5 week wonders

[philbas]

To be fair I took Graham's comment to be tongue in cheek, he just forgot the smilie

 

[MajorOak]

Went through a 4 year CITB/JIB indentured apprenticeship from 1987 to 1991 with a company called CITE Systems and the Rotherham College of Arts and Technology, best years of my life my apprenticeship.

I learned so much from the vast experience of the people I worked with, in so many varied locations from Mines to Steel Works to injection moulding plants to the installation of a funicular railway system on the Isle of Skye at the end of the 90s. I think what experience an apprenticeship gives you, cannot be got in any other way. You can't compress 5, 4 or even 3 years of constant on the job training into a 5 week course.

I decided at the age of 22 I wanted to go into electronics so went to Uni got an MEng in Electronic and Electrical Engineering, spent 3 years as an electronic design engineer in Cambridge, hated it.

Then decided I wanted to go into Software 15 years ago and I am now working for a Thermal Image company designing software for infra-red predictive maintenance cameras and working the weekends as the local Village Sparky and loving it. It has all come full circle!!

 

[Theorysparky]

To be fair I took Graham's comment to be tongue in cheek, he just forgot the smilie

so did i..........exclamation mark was the clue in this instance

 

[Sidewinder]

I was not sure, no smiley, so I responded and put a smiley in my post?

Graham?...

Mind, it did get me to think about a couple of things, and it is not the first time that I have had to explain that the reason I did not have an NVQ3 was that they were no yet invented when I trained!

 

[sprocketflup]

What I cant unnerstan' is the fact that the 5 week wonder course that I took to get started lasted for 13 weeks?

However, placed my 'x' in the 5ww course box, please dont hate meeeeeeeee

 

[steptoe]

I shouldnt have started this,

Im not a spark either,

now where can I get an NVQ logo to cut out and stick on some fancy typing paper... :|

 

[jameseye12]

Maybe we're not really sparks. Maybe it just all in our heads?

Whilst we're on the subject, what's that brown wire for? :slap

 

[Lusk]

Electrical & Instrument Technician

 

[Evans Electric]

; )OK here goes..Time served (but not in the Electrical industry as such!)

Left school..

4 year Telecommunications apprenticeship.

(Private company NOT BT, or GPO as it was then called!)

Gained BTEC Telecommunications certificate

&

HNC in Telecommunications Engineering.

Worked on installation & maintenance of various commercial communication systems:-

Internal phone systems, {before that days of the BT liberalisation a lot of factories had TWO phone systems, internal & external,

This was the era of mechanical Strowger switch boards, just as the electronic stuff was coming in.}

Broadcast systems

Pagers

Fire Alarm

Time & Attendance systems

Then as desktop computers became economically viable (a reasonable desktop PC was around

 

[steptoe]

Deke, you do realise that Brian & Neils positions may now be in the balance,

seems SL may be our unsung under a bushel computer geek in hiding!!!!!

Unix OS , eh? you kept that quite........

 

[Evans Electric]

Not very distinguished I'm afraid .

So, left school at 15 .

Started at GKN (They didn't do elect. apprenticeships so started as a trainee elect) Drop forgings, toolrooms and Cold Extrusion supplying the car industry with engine components and the universal joints used on the rear wheel drive prop. shafts and CV joints for what was then , the new Mini.

After 2 yrs I was finding it claustrophobic , clocking in at 7.30 , getting up from tea break when the foreman crawled out from under his stone to sound a hooter, so it was time to move on .

Went to Walker Bros as a JIB Apprentice . They were a big firm similar to N G Bailey in those far off days. ( I think they still exist in Oxford) We worked on big projects like hospitals ,schools, new tracks at Austin/Rover /BMC /BL car works , Metro Camell train carriage works , Morris motors in Oxford and MOD work.

Quallies were a mere C&G A Inst.

When "On the tools" as it was called , it was normal then to go where the work and the money was, so moved around a bit , B,ham's BT Tower etc. More MOD work.

When upgraded to JIB Approved Elec. continued in the same way but as site foreman .

Contracting to British Rail and Freightliner around the country.

Then a spell working on overhead cranes , with a Black Country firm who converted older cranes to radio control , took the cabs off so there was never the option of going back to a man in the cab. Went all over the country with them , panel building in the workshop then take it out to site , best hotels, seemed to be loads of money in it.

Then about 8 years with a smallish Stourbridge family firm contractor , lot of new schools and , The dreaded local Steel Works.

Then a rewind company in B,ham , again , forman on furnace installations and motor drives plus general contracting, and Boots Chemists refurbs .

Left there to start up Complete Electrical Services on our own with my late M8 . Basically his firm , me as Supervisor and estimator. Long standing customers were Aston University, Barclays Banks , British Gas , City Hospital and West Midlands Police. After 14 years bad debts finally strangled us to death.

That was about 16 years ago , nobody wanted me as an estimator or supervisor with Electrician's Knees , ( "We want a younger man") so became self employed and blundered on as Evans Electric . Looking after various local printers until the recession and foriegn competition sent them, all but one, bust. With one of them left plus a large law firm , I'm now doing mostly domestic stuff .

Still there despite the CIS Tax scheme , collecting VAT , Part Bleedin' P .

Main claim to fame is joining an Electricains Forum and creating ........."Brian" .... :Cthe shoulder shrugging smilie.

When I started , all fixings were done with a hammer and plugging chisel called a Rawlplug tool or jumper bit. Conduit was all steel, no PVC . Hole saws were a piece of carp called an Enox cutter , the less said about them the better . Elf and Safety unheard of. No work was ever tested other than to find a fault.

And as I related in an ancient thread , five fellow sparks dead in the line of duty . That is now six , as my mate George (who started Compete Elect. Serv.) has died in Spain from asbestosis . He was basically a good guy and I miss him.

We worked together for forty odd years , I miss his intelect, his work ethic, his enthusiasm and his dry Brummie humour . ( And the fact that he'd chat up any female you met and would $hag a damp corner given the chance ) But thats another story .

Which I won't be telling .

 

[AcombAndy]

Full scope self certifying. 6 Day course + 17th Ed.

23 years as an RAF Electronics Engineer, left when promoted to my level of incompetence.

I passed the 6 day

 

[Evans Electric]

Hi AcombAndy, just wondering if you refered to yourself as the " IT Engineer " or was it someone else on the course.?

 

[Dave Buchan]

I can't believe I've just wasted nearly seven years of my life studying in the further development of my electrical career.

Check this out;

"Become a qualified domestic electrical installer in 16 days"

Electrical Training Course Packages for Beginners | Electrical Courses to Start Your Electrical Career

 

[Zeespark]

Without experience, these courses only give you half (at a push) of the knowledge and experience that you need to become an electrician, even a domestic one. 26 days to become an electrician - absolute joke, these courses were designed for guys that have been on the tools for 20 years but had no paperwork, not for people wishing to change careers.

AndyGuinness

 

[Electricalserv]

Well let me introduce myself.

I'm a self employed Napit QS. Left school and did alot of jobs. Control panel apprentice, Window Fitter, Builders labourer, asda. Never stuck at any of them. Decided to go to college and got on the 2330 level 2. Worked for a company throughout level 2 the got sacked. (argument with boss) Jumped onto 2330 level 3 got a new job, new boss. Learnt alot with this firm was left to do rewires on my own so got loads of hands on experience. Made team leader, me and a couple of other lads doing 2 rewires a week. Sat 2382 then 2391 passed both. Decided I was going to go it alone as I was essentially running the firm on the ground whilst my boss watched over me.

In the end packed up my tools and joined Napit full scope. Been tradeing 3 months. Things are picking up after a slow start but I'm getting there. Oh I'm from merseyside!

Current Quals

17th Edition

2391

2330 L3

2330 L2

 

[batty]

How do you do the work without your tools?

 

[mark740]

OK here goes

I joined the Army at 16 ....Royal Signals as a telecoms Tech, was breezing the course and had my first yearly medical (service puleems for those in the know) had a colour blindness test (I knew I was colour blind and even told them at joining medical) failed and as the army had missed it from my initial medical (unbelievable I know) they then said

 

[jameseye12]

OK here goes I joined the Army at 16 ....Royal Signals as a telecoms Tech, was breezing the course and had my first yearly medical (service puleems for those in the know) had a colour blindness test (I knew I was colour blind and even told them at joining medical) failed and as the army had missed it from my initial medical (unbelievable I know) they then said

 

[mark740]

probably not, i can stil make off a 40 pair telecoms cable so cant be that bad right ?