Electrican training/van

[Iain83]

Hi there all, I'm new to the forum, and wanted to ask you all about a number of things.
I am new to electrics but take a passion in it

Ok I am getting on a bit at 28 years old, for getting into this industry but, I am interested in learning from 12 volt to 11/33 kv, but not sure the best way for going about it. So.

1. There are short 'train' you in 6 month courses, which frankly seem a bit daft, cause there so much to learn for 4-6k. (seems a bit of a rip off) and most people don't seem to want to take those people on (any experience of that) so that leaves college and 3-5 years of training, but at least it would be proper like. Do you just ask around and hope you get an opening to work with a company whilst training?
I thought domestic installer would be the cheapest way to go right, as an alternative trying to save money, and then build from there, once you have experience, or am I doing myself wrong by limiting to just domestic at first.

However...I've been around looking at various different courses like trade skills for u and trade qualified (packages up other training courses lessons) which will ask your for 4-6k which sounds a bit of a rip off. But if you look at it as investment I still dont know, cause you got tools, and work van and all that so :|

2. Job prospects whilst training/trained, I hear people making like 50k if they are self employed. but what the real figures mostly do you think, I am guessing its all hard work more than people make out it is, and the way the construction industry is atm I guess not so great but in 3-5 years no one will know what it will be like, hopefully better.

3. All the codes for courses confuse me a bit to as it seems in a bit of flux, 2392 I think is the one with NVQ 3 in something is one way of doing it, are there other ways of training What would I need to be qualified for 11/33 kv and would that cover other work.

4. What would make a good sparkie van
I am sure you got your views on this, I am looking at a Toyota Hi ace, they seem cheap and reliable, other say new shape transit, and all that, so I guess horses for courses,

5. out of curiosity,
Single Phase - two lines in, does the neutral go back to the power station - surely not, also with Three Phase it is 2 x 240 volts rather than 3 x 240 ? ie the L3 is the neutral

Thanks

Iain

 

[Adam W]

1. You'd be best off starting the C&G 2357, which combines the old 2330 and 2356 NVQ3. A domestic installer course might teach you which wires to put where, but without the understanding as to why anything is connected where it is you'll soon come unstuck.

2. There's not much money to be had anywhere at all at the moment - a lot of sparkies aren't earning much more than minimum wage. There is no way I would have gone into this business just for the money, and wouldn't advise anyone else to either.

3. There is a special course to do for high voltage work which expires after a certain length of time. If you're starting from scratch you'd be better off learning the low voltage (50 - 1000v) stuff first.

4. I'd personally go for a partner or berlingo, but it depends what you're going to be doing with it. I would expect a ford van to rust away within a few years.

5. A neutral is produced at the transformer, which converts 3 lines (delta) into 3 lines (star), and neutral. If you only wanted a single phase supply you would take one line and neutral from the transformer, trying to balance the sum of all the lines including the ones which go to different properties.
A domestic installer would just accept that houses are supplied with live and neutral.

 

[ezzzekiel]

woah slow down boy, youre jumping from 12v to high voltage to 3phase and van choice,

step back breath and take it one step at a time

 

[Knobhead]

Forget the MV / HV stuff, you wouldn’t allowed anywhere near it. After about 10 years in industrial electrics then maybe, but if you think you can step from house wiring to MV / HV work forget it! 15 years in heavy industrial electrics to get my first MV ticket.

Sort yourself out!

 

[VoltzElectrical]

what are you doing at the moment? I mean, it's not the right time to be asking the simultaneous questions of 'where does a neutral come from?' and 'what van should I buy?'.

FIRST. Don't give up your day job.
SECOND. Banish all thoughts about buying a van and tools.
THIRD. Banish all thoughts of wasting 4-6k on courses.
FOURTH. Don't give up the desire to learn about the industry. Buy a couple of books. READ THEM. Call a couple of local sparky firms and get some experience as a mate. Then if you like it, go to college while working.
REMEMBER. There are no short cuts. £50k???? dreaming. DREAAAAAAAAMMMMIIIIING.

Good luck.

 

[GLENNSPARK]

Hi there all, I'm new to the forum, and wanted to ask you all about a number of things.
I am new to electrics but take a passion in it

Ok I am getting on a bit at 28 years old, for getting into this industry but, I am interested in learning from 12 volt to 11/33 kv, but not sure the best way for going about it. So.

1. There are short 'train' you in 6 month courses, which frankly seem a bit daft, cause there so much to learn for 4-6k. (seems a bit of a rip off) and most people don't seem to want to take those people on (any experience of that) so that leaves college and 3-5 years of training, but at least it would be proper like. Do you just ask around and hope you get an opening to work with a company whilst training?
I thought domestic installer would be the cheapest way to go right, as an alternative trying to save money, and then build from there, once you have experience, or am I doing myself wrong by limiting to just domestic at first.

However...I've been around looking at various different courses like trade skills for u and trade qualified (packages up other training courses lessons) which will ask your for 4-6k which sounds a bit of a rip off. But if you look at it as investment I still dont know, cause you got tools, and work van and all that so :|

2. Job prospects whilst training/trained, I hear people making like 50k if they are self employed. but what the real figures mostly do you think, I am guessing its all hard work more than people make out it is, and the way the construction industry is atm I guess not so great but in 3-5 years no one will know what it will be like, hopefully better.

3. All the codes for courses confuse me a bit to as it seems in a bit of flux, 2392 I think is the one with NVQ 3 in something is one way of doing it, are there other ways of training What would I need to be qualified for 11/33 kv and would that cover other work.

4. What would make a good sparkie van
I am sure you got your views on this, I am looking at a Toyota Hi ace, they seem cheap and reliable, other say new shape transit, and all that, so I guess horses for courses,

5. out of curiosity,
Single Phase - two lines in, does the neutral go back to the power station - surely not, also with Three Phase it is 2 x 240 volts rather than 3 x 240 ? ie the L3 is the neutral

Thanks

Iain

I chose the college route with an apprenticeship and i`m 38 years of age. Like you i feel like i should have done it sooner but theres no point gettin the violin out....should still have plenty of time to work/learn in this industry. What do you really want out of this? If domestic installer is your play then all well n good but dont forget: you will be competing against all those who went on one of these 6 week "courses" and dont forget "dave" at the end of the bar who wired a plug (once upon a time). It would all depend on what family commitments you have and how fast you want to "get in". But dont forget (and heres the bit that they dont tell you)..If learning a trade is easy......then why int averyone a plumber......why int everyone a sparky??? My advice to you would be: sit down think hard about it and if you really want to do this then go to college and learn from proper lecturers who invariably are sparkys themselves and most importantly....enjoy learning whilst you are there but please forget about 50K and all that as its a load of cobblers and is also false advertising (in my eyes anyway)
All the best.
Glenn.

 

[alarm man]

4. What would make a good sparkie van

works for them

 

[DNS1]

After all the bombardment from the "give us £3.5m and become a sparks in your lunchbreak" firms, it took a lot of explaining from folks on here to get me to understand the way it all REALLY works.

I'm in a full-time job, but fancied getting myself some electrics qualifications (just for my own satisfaction and so I can sign off my own work initially). Basically, with the level of experience I've got (a load of time house bashing on personal projects, work for friends and family) I'm looking at initially getting the 2382, registering with a scheme and being a domestic installer. Nothing more. No calling myself an "electrician", no commercial or industrial work etc. Just fitting sockets, installing showers, changing light fittings etc.

Here's a few tips for you:

1) totally ignore the "ultra-fast track" courses for umpteen thousand. I was almost tempted by one and then found a place doing the exact same thing for a few hundred. (if you're anywhere near Kent, Able Skills in Dartford get rave reviews and don't try to tell you that you'll be the messiah of the electrical world after 2 weeks)

2) don't spend any money on anything that you're not going to use if you don't get into the industry. All the tools I've bought, I've done so knowing that they may never be used to generate income, so I've got them primarily for personal projects.

3) Buy yourself a copy of BS7671 (yes it's bloody expensive!), the On-Site Guide and Part P Building Regs for Electricians. Read them inside out!

4) errr... I'm sure i'll think of one...

A few hours on this forum certainly opened my eyes to the "real" world of electrics.

 

[matt456]

"I'm looking at initially getting the 2382, registering with a scheme and being a domestic installer. Nothing more. No calling myself an "electrician", no commercial or industrial work etc. Just fitting sockets, installing showers, changing light fittings etc."

If i were paying someone to fit an electric shower then i would like to think they had the confidence to call themselves an electrician! Im slightly worried by the above comment

 

[Engineer54]

Forget the MV / HV stuff, you wouldn’t allowed anywhere near it. After about 10 years in industrial electrics then maybe, but if you think you can step from house wiring to MV / HV work forget it! 15 years in heavy industrial electrics to get my first MV ticket.

Sort yourself out!

Probably only 15 weeks now Tony!!! 15 week MV wonders!! lol!!! :shocked3:

 

[oldtimer]

12v to 11kv ? thats a big jump but heres how it can work Domestics is one avenue Indusrtrial Commercial is a 2nd HV is a third and then you can branch off to alarms intruder/fire Facilities maintenance HVAC controls I could go on I also know guys in the first 3 that will not and do not dip their toes into the others ie HV spark will not do domestic , Domestic sparks that cannot do industrial commercial . So decide what you want to do then stick at it dont jump around or you will be Jack of all Master of none.
OK what did I do time served Industrial/Commercial then Intruder/Fire alarms/ then HVAC BMS controls then Facilities maintenance then small domestic electrical repairs so whats the big deal none realy but you need to adapt to survive

 

[Knobhead]

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Probably only 15 weeks now Tony!!! 15 week MV wonders!! [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]lol!!! :shocked3:

Trouble is I’ll bet there’s a company out there running a MV course just like that.

The last one I went on was so watered down it was a joke. It’s now HV appreciation, not the HV system management course I first went on. The students now aren’t even allowed to work live on the LV system. Fitting links in to a live underground box was fun, I paralleled two 250KVA transformers that had the tap changers deliberately set out of balance to give some good flashes and bangs. A 4-way link box took some getting your head around. The one I was playing with had 3 transformers feeding it.

My first time with the EMEB we were testing live on 11KV, now you just watch the tutor doing it. I’ll admit I was nervous the first time I phased out a new 11KV feeder, crawling in the cubical with the “hot sticks” is a bit daunting. Protection relays were just skated over, no real theory of their operation. Differential protection was totally ignored until I asked about it.

 

[Engineer54]

You can be sure of that!!! If they can see money to be made, then there will certainly be companies exploiting it... Testing with hot sticks and phasing sticks didn't really bother me that much, ....got told off a couple of times for dragging the sticks away from the terminals taking the ark with them. Well it was such a pretty blue colour, and made noises like rice krispies, that i remembered from a kid, ...i couldn't resist it. ..lol!!!

 

[i=p/u]

come on guys its a 2 day course nowadays..