Consulting
Drilling & underground consulting
Beau Straub has been boring professionally since 2003. Drilling companies, utilities and contractors call him when a job needs to be planned right, priced right or rescued.
How Beau can help
Consulting services
Hourly, day-rate or per-project — tell us what you need and we'll scope it with you.
HDD consulting & bore planning
Bore path, depth, entry and exit, tooling, fluids and crossing strategy for tough shots — under highways, creeks and rivers, through cobble and rock, or in tight confined spaces.
Bid & estimating help
Realistic footage and production assumptions, crew and equipment loading, and the risk items that sink bids. A sanity check before you submit.
Troubleshooting problem jobs
When a bore is fighting you — rock, cobble, lost returns, steering trouble or stuck tooling — get an experienced second set of eyes, by phone or on site.
Crew training
Drillers, locators and flaggers: practical, job-site training from someone who has hired and run crews.
Equipment advice
What rig, plow, trencher or hydro-vac fits your work, what to look for buying used, and tooling choices for Montana ground.
Traffic control advisement
Work-zone setup, lane closures and detours planned the right way for the road and the job.
Safety programs
Daily job hazard analyses, site-specific orientations, drug testing and driver checks — the program 406 Underground ran on its own crews.
Growing an underground contractor
Beau built a Colorado telecom and drilling company to 100+ employees and started 406 Underground from scratch. Talk through growth, crews and bidding.
Who calls us
Built for the people doing the work
- Drilling & boring contractors — planning, bidding, problem bores and crew training.
- Utilities, carriers & engineers — constructability and method selection for underground routes.
- General contractors & developers — getting utilities in without surprises.
- Property owners & municipalities — straight answers on bore vs. trench and who to hire.
Experience behind the advice
- Boring professionally since 2003, starting with cable-system rebuilds for hurricane relief.
- Built a Colorado telecom & directional drilling company (Rapid Wire LLC) to 100+ employees.
- Founded 406 Underground in Helena in 2013; 1,000,000+ feet drilled by the company and 700,000+ hours without a lost-time accident.*
- Boring contractor for NorthWestern Energy projects.
*As published on the Four O Six Underground website, 2017–2019.
Reach out
Call or send the form with the job details.
Quick scoping call
We talk through the problem and what help looks like.
Clear quote
Hourly, day-rate or per-project — agreed up front.
Get to work
Remote review, on-site visit, or both.
Request a consult
Tell us about the job
The more detail the better: footage, product size, ground conditions, crossings, what's gone wrong so far. Beau will get back to you directly.