How many LPS's do you sell a year? How much?

cody willard

cody willard

Participating member
Location
Tulsa
I have been climbing for eight years, and have only came across two trees with the lightning protection system. I always hear about people installing them by never actually see it done, not sure if it's just being from Tulsa Oklahoma, but I can't count how many trees removed due to lightning strikes, we can get pretty bad electrical storms here, and all the nice houses near the river and lakes always have big trees killed or stress by lightning strikes.

•I was curious how many times a year do you guys end up installing them?

•What's the average price?

•I figured the average 65 foot oak with two main leaders using two-three air terminals would be around $600ish in material, then throw in a day rate at 1300 for basic labor and you're looking at possibly $1900 to install a system? " based off Independent Protection Companies catalog " seems reasonable, kind of curious how hard of a sell it is?
 
NE is not a real lightning hotspot is it? And bovine undies aren't a thing right?

I do maybe one a month. But I installed 11 in a weekend once. Andersonville GA.

$600 is high for mtls. ILP always specs extra. And why figure a day labor? This one took 56 minutes: "Lightning protection is warranted, given the tree’s height and location. A system could reduce lightning risk by 97 percent. The conductor could go under the rock and pipe in the drainage trench to that low spot in the corner, and connect to an 8-foot (2.4 m) ground rod."

http://www.historictreecare.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Dendro-1108-Mutilated-187kb.pdf
 
JD3000 said:
...you rail against Ohio every chance you get...at least when I bring it up of course...
Click to expand...

Well, yeah.. I just do that cuz you live there... but, it's not like Nebraska is a vacation hotspot, either. Remember that SETI equipment they loaded up on spacecraft to look for some signs of intelligent life in the vast unknown, or at least something that didn't fart in the bathtub? They tried to use it to locate the bunghole of the universe, and between the farting noises they could hear 80,000 idiots in Memorial Stadium chanting, "Go Big Red! Go Big Red!"
 
JeffGu said:
Well, yeah.. I just do that cuz you live there... but, it's not like Nebraska is a vacation hotspot, either. Remember that SETI equipment they loaded up on spacecraft to look for some signs of intelligent life in the vast unknown, or at least something that didn't fart in the bathtub? They tried to use it to locate the bunghole of the universe, and between the farting noises they could hear 80,000 idiots in Memorial Stadium chanting, "Go Big Red! Go Big Red!"
Click to expand...
Lol. Dude that's pretty good wit right there. Gotta hand it to you.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I257 using Tapatalk
 
cody willard said:
I have been climbing for eight years, and have only came across two trees with the lightning protection system. I always hear about people installing them by never actually see it done, not sure if it's just being from Tulsa Oklahoma, but I can't count how many trees removed due to lightning strikes, we can get pretty bad electrical storms here, and all the nice houses near the river and lakes always have big trees killed or stress by lightning strikes.

•I was curious how many times a year do you guys end up installing them?

•What's the average price?

•I figured the average 65 foot oak with two main leaders using two-three air terminals would be around $600ish in material, then throw in a day rate at 1300 for basic labor and you're looking at possibly $1900 to install a system? " based off Independent Protection Companies catalog " seems reasonable, kind of curious how hard of a sell it is?
Click to expand...

Well back to the regularly scheduled program already in progress;
Helped maintain and install many systems at my previous job. Every year we would take a couple weeks to back out the drives, make repairs and install a few new systems. It's not overly complicated to install, actually very easy. Since I moved on I believe I have quoted 3 systems, and all three declined or got someone else. It is a very tough sell in our market, because many times labor and materials are around half the cost of removal and people don't like their trees that much.
I can't remember the average price but the last one I quoted was a 100' tall tulip poplar, one lead with single terminal and it was just north of $900. I figured climber and ground man 3 hours plus materials (I think around $450).
 
Here in Chapel Hill, NC, there are TLPSs on a few heritage trees on UNC campus including two huge willow oaks that stand as sentinels at the entrance of the historic Carolina Inn. I know of another that is protecting a 4 foot diameter pecan tree in historic Hillsborough, NC.

In my limited experience it is much easier to "sell" a TLPS when the property owner's priority is protecting the tree, not protecting their home or car from falling limbs/trees, or even side flash to the house. I had a conversation recently with a botanist at the Raulston Arboretum who was unwilling to install a TLPS on one of the arboretum's largest trees - a willow oak - because he considered it an insignificant specimen.

I'm installing 2 TLPSs next month for homeowners with historically significant oak trees close to their homes. I generally plan 3 to 4 man-hours for a single conductor TLPS installation, and 4 to 5 man-hours for a double conductor TLPS. IPClp.com gives a 20% arborist discount off the prices listed on their website, which helps to blunt the freight costs for delivering such heavy materials. The supply and shipping costs for my two most recent TLPSs were $365 (80-foot tall, 2-conductor TLPS) and $235 (60-foot, 1-conductor TLPS).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

New threads New posts

Back
Top Bottom