WWETT

As we move into the first quarter of 2023, the trade show circuit is in full effect, and the Mechanical Hub team will be present at all of the events, starting with World of Concrete next week. The buzz is strong moving from the post-COVID drag to in-person connection again that includes all shows from January through March.

World of Concrete (January 17-19, Las Vegas) — This show has been serving the concrete and masonry construction industries for nearly 50 years. Why does Mechanical Hub attend? Tools baby! The leaders in the tool industry—that delve into the concrete side of things—are all there and great conversations and connections can be made there. And, it’s Vegas. I’m sure you can find something fun to do there, right?

KBIS/IBS (January 31-February 2, Las Vegas) — Since co-locating back in 2014, this really is a can’t-miss show. Combing the Kitchen & Bath Industry Show (KBIS) and The International Builders’ Show (IBS) was a huge boon to both of these prior individual shows. Combing forces is like watching Hanna-Barbara’s Wonder Twins “activate” in the form of a leading national trade show every year. Finding the latest in kitchen and bath trends with the latest and greatest from the building world? Um, yes please.

AHR Expo (February 6-8, Atlanta) — If I could count the amount of steps I have amassed over the years walking this show floor, I probably would have worn more comfortable shoes from the beginning. This is the largest annual U.S. HVACR trade show and you will not be disappointed with how much there is to see and do at this event—from seeing the latest technology and products visiting with manufacturers at their booths to the educational tracks offered. BTW, Mechanical Hub’s two podcasts will be broadcasting from the AHR Podcast Pavilions, so if you’re at the show, be sure to stop by and say hello. (Appetite for Construction Podcast Monday, Feb. 6 at 5:00 pm, pavilion 2; Tuesday, Feb. 7 at 4:00 pm, pavilion 1. Make Trades Great Again Podcast Monday, Feb. 6 at 2:00 pm, pavilion 2; Tuesday, Feb. 7 at 11:00 am, pavilion 1; Tuesday, Feb. 7 at 1:00 pm, pavilion 2.)

WWETT Show (February 20-23, Indianapolis) — Man, we love going to this show as well. So many connections made, such a great time. The Water & Wastewater Equipment, Treatment & Transport Show—a mouthful so let’s just call it WWETT—is the world’s largest annual trade show for wastewater and environmental service professionals. This show offers educational programs, live demos, the latest in drain cleaning technology, and the opportunity to connect with fellow industry showgoers. For those that can remember that far back, this was the old pumper and dumper show.

ISH Messe Frankfurt (March 13-17, Frankfurt, Germany)—Guten tag from Deutschland! The Mechanical Hub team will be making the jump over the pond to attend one of the world’s largest biennial (every two years) PHVACR trade show. The focus of this year’s ISH is marketable solutions for a sustainable future. Currently, the organizers are expecting around 2,000 companies to present their solutions for renewable sources of energy, sustainable water usage and clean air at the leading international trade event for the HVAC and water sector.

ISH 2023 will offer the ISH digital extension, a virtual presence that will open in parallel to the live event in Frankfurt and will also remain open for one week longer until March 24, 2023.

Pre-COVID, ISH was so popular, more space was allotted to the already mammoth 12 building campus. According to the ISH website, the show is the largest exhibition venue in the world for product innovations, and it occupies an area equal to approximately 39 football pitches. Thank goodness for Ted Lasso, because we now know that pitches mean soccer fields. We’ll need to brush up on our German for sure as the MH team will be traveling the countryside after the show, visiting with some key clients.

Hope to see you on the road!

Indianapolis — Water & Wastewater Equipment, Treatment and Transport (WWETT), the world’s largest annual trade show for wastewater and environmental service professionals, today unveils its conference program. The event takes place February 20-23, 2023 at the Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis, IN. Register to attend here.

Marc Acampora, VP & Market Leader of the WWETT Show, said, “We are delighted to bring wastewater and environmental service professionals together with the leading minds in the industry to help drive their businesses forward. There will be a tremendous amount of learning, exploring, networking, and fun to be had this winter in Indianapolis.”

The WWETT accredited conference program delivers unparalleled education including nearly 100 sessions across 21 tracks targeted to municipalities, plumbers, portable sanitation professionals, septic contractors, sewer contractors and wastewater professionals.

Chad Williams, resilience speaker, bestselling author and Navy SEAL, will deliver the keynote address. Williams draws from his experience in military to provide a Navy SEAL’s perspective on issues related to effective leadership, resilience, teamwork, overcoming adversity and motivation.

Conference program highlights:

• Seven national associations leading education
• Two Technical Tours
• Women in the Industry Networking event
• New to the industry networking event

• New Diversity Track
• Four-hour Confined Space Entry Training
• Two workshops on Management/Leadership
• Eight-hour certification classes led by National Association of Wastewater Technicians and Portable Sanitation Association International

Many sessions count toward fulfilling required continuing educational units (CEUs) and professional development hours (PDHs). Learn more here.

In addition, the Expo Hall will showcase new and innovative products from 500+ exhibitors such as Federal Signal, Environmental Solutions Group, Satellite Industries, Vac-Con, Inc and CUES, Inc.

Additional event highlights:

• The NAWT Shootout brings awareness to the updated Federal Regulations regarding Pre-Trip inspections. It also gives individuals who will be testing soon for their CDLs an opportunity to practice their Pre-Trip Inspections and those that already have their CDLs an opportunity to learn what the new regulations cover and how to respond to road-side inspections. The top four individuals with the most correctly identified problems will be named winners.
• The National Onsite Wastewater Recycling Association (NOWRA) will be conducting the National Backhoe ROE-D-HOE® Championship Competition. The three-day open event allows attendees who are skilled backhoe operators compete by using the backhoe bucket to skillfully and smoothly move small objects such as a golf ball or bowling pin in an extreme race against time. The competition is timed and will culminate with the contestants with the top three times winning belt buckles in addition to up to $1,000 in cash prizes.
• WWETT Talks Live is a new interview series that will feature bite-sized insights from the wastewater industry’s most innovative leaders. It will cover the state of the industry, which trends to adopt and which ones to avoid, leadership and roles in company structures, becoming a multi-dimensional operation, trials and tribulations of expanding and the importance of your work and community impact.
• Operators Without Borders provides certified, volunteer water and wastewater operators who can support utilities in developing countries following emergency and disaster situations to ensure that safe drinking water and wastewater management services are resumed. On February 21 at 4:00 p.m., a special Happy Hour General Session will be hosted at booth #2149 in the Expo Hall to discuss the current situation of water and wastewater utilities in Ukraine and how we can help.
• WWETT will show the documentary Sh*t Saves the World, which provides an intriguing and humorous glimpse into our species’ impact on the Earth by exploring how one of the most simple and obvious solutions to aid the environment may lie in what we often look down upon as waste.
• IndyHumane has been committed to helping central Indiana’s pets in need since 1905. The organization’s locations collectively support an average of 10,000 animals each year, roughly 90 percent of which are adopted. In booth #5935 in the Expo Hall there will be dogs and kittens to meet, play with and adopt.
• The Welcome Party takes place February 21 at 5:00 p.m. at The Grand Hall @ Downtown Union Station.

RIDGID, a part of Emerson’s professional tools portfolio, invites attendees to stop by their booth as they celebrate more than 25 years as the leader in diagnostics at the show by offering attendees the chance to win a Limited Edition SeeSnake Camera Reel

RIDGID®, a part of Emerson’s professional tools portfolio, announced their participation in the WWETT Show, Feb. 21 – 24, in Indianapolis. Their product team will be providing hands-on demos of their latest drain cleaning and inspection tools, including the new SeeSnake® microReel™ APX™ designed to optimize inspections.

Engineered with a lightweight, compact profile for easy portability, the microReel APX features bright LED lights and auto image flip, ensuring clear, upright images. Paired with TruSense® technology, this tool delivers the industry’s best in-pipe image and RIDGID invites tradespeople to stop by the RIDGID booth (#1141) to be one of the first to experience it. The product launch coincides with a milestone for the brand as they celebrate over 25 years in diagnostics.

“The RIDGID SeeSnake microReel APX continues to deliver on our promise to help plumbers find, see and pinpoint problem areas in-pipe. It is our latest camera reel to offer TruSense technology, so plumbers have the enhanced data capabilities they need to see and diagnose issues,” said Laura Wolverton, marketing director, underground technologies, RIDGID for Emerson. “WWETT will be a great opportunity for plumbers to test out this new tool’s durability and imaging and see the product firsthand.”

Additional RIDGID tools available for demo during WWETT include: FlexShaft® Drain Cleaning Machines, sectional machines, drum machines, jetters, SeeSnake camera systems, locators and pressing tools. Greenlee®, also a part of Emerson’s professional tools portfolio, will be joining RIDGID in-booth to showcase select tools, including Knockouts, GSB Series Step Bits, Carbide-Tipped Hole Cutters and the G1 Versi-Tugger™.

Along with product demos, the RIDGID brand has several other interactive booth experiences planned. Attendees can enter to win a SeeSnake 25th anniversary reel and a chance to win a FlexShaft Drain Cleaning Machine being given away each day during the show. The first day of the show will also kickoff entries for the brand’s popular RIDGID Experience, the annual, all-expenses-paid trip has continued to grow in popularity with tradespeople, and the RIDGID WWETT booth will be the first location for attendees to enter for their chance to win a spot.

RIDGID and Greenlee will also be taking their social followers virtually to WWETT. Follow along here: RIDGID – @ridgidtools on Instagram, @RIDGIDTools on Facebook, @RIDGIDToday on Twitter and Greenlee – @greenleetools on Instagram, @GreenleeTools on Facebook, @GreenleeTools on Twitter.

To learn more about RIDGID and Greenlee purpose-built tools, stop by their booth (#1141) during WWETT, contact your local distributor or visit RIDGID.com or Greenlee.com.

So, as the story goes, a sales rep out west who had spent decades selling a competitor’s plumbing products is hired by General Pipe Cleaners. After initial training, he returned to his territory with a smattering of cables, cutters and drain cleaning machines to get him started.

The first time he demonstrated the Flexicore Cable, he called the company to complain that the pipe snake, “just didn’t feel right!” It felt “limp”, not “springy.”

As Dave Dunbar, National Sales Manager with General Pipe Cleaners explained, “the Flexicore engineering process has the effect of making the cable feel less springy than hollow cables.”

It took a few phone calls to get things straightened out with the rep, but then six months later, he was complaining that the cables lasted so much longer than his former brand’s that he was only selling a fraction of his previous replacement snakes. A small fraction.

It was this story that interested a few of our contractor friends. Why would it be springy? Is it really that stiff and is that a good thing? Would it really last longer?

Knowing General Pipe Cleaners would be at the WWETT Show this past spring, I introduced the General’s team to a few drain cleaning contractors that we are big fans of and have worked with in the past. It was my hope that we could create some valuable and interesting content based on the original story and the contractors having never used Flexicore.

It was soon after the show that we asked for them to send a few of their Flexicore cables to a few of our ProStaff team members to get their thoughts on the cable. They obliged and three drain cleaning pros were sent the cables to use on their existing cable machines, which for transparency, were all competitor drum machines.

As you may know, the Flexicore cable is the result of a process, where instead of coiling a hollow cable, they tightly wrap spring steel around a 49 strand aircraft quality wire rope. This provides the cable additional strength when it is under torque.

Each member of our team received a variety of Flexicore cables based on their typical daily drain cleaning challenges with the request to use them over a couple of months and provide feedback. The team of contractors included Felix Delgadillo, DrainGuys (Chicago), Terence Chan, Impetus Plumbing (Vancouver) and Jeff Keller, Bulldog Contractors (Texas), all are longtime drain cleaning professionals in their area of the country.

As expected, those daily challenges included providing both residential and commercial services, addressing clogged kitchen drains, clogged bathroom drains, clogged outdoor drains, and clogged sewer lines using today’s best technology to unclog lines to keep the water flowing.

While Keller, Chan and Delgadillo confirmed that this was the first time using the cable, Chan stated what all three mentioned, “I’ve never used the product but very excited to see what it can do.”

Chan went on to say, “Initially seeing the product, I was a bit leery how it may hold on to the heads, but it did, really well. In fact, I’ve had trouble with heads from a competitor and the Flexicore held.”

“The screws to hold on the head versus a snap lock is a nice addition,” said Keller.

One of the unique byproducts of the Flexicore process is that the cable stiffens and gets stronger under torque, which Delgadillo agreed, “the cable feels less springy and it does get quite stiff when the operator needs it the most.”

Keller continued, “it caught me off guard and took some getting used to. Most if not all drain cleaners/plumbers are used to listening to their machines and the feel of the strain on the cable to evaluate the blockage, so this was a bit different, but did a solid job.”

As discussed in the WWETT video, when a drain cleaning machine rotates a pipe snake down the drain and it hits a clog or stoppage, tension or torque builds up in the cable. Because of the direction the drum is turning, the reaction of the outer coil of spring steel is that it wants to contract due to the tension. However, because the wire rope is in the way, the only thing that it can do is tighten, which makes it stiffer and stronger and the cable much less likely to kink or break when in use.

Chan concluded, “I would recommend this to peers in the field as it got the job done. I’m curious to see the long-term difference versus some of the cables we typically use and recommend everyone make sure they have the cable sizes they need for their machines.”

We second that Terence! Be sure to size your cables correctly so it all works perfectly.

While the contractors are still using the cables in the field, it was a unanimous decision that more time in the field was needed to truly understand the value of Flexicore cables and how it holds up long term versus other options.

We will continue to check in with the team to provide updates later in the year.

Contractor Bios:

Felix Delgadillo – He has been in the plumbing trades for over 15 years. Most of his experience has been in remodels & new construction for both commercial and residential. He is passionate about new construction and wanted to expand professionally to the service side. In 2019 he started his second company, Drain Guys, LLC. Drain Guys specializes in commercial and residential sewer cleaning, camera inspections & locating.

IG: www.instagram.com/drainguyschicago

Facebook: www.facebook.com/Drainguyschicago

 

Terence Chan – He is a plumbing, heating and gas contractor out of Vancouver, BC, Canada. His company is Impetus Plumbing and Heating. Impetus stands for a force that makes something happen, which stands for everything their name defines them to be.  We make everything happen and will never say no to any job. This company wants to be seen as the next up and coming generation that will make a difference and disturb the status quo in the current trade.

IG: www.instagram.com/impetuspandh

Facebook: www.facebook.com/impetuspandh

 

Jeff Keller – Bulldog Contractors allows him to work alongside his father Carl and other Bulldog team members. For over 35 years, Bulldog Contractors have brought areas of Northeast Texas first class plumbing and septic service, experience, and quality work with exceptional results. They are committed to exceed the expectations of our customers with quality service and expertise on every project we do. With a lot of repeat business, they have built long-term & trusting relationships over the years.

IG: www.instagram.com/jkeller1.0

Facebook: www.facebook.com/builditlikebulldog