OP
MiAmigo
Afternoon all,
May as well make my second ever post!
Like Eliminator Guy above I re-trained and took a couple of courses. Mine were with Trade Skills 4U. I had worked in broadcast electronics since leaving school and have a HND in electronic engineering. I was made redundant about three years ago and discovered what people had been telling me for years- namely that when I get to 50 no one will want me.
So I decided to spend some of my redundancy pay on some re-training and TradeSkills 4U were fairly local in Crawley. Plus, since I had spent most of my adult life (and much of my childhood) thinking about amps, volts and ohms I didn't think the courses would be that difficult. In fact I found all the electrical theory a breeze- it was the rules and regs I wasn't prepared for. I did a basic electrical installation course which entailed a week being supervised by an experienced electrician and having to assemble various circuits on a board. All these circuits were tested for R1+R2, insualtion etc under DC conditions. There was no certificate for this course but I subsequently did an EAL Domestic Installers course (4385), C&G BS7671 and C&G level 2 testing and initial verification. Armed with these bits of paper I then put a small advert in our local paper for Minor Works, just to gain some experience. I had approached a few building firms locally to get some experience but they all had insufficient work to keep their regular Sparkys busy. I also found, somewhat depressingly, that my ad in the local attracted more calls from out of work Sparkys than business from clients. Anyway, undeterred I have accumulated about 20 Minor Works jobs and am in the process of applying for Elecsa membership. My aged aunty's house needs a new CU and some other minor work and i intend doing that and submitting it for the Elecsa inspection.
My experiences with the training organisations is that during the good times their main business comes from electrical contractors who send their trainees along for an intensive course. During recessions such as we have just had their main business is from people investing their redundancy pay. Virtually all the people doing the courses that I was on were all recently made redundant. A few dropped out after a few days on the basic course- they were so out of their depth. Others who mwere a bit more savvy stayed the disitance but I'm not sure how many woulkd actually go into the trade.
My ambition is to get the Elecsa acreditation and spend the last 15 years of my working life jobbing Domestic work.
May as well make my second ever post!
Like Eliminator Guy above I re-trained and took a couple of courses. Mine were with Trade Skills 4U. I had worked in broadcast electronics since leaving school and have a HND in electronic engineering. I was made redundant about three years ago and discovered what people had been telling me for years- namely that when I get to 50 no one will want me.
So I decided to spend some of my redundancy pay on some re-training and TradeSkills 4U were fairly local in Crawley. Plus, since I had spent most of my adult life (and much of my childhood) thinking about amps, volts and ohms I didn't think the courses would be that difficult. In fact I found all the electrical theory a breeze- it was the rules and regs I wasn't prepared for. I did a basic electrical installation course which entailed a week being supervised by an experienced electrician and having to assemble various circuits on a board. All these circuits were tested for R1+R2, insualtion etc under DC conditions. There was no certificate for this course but I subsequently did an EAL Domestic Installers course (4385), C&G BS7671 and C&G level 2 testing and initial verification. Armed with these bits of paper I then put a small advert in our local paper for Minor Works, just to gain some experience. I had approached a few building firms locally to get some experience but they all had insufficient work to keep their regular Sparkys busy. I also found, somewhat depressingly, that my ad in the local attracted more calls from out of work Sparkys than business from clients. Anyway, undeterred I have accumulated about 20 Minor Works jobs and am in the process of applying for Elecsa membership. My aged aunty's house needs a new CU and some other minor work and i intend doing that and submitting it for the Elecsa inspection.
My experiences with the training organisations is that during the good times their main business comes from electrical contractors who send their trainees along for an intensive course. During recessions such as we have just had their main business is from people investing their redundancy pay. Virtually all the people doing the courses that I was on were all recently made redundant. A few dropped out after a few days on the basic course- they were so out of their depth. Others who mwere a bit more savvy stayed the disitance but I'm not sure how many woulkd actually go into the trade.
My ambition is to get the Elecsa acreditation and spend the last 15 years of my working life jobbing Domestic work.
