As usual, the first step for any project involving digging is getting the utility locations marked.

I have put in some flower beds over some of the utility lines.

Stating the obvious?

Apparently there is an ATT line running from our yard to our neighbors'.

Aaron and Kyle were well-organized; they brought boxes of tools and supplies, and their own work table. Kyle started by shutting off power and removing our old main fuse box.

Aaron leveled the ground and placed the concrete pad for the unit.

Aaron pushed...

...and pulled the unit off their trailer.

Then he arranged their handy-dandy battery-operated crane on either side of the unit.

Somebody had designed an impressively efficient system for moving the unit: The unit had holes on one end that a pipe slid through to allow the crane to pick it up. Then ties with J-hooks were fit into holes in the other end to allow the crane to lift the unit off the ground.

Easy-peasy

Moving the unit to its resting place

Setting it into place

Easy does it

On the other side of the garage, Kyle had everything laid out to get to work.

Kyle, working on the power boxes

They kept the meter running and had power for charging batteries.

Aaron exposed the 'innards.'

Inside the box is a little combustion engine.

After attaching the unit to the concrete base, Aaron carefully wiped it all clean.

The box and the base had pre-drilled holes to bolt the two together.

Aaron and Kyle worked together to loosen some of the tight connections in the main power box.

Old power box removed

Ready to install the battery

New box in place

Kyle started re-attaching wires.

The interior of their trailer

Pilot hole for the wiring from the power box to the unit

The hole was drilled from the outside, where the power box is, into the garage.

Aaron unrolled the protective sheath for the wiring to let it relax in the sun.

After the pilot hole, a larger hole was drilled to accommodate the sheathed wiring.

On the side of the garage near the unit, Kyle got into the flower bed to make another hole in the wall.

Kyle, pulling the protective sheathing through the wall to check the required length before cutting it.

Inside the garage--where I had cleared a lot of junk for them to work--Aaron and Kyle pressed the sheathing to the wall to insure an accurate measurement.

They attached a thin, stiff rod to the end of the wiring to guide the wiring through the sheathing.

Snaking the wiring into the sheathing

Next, Aaron stripped the ends of the wires, so they could be attached to the unit on one end and the power box on the other.

Kyle attached the sheathing to the wall with brackets, while Aaron attached the wires to the power box.

All hooked up on this end

Kyle was careful to make sure the sheathing looked nice and level, using brackets to attach it around the inside wall of the garage.

He did the same thing on the outside wall.

Then Aaron got to work attaching the wiring to the unit.

Then he installed the battery.

All hooked up

At the same time, Kyle started re-packing their tools and supplies.

Next, Aaron started entering codes into the unit's electronics.

Then Mary came out to test the alerts on her phone.

It works!

The plumbers were still on another job, so Kyle and Aaron started digging the trench for the gas line.

Steve consulted photos we took when the sprinkler system was installed to prevent a severed line.

"I think the lines run thataway."

Not looking so certain

Kyle finished out the trench.

It got warm by the time they got the trench dug.

The sprinkler line was unscathed. Funny story though: Steve didn't think about the location of two sprinkler heads, which, as it turned out, had been covered by the concrete pad and had to be capped and moved later.

We took a lunch break and, when we came back out, the plumbers had arrived, had already buried the gas line and were working on attaching it to the meter.

A flexible metal joint attached the gas line to the unit.

Putting the finishing touches on the gas connection

Adding a little paint

Mary, beside the finished generator

Steve took his turn.

Mary took a few yard photos; this beebalm was still blooming.

The view from the back of the yard