A hot stick is a fibreglass pole that keeps the worker insulated from the conductor, fitted with hooks, clamps or testers to open fuses and disconnectors, apply portable earths or work energised lines from outside the minimum approach distance. Sticks are kept clean, dry and dielectrically tested at set intervals, because contamination along the surface creates a leakage path. Line crews call energised work done this way hot sticking.
Grab the hot stick and drop the cutouts on that transformer, then test it and put the earths on.
Also heard as
- hotstick
- operating pole
- insulated stick
Related terms
Portable earths
Removable earthing leads clamped onto isolated conductors to short them together and to earth during work.
Hot
Shop word for live or energised, and in North America the everyday name for a phase conductor.
Live
Connected to a source of voltage, or describing a conductor meant to be energised in normal use.