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Continuing last week's discussion of buggy whips ... Another reason Polywater® Lubricants will continue to flourish is the limitations of friction-enhanced cables. SIMpull™, for example, offers modest improvement to THHN, which is already a relatively slick jacket type. THHN has few attributes of a specification cable. It isn't high performance, high temp, fire retardant, chemical resistant, etc. It's most often placed in inexpensive EMT conduit. This represents the vast majority of residential and small commericial wire pulling--short runs that typically use little or no lube anyway. Friction-enhanced THHN is spiced-up low-end cable. Longer pulls, however, increase the risk of incredibly expensive damage or delay. A danger for cable pullers is in believing that the "no lube" claim applies to all circumstances. Dry short runs in EMT are one thing, but there may be painful lessons ahead before users realize the futility of cutting out pulling lubricants on tough pulls. The cost of lubricant pales in comparison to damaged cables and construction delays. NASA learned that it shouldn't have tried to save money on the Space Shuttle by skimping on o-rings. The same applies to cable lubes. Protection is cheap. It's called "Polywater." There are huge friction differences in pulling friction-enhanced cables in various duct types such as PVC and steel--and even from one EMT brand to the next. Polywater SPY makes significant friction reductions in all types of ducts and is the best lube choice for friction-enhanced cable. It offers the lowest friction, the least mess, and the greatest convenience. Check out our analyses: Graph 1 and Graph 2. Our response to friction-enhanced cables is simple: they're slippery, but Polywater makes them much slipperier. If a friction-enhanced cable works, installers will--and should--use it. We seek not to disparage the product, but only to point out that it won't be suitable in all cases. We hear tales of restricted industrial use due to silicone content, slippage in cable feeding equipment, problems in cutting to length at distributor locations, jacket weakness, and inadequate friction reduction in tough pulls. Such cables will carve out a market segment containing many happy customers. They will not, however, replace cable pulling lubricants in the foreseeable future. Our task is to sell products to those who do not or cannot use friction-enhanced cables, or who wish to improve enhanced cable performance in difficult pulls with the added insurance of lubrication. Cable manufacturers are our friends. There's plenty of room in this market for multiple cable placement technologies, including friction-enhanced cables, cable in conduit, cable tray, plenum cable ... and Polywater® Lubricants. Consider that despite 100 years of wild success for automobiles, buggy whips are still sold today--admittedly in small quantities, but somebody out there is making a tidy profit producing them. APC intends to lead the cable lubricant market for many years to come. |
