have to believe in yourself and your ability. Then you will begin to change to be a better employee. After that, you will feel belonged to the company once you realize the meaning of coming to work then you will become a better person. This can be simplified in 4 words which are:

Yes, the most important thing is believing in yourself. This reminds me of the famous quote of Naruto.. Dattebayo! (believe it!)

The Thirtieth Day

The picture above shows the logbooks used to record the data for the partial discharge test that has been done from 2007 until now. O.W.T.S. stands for Oscillating Wave Test System, an alternative method of partial discharge test which has been brought to Malaysia by The Team, something that they are really proud of and a big contribution to the TNB distribution system. 1 logbook contains about 30 cables and multiply it by 35, The Team has already tested more than 1000 cables. Very impressive.

So, what about it? I need to rearrange the softcopy of the data to a new format that will be used as a standard format for all the partial discharge test team in the country. By doing that, I also need to look for the pattern of partial discharge occurance in cable sby their location, type, length, age, and etc. This will be my regular activity until stated otherwise..
-tgh gile mass effect 2

The Twenty-Ninth Day

One of the test equipment in The Lab can measure the overall capacitance of a cable. If we know the capacitance specification of the cable which is in uF/km, the length of the cable can be calculated. The problem is that the information is not available since the value of capacitance/km differs for each cable and depends on sizes, types of insulation, and manufacturers. Nobody would still keep the cable datasheet I believe.

To estimate the value, I was given the task to find the average of the value based on the length and the total capacitance data taken from past samples. The values then will be classified based on the criteria stated above. The average of the value will be useful to predict the length of the cable, if the actual equipment fails to work.

Also, cekodok again today! This delicious thing deserves a better name, far better, heh.

Quick, 4 cucuk left!

The Twenty-Eighth Day

Remember the cable that went under the knife two day ago? I was asked to compile all the data related on the cable such as the partial discharge (PD) test result and the failure analysis report to form a case study on the reliability of the PD results. So I did some study on some case study samples and collected the required data. All I need left is the failure analysis report which the person in charge is still working on.

On a totally unrelated note, on some days a person of The Team would be generous enough to bring food to The Lab, and it has never been me, not yet! Most of the time it was cekodok. Honestly, I was never a fan of cekodok but this changes recently. Is it because of the new environment? or the fact that it is free? but one thing for sure is because I'm hungry, heh.

Don't be fooled by the looks

The Twenty-Seventh Day

Again today, I accompanied the part-cable-part-failure-analysis-person to the FAG office for a researches sharing meeting. Yeah I know, most of my time is spent by following and watching, heh. It was not about cable this time, but about 2 incidents of exploding switchgears. They are trying to find the reasons that caused the incidents to happened based on pictures, previous records, and tripping logs.

It feels like watching CSI and House, but instead of human anatomies and crime scenes, there are burned scenes and burned switchgears, of course. Together in the meeting are a material expert and a cable expert, both from TNBR. It was interesting to see people with different expertises giving opinions on different perspectives. Also, free meal for those who attended. Got to love meetings.

Samples of burned switchgears

A corner in the FAG office. There is a labi2

inside the aquarium; totally not a failure

The Twenty-Sixth Day

As usual, the day is started with The Monday Buzz. I would like to share one of the topics presented which is about brain. As an employee, normally you do the same thing everyday and that will make your brain lazy which will cause problem when you actually need to use it. To prevent this, you need to train your brain constantly and some of the recommended methods are by playing musical instruments, solving puzzles, and by throwing away your calculator. Not literally of course. How come playing computer games is not included? Sigh.

After that, I accompanied a member of The Team to do a post-mortem on a section of a cable that is suspected to have a faulty joint based on the Partial Discharge test result. The post-mortem is done by the failure analysis group (FAG) *laughs* and the person I accompanied is also a part of that group. The findings from the post-mortem will be used as a case study and a lot of people will get benefit from it. Unfortunately, I have to leave before the cable surgery is done due to another event. Wow, what an eventful day.

A phase of a 33kV underground cable,

waiting to be cut

In the afternoon, I attended a talk on the new methods of fault location pin-pointing presented by two researchers. The first speaker talks about transmission line and the second speaker which is my co-supervisor talks about pilot cables. This monthly program gives opportunity for researchers to share about their researches to other employees and the audiences can ask questions at the same time. Very educational indeed.

You are both welcome!

The Twenty-Fifth Day

Back to my regular activities, helping the technical assistant doing reports on partial discharge tests. The reports are going to be presented to the TNB Distribution in the respective area of the tested cables.

For your information, the partial discharge test is being done everyday at different places and usually they will test two cables per day. Last week was in Cyberjaya, this week was KL, next week is somewhere in Johor, and the list goes on. The list of clients are already being scheduled for the next 2 months and they have to be out-stationed at least one week every month to fulfill the schedule.

Imagine doing this for years. I'm not sure if I'm able to show this level of commitment when I work later, heh.

The PD test van, has the same look with other TNB

utility vans. The identity of the guy remains a mystery..

The Twenty-Fourth Day

The last day of CBM Cable Course. Today, we learned about how to analyze the data that have been acquired from the cable tests. The analysis is very important to the determine the condition of the tested cable and action will be taken based on the analyzed result, which is the goal of CBM.

The speaker also presented several case studies on cable failures that he experienced himself. Based on that, it has been proven that the analysis does help. Sometimes, results may be not accurate due to certain factors so you have to rely on your instinct and that my friend requires years and years of practice. At the end of the day, we got to do a test on what we have learned in the course. It was an open book test and since I'm a practical student, the result of the test won't effect me in any way. Doing test for fun is really fun!

The test paper

The Twenty-Third Day

The second day of CBM cable course. More cable tests are being taught and in the evening, there is a demonstration on partial discharge (PD) and dielectric spectroscopy (DS) test. As I stated earlier, the details on all the tests will be done sometime in the future. Oh really? Yeah, this blog is in dire need of technical stuffs.

ILSAS, the place where I'm sitting for the course stands for Instit*t Latih*n Sult*n Ahm*d Shah. It is a training place for TNB employees and covers EVERYTHING that has to do with TNB. One thing that I love about ILSAS is the food provided which is really good. I won't mind having to attend courses there all year long.

The view of the classroom. The arrow shows..

..the teaching materials used for the course

The Twenty-Second Day

After about 5 weeks without academic lectures, I got to hear them again today in the CBM Cable Course that is held in ILSAS, which is located close to my university. The course is actually for TNB engineers and executives all around the country that involves in cable maintenance.

Several slots in the course are handled by members of The Team and due to that, I felt less awkward being around those engineers. Also, my good buddy from highschool happened to be one of the participants, which makes this even cooler. Special thanks to The Colleague for taking the initiative to join the course, now I'm not stucked with my regular activities, heh.

The course is about underground cable, the cable construction, types of failure, cable testing method, and many more. Most of the participants are those that you would call pakcik, but they are really proactive, asking good questions and giving opinions based on their past experience, and this makes the class exciting. After the lunch break, we got to see how the test equipments are used and got to try them ourselves. The course give me more understandings on what I have learned in the past few weeks.

The notice on the class door

Participants watching a test being done

I will write about the cable tests when there is nothing else for me to write about, heh. In the evening, I went back to TNBR and got to play ping-pong with the technicians. You got sayur'd. Well, I haven't played for a long time. You will get sayur'd either way. Grrr.. give me a week or two and we will see, hopefully. >_>

The Twenty-First Day

Monday. Yay. In this morning assembly, the managing director of the company, which will be known here as The Director, came out on stage to talk to the TNBRians. He started his speech by praising them for their synchronism in the quick-upper-body-exercise earlier while he was watching from the back. Who wouldn't work properly when your boss is watching you from behind, heh. He pointed out that everyone has to be synchronized in achieving the mission and vision of the company.

After that, he continued on attitude crashing, which will eventually happened in one's life. Putting it short, to overcome them you need to maintain the right attitude, realize that it will not last forever, make major decisions before it gets worse, and communicate with knowledgeable people.

The speech is quite long actually, and you can see people moving their legs and bodies uncomfortably, yawning, and making small noises hoping that The Director will get the sign. It was funny. It feels exactly like the highschool's assembly when the principal is giving a speech. Oh, the memories.

View inside The Hall, plus bad lighting >_>

The Twentieth Day

Several weeks before I entered as an intern, The Team has floated a tender on PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) which includes safety shoes, helmet, gloves, and safety vests and quite a number of companies showed their interest. Today, they held a meeting to choose which one of the participating companies will be given the tender and I was fortunate to be there to observe the meeting.

The Team compared the items offered by the companies with the specifications and requirements stated in the tender. From there, the companies are shortlisted and will be brought to the higher-ups for further actions. The summary? With the current specifications, no companies are able to provide a size 13 safety shoes, as one of The Team is a proud wearer of that size. I bet you never knew anyone with that shoe size, hoho.

After the afternoon prayer, I went for another cable testing in Cyberjaya. The PE (Pencawang Elektrik), where the cable is going to be tested is located just across S*kolah S*ri P*teri but unfortunately, the students suddenly went missing, heh. Things went as usual, lots of waiting involved but I am starting to get the hang of it. Waiting is part of the job.

The Visit #3

Flagship Village is like the coolest village name among the villages that I knew. Agreed? Anyway, today's entry marked the end of the first month of my internship. 2 months to go and yet I still haven't learned much from them. Ich muss richtig Gas geben..

The Nineteenth Day

Please disregard my previous post under the same title. My extreme laziness suddenly kicks in and made me unable to make a proper post. This will happen a lot more in the future so get used to it, heh.

The logbook that is required to record the data for the cable testing is out of pages and new logbooks need to be made so I went with one of the technician to the stationary room located in the managing department. It is just a small room but has enough equipments and stationeries to fulfill office related tasks.

There is a huge photocopy machine, which always have people using it, a binding machine, a rack of colourful papers, binding combs of different sizes, and other things that I am unfamiliar with. For the first time in my life, I finally got to use a photocopy machine and a binding machine. How sad. I know, *sniff*. We went back to The Lab with 3 new sets of freshly made logbooks.

The binding machine, and other stuffs

The Eighteenth Day

The Team of cable diagnostics, besides doing researches on issues regarding cables, also provide cable testing services to clients all over the country. The partial discharge test which I've mentioned recently is also included.

This tests are complying to the maintenance strategy known as Condition Based Maintenance (CBM). Heard of prevention is better than cure? It works just like that. According to the test results, the cables which have the potential to fail will be replaced immediately or will be tested again in the near future. Even though this requires more time and effort, it has been proven that this strategy is more economical.

At the moment, I'm learning how to translate the raw data acquired from the tests to informations that will tell about the condition of the cable. I might save you from the upcoming blackouts, who knows heh. Let see what The Intern is up to..

Pekerja Terbaik April 2010

You wish!

The Seventeenth Day

The Lab is not as lively as usual since most of the members were out due to work related matters. Initially, I was planning to loaf around since there is no one to supervise me but hey, everyone else is working hard so I should too.

Wish granted. I was occupied for the whole day, thanks to The Team. The first half is spent by keying in cable test results into the company's operation database and the other half is by following The Team to do Partial Discharge test on 2 cables in Cyberjaya. Yeah, the test is similar to this, but this time I got to use the testing equipments by myself.

As an engineer, it's not just about knowing how to do the procedures, you also have to know why the procedures are done that way. That was what I did, asking questions after questions. It's a good thing that The Team is being really helpful. Remind me to bring some pulut kuning next time, heh.

The Visit #2

Something to ponder on: Studying is about gaining knowledge and work is about gaining wealth. Knowledge will always be helpful and work should be something that you enjoy doing, doesn't need to be related on what you have studied.

End of post.

The Sixteenth Day

The Monday Buzz is here again. I would like to point out something interesting, for me at least, that happened in the hall this morning. In the assembly, selected staffs will come out on the stage and share anything that they want, from "cupcake baking" to "how to stop smoking". Anything. This time, it is about effective breastfeeding. I don't think there is anything wrong with that but the speaker is a guy and most of the audience are guys as well, maybe a more appropriate topic can be chosen instead. There are even actual pictures of the subject on the screen. Giggles can be heard everywhere.

Surprisingly, as soon as the slides ended, the speaker revealed that it is just the introduction of his talk. I didn't see that coming, I'm sure the others as well. No, you must be the only one. Shh.. don't ruin that part. Anyway, the talk is actually about leadership. As a leader, there will be a time that you need to talk to your followers about something uncomfortable, not only to yourself but your followers as well, but it has to be done either way. So, what do you do? You have to be well prepared, be comfortable with your subject, and deliver it in a way that it makes your audience comfortable as well. How? I leave that for you to think about, heh. The speaker showed a very good example on that thus giving me something to write about. Excellent mister!

The entrance to the hall

The Fifteenth Day

At the moment, I was assigned to complete a technical report on Pilot Cable fault location. All the data required is already there so what I need to do is to arrange the data nicely and add nice sentences where necessary, heh.

Pilot cable is a communication cable, put in parallel with voltage cable which will operate relays at both end when the voltage cable is faulty to prevent overcurrent. More on this later. The Cable Unit is researching for the correct methods in locating and repairing faults in pilot cable, which will be then used by TNB. The pilot cable that we have in The Lab:

The Big Picture

The cables inside, refer to the red arrow above

The Fourteenth Day

Hmm no, this is not the continuation from yesterday. That has to wait, heh. I actually want to write about pilot cables but since I don't have any self taken pictures of the subject, this has to wait as well. So what now? Hold on, let me check my pictures folder. Okay here:

The other path to The Lab

Yup, this is the hallway to the lab from the other end. There's is something interesting on my right where I was standing to take this photo and guess what, that's got to wait as well! Haha. Until then, later! *runs* What! that is all?

The Thirteenth Day

One of the staffs lost a family member this morning and The Lab members paid a visit to her family's house during lunch break. May Allah grant him a place in Jannah, amin. Let us be reminded that our turn will definitely come so let's make sure that we are well prepared.

One of the most important properties in electrical studies is resistance. It is a measure of opposition to the passage of a steady electric current. Resistance can be calculated using the Ohm's Law, V = IR and is measured in Ohms, taken from the name of the founder, Mr Georg Simon Ohm.

Georg Simon Ohm

(1789-1854)

Thank you Mr Ohm for the great discovery, because of you I got to study what I'm studying now, seriously. To be continued..

The Twelfth Day

Being an engineer is not all about doing reports, researches, and technical stuffs. You do other things as well. Bad introduction. I knew you are going to say that because I kind of agree, sadly. Anyway today, I was given the opportunity to write a tender about purchasing a new microscope for The Lab. Actually, the tender is almost complete. All I need to do is to add things that I think necessary and do some editing here and there. So you did almost nothing? Hey! at least I learned something.

The challenge is that in a tender, you cannot state the brand or model that you want but instead you have to specify the specifications of the microscope and this requires knowledge on the subject which I don't have any, heh. So I spent quite a while reading about microscopes, their functions, and their usages. Hopefully I'm still there when the new microscope arrives.

Microscope brochures to be read

The Eleventh Day

Let me start with the morning assembly, locally known as The Monday Buzz. It began with a doa, followed by a short upper body exercise, then a pledge reading ceremony by the employees. It was the management turn this time. After that there's a talk on the green technology unit, tips on e-mail tracking, and a video about fuel cell technology, which is 3 times more efficient than a conventional gasoline engine. At least that is what I managed to remember. The assembly ended with everyone singing "the song of the day", which is this song. I chose that because it has the highest views among other videos with the same title, heh.

Wow, that's quite a lot. I should do this every Monday! I still haven't received my specific assignment yet so until then, I won't be writing about my daily activities since it's just the same as the previous days. Now I present you, a random picture of TNBR to end my post.

The path to The Lab

The Tenth Day

The tenth day. A new entry with just an hour gap? Well, I'd feel bad if I didn't do an update for all the days that I came to work. The day is Friday, and Friday seems to end sooner than any other workdays, heh. So what? Give me a break. I'm out of ideas, and pictures as well. Wait, there's still one:

The Very Cosy Meeting Room

This is where the cable team have their meetings and discussions. The meetings are usually small, you can tell from the number of chairs there.

Hmmm. Nothing much happened on this day, other than helping the team with their research data and going around The Lab looking for things to be looked at. Several staffs just came back from outstation, and several others will be outstation-ed next week. It is a common thing in The Lab. There's always people that went outstation, which also means that there's always unoccupied seats for me, yay! A picture to end this post:

TNBD and TNBR working together

The Ninth Day

You missed the updates for the last 2 days! What!? you can start a thread now??! I can do whatever you can do. Okay, this is going to be.. troublesome. Anyway, that is what weekends are for! To do things that you aren't able to do on the weekdays! Nonsense. Whatever. Note to self: Do not baring2 kejap before updating the blog. Back to cables. Remember XLPE cable from the last entry? This is how it looks like:

The white thing surrounding the copper conductor is the XLPE material. Why XLPE is more preferable? It has high electrical and mechanical strength, high aging resistance, environmental stress resistance, anti-chemical corrosion, easy to be constructed, and can withstand higher temperature. XLPE is so cool! I know, right.

But then again, XLPE cable are also prone to failures. 2 types of common failures are partial discharge which I have briefly covered and water tree. A tree made from water? Wrong. It is a diffuse structure in the XLPE resembling the shape of a tree and is formed and grow in the presence of moisture, impurities, and electric field over time. In The Lab, this is how they investigate water trees in cables:

The XLPE insulator is first separated from the cable and put into the green machine to be sliced. The sliced XLPE will be put in a water bath at a certain temperature, together with a colouring substance to make the water tree more visible, if there's any. Credit goes to The Colleague for the information. After that, it will be cut into pieces before being observed by using a microscope.

Observation in action!

The picture in the red box above is taken from somewhere without permission. Hahaha. Not funny. It shows 2 types of water tree. Water tree is fatal because once they are big enough, they will bridge the insulation system, causing the cable to fail as shown by 'leakage tree'. The pictures in this entry is actually taken on The Eighth Day but since there's nothing eventful that happened in this day, I just need to put something, heh.

Moving on to the tenth day!

The Eighth Day

Before I proceed with today's event, let me share something about cable insulations. Insulators are materials that do not conduct electricity or resist current flow and can be in a form of solid, liquid, or gas. Insulators protect you from the danger of high voltage and the conductor from environmental factors. In Malaysia, modern high-voltage cables have XLPE insulators, which stands for Cross-Linked Polyethylene but there are still cables with oil insulators.

So today, I followed the technicians to take oil samples from this oil-filled cables. The samples are then sent to the lab to be analyzed for moisture content, dissolved gases, and impurities. This information will tell us about the condition of the cable and also the insulator itself. The process of the oil sampling will be summarized in the pictures below.

The oil tanks that provide continuous flow of oil

to the cables

The tube that connects the cable to the tank is bypassed

Sample taking in action!

The oil used is mineral oil or liquid petroleum. As you can see, it is colourless. An amazing application of the oil that I found, not related to cables unfortunately. Computer enthusiasts, this might interest you:

No cooling fans = less power consumption + no sound + no dusk.

Awesome? Definitely.

The Seventh Day

Seventh is such a cool word. Try repeating it many times. Seventh, seventh, seventh, seventh. Loudly this time! Seventh, seventh, seventh, seventh. It is so beautiful that it sounds like music to my ears. Dude, you're crazy. Excuse me, did anyoneone say something? Grrr... Oh well, let's proceed.

Finally, the 5S inspection day! The auditors were saying positive words for the big improvements that they made to the lab and I think they are going to get great marks this time. The results will be announced in the next morning assembly. Let's hope for the best! go go cable group! The 5S corner:

Also today, a group of people from Kenya paid a visit to the place or the cable lab, which will be called The Lab from now on. The Boss is explaining to them about the projects there and the cable samples on the table. They barely looked at my direction so I only managed to get this kind of picture.

What did I do? I helped one of the technical assistant to do a powerpoint report on the PD and IR tests that the cable group did last week in the KL area, refer to The Visit #1 for more information. The data obtained from the tests is processed by using this special software and this makes the life of the cable people much easier. This report is very important to the client, TNBD which will determine that which cables need to be replaced immediately, need to be rechecked in the near future, or do not require any major concern. It seems like I keep changing places everyday. My workstation for today:

Tomorrow? who knows. Later!

The Sixth Day

Monday morning is the time when all the TNBR employees including the top management gather in a classy auditorium for the morning assembly. I was honored to be there this morning to witness this event with my very eyes. I purposely escaped last week's assembly fearing the thought of introducing myself in front of the whole company and today, it turns out that nobody even noticed about our presence, which is cool, heh. Then again, there are still 10 Mondays left and 1 of them could be the day when my worst nightmare comes true.

The assembly was simple and fun. I'm not sure about everyone else, but I did enjoy it. You have to be there to experience the moment, it just can't be described by words. Oh really? Just say that you are lazy to write! Sshhh.. not too loud. Okay, you are right this time. Next Monday maybe! Hoho.

So today, I helped the senior technician with his research data by using Excel. The data needs to be represented by graphs and from there, further analysis would be done. The place where I worked:

The research is about IPC, which stands for Insulated Piercing Connector. What does it do!?? It joins cables together, as simple as that. They are creating a standard or module for IPC testing, which doesn't exist yet. More on this IPC later! An example of IPC and it's cross section:

The rest of the day is spent by helping the officemates preparing for the 5S inspection. Yeah, they are still working on it. Also, bonus pic of the day:

3 different sizes of trash can in 1 spot!

This takes awesomeness to a whole new level

The Visit #1

I'm not sure if there is going to be #2, #3, but hey, there is always hope. Thanks to the 2 servings of Nescafe ice from kedai nasi ayam UPTEN, I managed to stay awake throughout the whole ordeal. Oh really? You were yawning all the time! Dude, it's not something that I can control. At least I was acting sane.. Whatever. So anyway, we departed to KL around 10 pm with the vehicle of the technical assistant on duty. I thought I could ride with the technicians but the van doesn't have any seatings at the back, only equipments. Our destination is the PPU (Pencawang Pembahagian Utama) in Bangsar and the cable testing there need to be done during the night since the load is not as heavy thus switching can be done without causing power disruption. PPU? What's that? Refer to the picture below:

As you can see, the PPU is where electricity is received from PMU, changed to 33kV and 11 kV and then sent to the distribution station to be distributed to your house. We arrived about 30 minutes later and the staffs there were already waiting for us.

The cable that is going to be tested is the 33kV cable that is connecting the PPU to the distribution station. The tests are Partial Discharge (PD) test and Insulation Resistance (IR) test. Basically, the tests determine the condition of the cable and it's joints. With this information, early actions can be taken instead of fixing it when it breaks down, which may cause bigger problems. This tests are done on the switchgear, where cables involved have been de-energized.

Switchgear under operation

Inside the switchgear. The 3 red holes are

where connections are made for the tests.

The back of the van. Cables extensions for testing purpose.

The red barrel is a power supply, able to produce up to 40 kV.

The place where the tests are being monitored,

located at the middle part of the van. Air-conditioned!

The tests took about 3 hours and according to the technicians, it usually takes much longer than that. How fortunate. This was something new to me, I never knew about this before and new things are always interesting. I arrived home at 2 am. Remember the Nescafe ice? That made me unable to sleep for the rest of the morning. Go me! >_>