Need Help! in Gas

[Bill Raybould]

Hi Is there any one on here that can help me or tell me how i can do this. I have just passed my gas. it was a 8 week course with E-ON in Dudley i Did this course because i was made redundent last year and all i would like to do is go back to work. I am a young 54 year old And live in Dudley West midlands. The problem is that no one will give me a job because i have no experience. I need to find someone that will give me a chance to get some hands on. Can someone Help??????. Many Thanks Bill

 

[ecowarm]

when you say you have just passed your gas, are you a plumber?

 

[metaldust9]

how have you passed acs in 8 weeks

 

[payney1974]

Its the 8 week passport course, my friend did it a couple of months ago in fact he could of been on the same course as you Bill. He's in the same boat to, he's even offered to work for free to gain experience but still no joy!! I work at that Eon training academy sometimes Bill.

 

[metaldust9]

wats a passport course so hes not done his acs,he has to work with someone for a number of jobs or hours to get onto acs so he,,s not passed his gas yet just e,on course, is that right am lost all sounds bit misleading

 

[Bill Raybould]

No i have not been a plumber. I have been in electronics for the last 15 years.
I know its hard i have tryed all over the place and i think its a shame to give up there must be someone local that can help me!. There must be a way. Thanks for your replys

 

[SafeGasInstall]

pls dont get mad ,but why did you no do electric training as you did electric work all your live ?????

 

[payney1974]

wats a passport course so hes not done his acs,he has to work with someone for a number of jobs or hours to get onto acs so he,,s not passed his gas yet just e,on course, is that right am lost all sounds bit misleading

The passport does give you your ACS. They spend 4 weeks i think with engineers on site.

 

[Bill Raybould]

I have passed CCN1 CENWAT CKR1 CPA1 HTR1 MET2

 

[Bill Raybould]

I was a service engineer in the tv trade, but its now a throw away world and theres no need for engineers, so i needed a new trade.

 

[payney1974]

Could you not get a little van and start doing a bit of servicing? Get your gas safe card first.

 

[mfgs]

Dont mean to sound rude, but its worrying that people with no prior experience are fast tracked through an 8 week course and at the end can be gas safe registered. It sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

I think you will struggle to get work, you will need a good understanding of heating systems and controls etc aswell. You will be best off trying to offer to help out for free. There are alot of guys out there with loads more qualifications and experience out there who cant find any work.

 

[metaldust9]

amazing, it took me 2 yrs to get mine and that was suppose to be fast track and id been in plumbing 7 yrs first and around gas people and they were very stringent were i done mine dont want to sound horible but you will find it hard to get anyone to help ye, as 8 weeks is not enough to pass all that and theres also minimum wage public liabily insurance etc etc

 

[SafeGasInstall]

op ,can you convert Y plan to S plan and can you convert both S & Y to sealed system ? can you take combi out and put new one in! Can you run a complete gas run let say from gas meter to boiler 15m through the house ? can you relocate radiators ?

can you do TT, gas rate , calculate purge volume and read working pressure adjust burner pressure ?

if answer is yes to all above ,then get van and go and start working as sub contractor ?

 

[payney1974]

Ideally you need to be classed as an improver, work with a company on minimum wage for 6 months with a service engineer to get the experience. Service engineers can just about get away with not knowing the difference between different systems ie. Y S W plans.

 

[metaldust9]

i had to proove what id done by portfollio, minimum number of hours and 60 jobs all signed of by gas safe reg person out in the field, not in a center before could even get near doing acs then had gas safe coming out after ad passed asking me were id worked what ad done and questions on gas rate etc and general chat to suss me out

 

[SafeGasInstall]

i had to proove what id done by portfollio, minimum number of hours and 60 jobs all signed of by gas safe reg person out in the field, not in a center before could even get near doing acs then had gas safe coming out after ad passed asking me were id worked what ad done and questions on gas rate etc and general chat to suss me out

was she good looking ,was it worth spending all this time with her trying to impress her with your knowledge ,how and what you can do with your hands and tools ???

 

[ecowarm]

I watched a "gas engineer" turn on a hot tap to get the boiler to fire ............ it was a system boiler, think they had only seen combi's.!!!!!

 

[metaldust9]

good luck to him, but its very scary passing so soon an with no experience ,it still scares me certon stuff and thats yrs later

 

[SafeGasInstall]

i did it once too ,did not know it was system and all pipe work was boxed in ! turn tap on boiler does not fire took boiler case of to realised it was system:tounge_smile:

 

[ecowarm]

i did it once too ,did not know it was system and all pipe work was boxed in ! turn tap on boiler does not fire took boiler case of to realised it was system:tounge_smile:

It had just been "serviced" apparently, but didn't know it wasn't a combi?

 

[metaldust9]

think ad get in me tool bag and hide lol

 

[metaldust9]

also if you have passed your gas without going out on site or in the field so to speak you have the power to pass landlord checks how do ye no what to look for like midfeathers gone ,liners missing,fumes in lofts uncleaned chimneys so yellow flame etc dodgy boilers dodgy gas fires ,flueless gasfires that are not set right, now there lethal the list goes on

 

[kirkgas]

also if you have passed your gas without going out on site or in the field so to speak you have the power to pass landlord checks how do ye no what to look for like midfeathers gone ,liners missing,fumes in lofts uncleaned chimneys so yellow flame etc dodgy boilers dodgy gas fires ,flueless gasfires that are not set right, now there lethal the list goes on

i agree with your point, however there are thousands of gas engineers who dont see any of the stuff you mention, as they are white box fitters, i have had a lot of people do their re-assessment who say the last time they did a spillage test or seen a pre-cast chimney was 5 yrs ago when they did their ACS, as long as they know where to look for the answers they should be fine, they get their excuse in early by saying they dont do that kind of work so dont know it, then cant gas rate purge or work out pipe sizing, things that installers must be doing every day, and the amount of experienced guys who dont know the exact criteria for TT's is shocking, so many do a TT after a boiler change and are happy that the drop is only 2mb and under the 4 or 8, but they "dont have time to TT in the morning" not like in the training centre, they have a house drained and boiler out by 8.30am

 

[payney1974]

also if you have passed your gas without going out on site or in the field so to speak you have the power to pass landlord checks how do ye no what to look for like midfeathers gone ,liners missing,fumes in lofts uncleaned chimneys so yellow flame etc dodgy boilers dodgy gas fires ,flueless gasfires that are not set right, now there lethal the list goes on

Ive been doing it for 17 years and never heard the word midfeather in my life??? So none of us know everything!!! We are all learning everyday!

 

[metaldust9]

yep agree with you kirkgas whole thing is all wrong,but 8 weeks mate passed and not been out there not blaming the bloke but how can you pass and never done any of what you have said above, at least some of them will have come across stuff at some point,tt is the first thing i do tells you everything,

 

[metaldust9]

payney midfeathers are in the chimily between houses that go and let fumes into the loft or the ajoining house if gone and lethal usually tell if the smoke is round the chimney pot bottom and dont out the chimney pot itself

 

[payney1974]

I'll take your word for it Metaldust9.

 

[Bill Raybould]

And all i was looking for was some help! For someone to take me under there wing to work for nothing to get some experience, local to were i live.

 

[payney1974]

I feel for you Bill, you do get that alot on here! We all had to start somewhere.

 

[Bill Raybould]

Well Payney Apart for you!, the rest are a wast of time. Will i have tryed on here but i will not be coming back its i wast of time.

 

[payney1974]

Try ringing a few small companies and offer yourself to them for free to get the experience. Large companies will be very reluctant to let you work for free and theres health and safety headaches!

 

[Bill Raybould]

I have but i will keep trying Many thanks Payney

 

[Bartdude]

Well Payney Apart for you!, the rest are a wast of time. Will i have tryed on here but i will not be coming back its i wast of time.

I appreciate that you feel that you're not being helped enough here but there are posts like yours every day on this forum.A lot of the guys on here are fully trained and self-employed and the lack of work at the moment is biting for many. The training centres that offer these short courses promise all sorts of potential work and earnings when the reality is very different. If you search on this forum you'll find lots of discussion on this subject.

I wish you luck in your search but the cold reality is that the market is depressed and jobs will be few and far between.

 

[fuzzy]

I have passed CCN1 CENWAT CKR1 CPA1 HTR1 MET2

if you have no plumbing quals you must be a cat 3. That cat requires extensive experience, approx 240 days o work. so how can you have tht qual and not be experienced?? thats the thing that gets me, it isnt a course for newbies, never was, doesnt even teach you how to do gas, its a safety course. why do it in the first place if you have no other experience or quals?

acs wasnt desinged for newbies