My wife, Janet, and I had a wonderful two week vacation in Switzerland last summer and I wish to share my findings and observations with you who have an interest in foreign insulators. My foremost observations, and recommendation, is for those who love beauty to travel there. Of course, do so when the dollar is a little stronger.

The country has outstanding beauty from the lakes to the mountains and the Swiss are VERY congenial, as well as ingenious. I am still amazed at what they have accomplished in the way of elaborate rail and cog-rail systems which run through, up, and inside mountains. These achievements, many of which were completed in the late 1800's, are a credit to those who designed and constructed these efficient modes of transportation.

Although the scenery captivated a great deal of my attention, my love for insulators kept me looking out the train windows as we whizzed past pole after pole of insulators. This got to be a running joke, "Look at that! Oh, he's looking at insulators again." I got to where I had begun to notice a few consistencies, but I would always notice yet another new insulator which would push my interest even further. I began by noticing only brown and white insulators and soon I began to notice tan, bronze, and finally yellow insulators. I am not familiar with porcelain insulators, but I knew that a yellow glass insulator is a prize. So, of all I saw, I began to like the yellows the most.

After about a week of doing all this watching, I decided that I had better get busy if I was to take any home with me. This was not easy, for I am used to getting insulators off abandoned lines. I never did see a downed pole or even one without wires. Feeling rather discouraged with the prospects, I had to turn to the Swiss for help.

At one of our stays at a small hotel, we had a very nice couple as our hosts. Since they were so nice and spoke English well, I thought that I would try out the topic of insulators on them. Though very puzzled at my interest, they were very willing to help. The very next day we were off bright and early for the town's power plant. Our host was familiar with the people there, but they were also very puzzled. I was led up to the upstairs where the supervisor of the plant fumbled through hardware in the dark. I was hoping that he would turn on the light and I would see piles of colored insulators, but instead all there was to be had were power pieces weighing 40-50 pounds a piece. (Mike Guthrie, don't ask me what they looked like, I only knew that they would not have traveled well on and off trains for another week!) This stop was not a total wash though, for I got a nice translated tour through a Swiss hydroelectric plant.

It wasn't until we got to a larger town that I got really lucky. We went into a hotel on the main street, told the gentleman at the desk about my interest, and asked where we might find the local utility company. It was obvious that we were not guests there, but he and another gentleman put their heads together and got us pointed in the right direction. When we got there, people were on lunch (lunch and "tea" are times in the day where all comes to a halt), so there was little activity.

The ladies at the front counter didn't understand English, and I had forgotten nearly all the German I knew, so Janet gave her French a try. They were confused, but got a young supervisor from the back who spoke English very well. He understood our interest and motioned for us to follow. On the way, I explained that I was not looking for the giant ones. He said, "O.K.," and indicated all that they had left were the white and yellow ones. Janet could tell how let down I was by this remark, for I floated the rest of the way! Upstairs was a room full of meters, fuses, wire, lamps, signs, and lots of insulators! This was the stock room where items were kept in reserve until they were no longer needed and then they would get buried. When I asked where, he reiterated, "buried."

Not only was I free to take what I wanted, he went all through the room grabbing items and offering them to me and explaining the purpose of each. I liked everything, but I kept thinking of the pain I would put myself through if I took too much with me. So, I confined my selection to only insulators, yellow insulators, and a few aluminum pole signs in German. Most of the insulators had the metal pins/mounts still in them. After trying to turn one off its pin, he explained that they will never come off. Later trials proved him to be correct. I now credit the Swiss for their railways and their INSULATOR CEMENT!!

I did get a few other brown ones at another power plant in another city, so I was very happy, but very weighted down. Throughout all the searches, I could not believe the help I was provided by these people. They knew what I wanted, but not why, and they would go out of their way to help. I even went into a gas station and asked to borrow an oil filter wrench to attempt turning them off (I hadn't given up yet!) Well, they went and set me up at a work bench with a drill and a vise so that I could remove the cement. Wow! I don't think that even Mr. Goodwrench would do that for a foreigner over there. Well, that is my saga and here are a few of my observations and generalizations about Swiss insulators:

Nearly all the insulators I saw were porcelain. I only saw glass once and they were clear and resembled a CD 122. Other times, I noticed that near train stations, the overhead wires were hooked to a glass piece resembling a "sombrero."

Finding spare insulators was hard because they are being phased out. Due to the snowfall that occurs there, they are placing telephone and low-voltage lines underground. And, when they take down a line, they don't stockpile items in the wild. They are so tidy that everything has a place out of sight. The insulators I encountered were for telephone and low power. The shape for both was, for the most part, the same and only the sizes differed. This photo shows the variations in a particular type. I am told the voltage run on the power insulators is both 220V or 380V.

4-7/8" telephone style             5-1/2" power style

The way they are mounted to poles depended on whether or power. This picture shows the typical configuration for the power insulators...
	...while this is the way in which the telephone insulators are installed.

The telephone insulators were always mounted on metal crossarms and rarely were there more than two per crossarm. Only saw one instance where there were four on an arm. When going around corners, they would even double up on the crossarms (front and back), so the tension on the wire would be distributed across two stress points.

The individual pin/brackets for the power pieces were of heavy metal (almost as heavy as the insulator), and they were threaded on both ends. The auger end screwed into the pole and the other end had threads more like a bolt. They did not fit the threads in the insulator and this is where the cement came into play. While we were at the warehouse mentioned earlier, I did see some mounts with a curved bracket on the end that would match the curve of a metal pole when being bolted to it.

Though most of the insulators had slot-tops, the wires were always tied along side in the wire groove. When I say tied, I mean TIED. I am used to unwrapping a tie wire the same gauge as the as the main wire and it only takes three wraps to get it off the main wire and another one wrap to get it off the insulator. The Swiss use a tie wire of about #18-20 gauge, double it over, wrap it around the insulator three times, and then reconnect it to the main wire with about 15 very tight wraps. Below is a picture of a brown insulator on a typical bracket.

I also noticed that all wooden poles had metal caps on top very similar to inverted frisbees. These covered the entire surface and diverted rain from directly seeping into the pole, preventing rot which would cause the screwed-in mounts to pry out.

All insulators I encountered were double-petticoats and I even saw some slot-tops that were triples. Below were three different sizes of insulators.

I only wish that I had done some research prior to the trip to know what I had been seeing, and also to know if there was anything else I hadn't seen. I imagine that these insulators are very similar to those found in the bordering countries of Switzerland. Also, I would be happy to answer and questions of you readers about my trip.