MIG LEVEL 3 PIPE 3268-03

[c.a.p.r.i]

Having passed Level 3 MIG plate earlier this year at Burnley college i'd be interested to know of any other colleges within the North West offering Level 3
At this present time there is only one person (me) signed up to take either Level 3 TIG or MIG pipe, the college needs a minimum of 6 people in order to run the course. Noticed Leeds offer the course at £922 which is way off the scale however, i may take level 1 gas welding at Leeds then proceed onto level 2. Tameside college in Ashton is where i taken MIG, ARC, TIG (mild steel) TIG aluminium & stainless steel, it's a good college and all the tutors are spot on...

Most welders choose only to become qualified up to level 2 then get coded, this must be why so many colleges choose not to offer level 3. Having said that Leeds offers level 3 and Manchester does not, can't be a shortage of qualified welders and mechanics in Manchester (try finding a mechanic qualified in both engineering & welding) Unlike Lancashire, Yorkshire was very much the heart of all English engineering and in my opinion is very much more finer of the two counties...fish+chips in beef dripping = quality.

 

[c.a.p.r.i]

Now passed Level 3 Mig & Tig Pipe along with Level 1 & 2 Gas.
*Leeds College of Building is my choice, taken me 15 hours to pass the five test pieces in Level 3 mig pipe.

 

[Munkul]

Nice one what's next for you then?

 

[addjunkie]

Nice one what's next for you then?

Ajob delivering for Tesco it pays better than welding….sadly

 

[Munkul]

Ajob delivering for Tesco it pays better than welding….sadly

I think encouragement would be better than that sort of negativity?
I don't doubt you're right, in this day and age they want multi skilled pipe fitters and fabricators rather than dedicated welders... But that can come also, with a bit of luck getting a job at the right company

 

[denlow60]

Having passed Level 3 MIG plate earlier this year at Burnley college i'd be interested to know of any other colleges within the North West offering Level 3
At this present time there is only one person (me) signed up to take either Level 3 TIG or MIG pipe, the college needs a minimum of 6 people in order to run the course. Noticed Leeds offer the course at £922 which is way off the scale however, i may take level 1 gas welding at Leeds then proceed onto level 2. Tameside college in Ashton is where i taken MIG, ARC, TIG (mild steel) TIG aluminium & stainless steel, it's a good college and all the tutors are spot on...View attachment 192172
Most welders choose only to become qualified up to level 2 then get coded, this must be why so many colleges choose not to offer level 3. Having said that Leeds offers level 3 and Manchester does not, can't be a shortage of qualified welders and mechanics in Manchester (try finding a mechanic qualified in both engineering & welding) Unlike Lancashire, Yorkshire was very much the heart of all English engineering and in my opinion is very much more finer of the two counties...fish+chips in beef dripping = quality.

what are the welding positions and the degree of difficulty? is it a welding course? in the Netherlands you have a welding course if you have passed this you are not yet allowed to perform certified work. if you obtain a welding certificate according to ISO 9606-1 or ASME IX or AWS, you can perform welding in the area for which you are qualified.

 

[c.a.p.r.i]

With a ford granada two capris and a 50 foot narrow boat I soon learnt the best way to get anything done properly is to do all work yourself. Im currently working as a mechanical engineer at Shawstons in Hyde.

1G,2G,5F,5G,6G are the five welding positions required for City & Guilds (326803) Level 3 in either Mig/Tig/Arc/Gas followed by an online 30 question(GOLA) exam. All fairly straight forward and easily passable.
Now doing Level 2 in Plumbing and then on to Level 2 in Electrical Instalation followed by Level 3

 

[c.a.p.r.i]

After all my efforts it's doubtful an oportunity to further develop to my skills as a welder is ever going to happen. I have since been back to college and now have Level 3 in Light Vehicle Maintenance and Repair.
Start Level 2 in Mechanical Engineering in September next followed by Level 3.
If I can't find an employer wiling to take me seriously I just go back to college and carry on studying more trades...long term unemployment has long since set in.

 

[Munkul]

I dunno, that's a pretty negative outlook. Training only takes you so far, and I'm a big fan of formal training, but at some point you just have to start from the bottom.

There's plenty of work out there, but welding is pretty easy... Its the graft that goes along with it that's hard.
"everyone wants to be a welder until it's time to do welder sh*t" and that "sh*t" can be anything other than welding.

As a hirer, i look for attitude before skillset. We've had kids here on work placements, some are interested, some aren't. One kid came eager to work. Any task we gave him, even crap jobs like painting, he applied himself with enthusiasm and effort.
Guess who I hired...

 

[Erie Fred]

After all my efforts it's doubtful an oportunity to further develop to my skills as a welder is ever going to happen. I have since been back to college and now have Level 3 in Light Vehicle Maintenance and Repair.
Start Level 2 in Mechanical Engineering in September next followed by Level 3.
If I can't find an employer wiling to take me seriously I just go back to college and carry on studying more trades...long term unemployment has long since set in.

...and then you can be a teacher at said colleges.....

 

[Tinbasherdan]

...and then you can be a teacher at said colleges.....

for once, worryingly, I agree with you. I’ve been teaching in tech colleges for a while and whilst there are some good lecturers with lots of experience, I’ve also seen academics banged through a course to allow them to teach the level below due to staffing numbers being poor. I often got drafted in on a night school to drag them out of a hole they had found themselves in

 

[8ob]

I'm a big fan of formal training, but at some point you just have to start from the bottom.
There's plenty of work out there, but welding is pretty easy... Its the graft that goes along with it that's hard.
"everyone wants to be a welder until it's time to do welder sh*t" and that "sh*t" can be anything other than welding.

Nowadays its all back to front, in years gone by you would have been in an apprenticeship or working as an improver ( eg pipe fitter welder/fabby welder) and welding would have been a part of your training, when good enough you would be assessed and ticketed (coding was an assessment not a course). You were good at what you did by the time you got your tickets. The way the courses and tickets are dished out now you get way to many clueless but "qualified" guys hitting the scene and being sent to the back of the queue to start again.

Bob

 

[Tinbasherdan]

Nowadays its all back to front, in years gone by you would have been in an apprenticeship or working as an improver ( eg pipe fitter welder/fabby welder) and welding would have been a part of your training, when good enough you would be assessed and ticketed (coding was an assessment not a course). You were good at what you did by the time you got your tickets. The way the courses and tickets are dished out now you get way to many clueless but "qualified" guys hitting the scene and being sent to the back of the queue to start again.

Bob

The way the government judges colleges, they can’t afford to let students fail…….. read into that what you will

 

[Munkul]

I think it's because a lot of companies can't be bothered with decent apprenticeship schemes. It's a lot of hassle to be honest, especially when you take on more than one each year, and some of those kids are regrettably useless.

Some big companies still have good schemes. Bendalls in Carlisle have just opened a new welding school specifically to prioritise teaching their own people. My old company still take on a handful each year, and thats a proper decent allrounder mech fitting/fab/electrical apprenticeship.

 

[Erie Fred]

Getting a degree or a certificate is just a license to learn.

Unfortunately as of late some of the young Indian & chinese engineers I must work with have an
attitude that "I've worked very hard in school, they have taught me all I need to know".
As I am not a degreed engineer, they look down upon me.

I took one chinese engineer under my wing a wee bit the other day, and instead of simply tossing a drawing back at her for revisions,
as she produced a drawing with no tolerances at all to start with.

When I asked her to add tolerancing, she came back much too fast with +/-.030, which I knew was too loose.....

I walked her thru a conversation dealing with "now how will this part fit up to this part ?"
After our teaching moment, the light went on (LED that is) and the next day she showed some math, and revised it to +/- .008 .,....

Getting them to do a simple pen & paper tolerance stack up (without offending them) is like pulling teeth.

38 years ago when I started, the engineering manager would have publically embarassed them in a large monthly meeting where they used to present their work in front of the whole engineering staff.
"Shut up, sit down, and let me show you the numbers, I ran them last night",
was common from the boss.....

 

[addjunkie]

Getting a degree or a certificate is just a license to learn.

Unfortunately as of late some of the young Indian & chinese engineers I must work with have an
attitude that "I've worked very hard in school, they have taught me all I need to know".
As I am not a degreed engineer, they look down upon me.

I took one chinese engineer under my wing a wee bit the other day, and instead of simply tossing a drawing back at her for revisions,
as she produced a drawing with no tolerances at all to start with.

When I asked her to add tolerancing, she came back much too fast with +/-.030, which I knew was too loose.....

I walked her thru a conversation dealing with "now how will this part fit up to this part ?"
After our teaching moment, the light went on (LED that is) and the next day she showed some math, and revised it to +/- .008 .,....

Getting them to do a simple pen & paper tolerance stack up (without offending them) is like pulling teeth.

38 years ago when I started, the engineering manager would have publically embarassed them in a large monthly meeting where they used to present their work in front of the whole engineering staff.
"Shut up, sit down, and let me show you the numbers, I ran them last night",
was common from the boss.....

Firstly I dont think the nationality makes any difference, having worked with many nationalities over the years…its just the Im young, educated and know everything attitude. You were probably similar when you were young. I know I was. Then gradually you learn, or most of us do as our careers progress.

The public embarrassment in management meetings is now called bullying and though it may work to refocus some, I suspect proper coaching and quiet respectful guidance is far more successful. Suggesting to one of the high flying graduates that they wasted 3 years at university as it certainly wasn't engineering they studied can be a bit awkward when the come back as your boss a few years later. It can be difficult, I can assure you, though she laughed about it later.j

 

[Erie Fred]

Firstly I dont think the nationality makes any difference, having worked with many nationalities over the years…its just the Im young, educated and know everything attitude. You were probably similar when you were young. I know I was. Then gradually you learn, or most of us do as our careers progress.

The public embarrassment in management meetings is now called bullying and though it may work to refocus some, I suspect proper coaching and quiet respectful guidance is far more successful. Suggesting to one of the high flying graduates that they wasted 3 years at university as it certainly wasn't engineering they studied can be a bit awkward when the come back as your boss a few years later. It can be difficult, I can assure you, though she laughed about it later.j

Uhm no, I was a machinist apprentice turned drafter, working with engineers.
Never did I take an uppity attitude. The nice engineers took me under their wings, and taught me much.
for that I am eternally gratefull.

as far as the bullying, when you go in front of senior engineers, you need to show your work for all to critique, and they did not.
They tried to bluff the engineering manager, who came up thru the ranks many years before, unlike today's management.
The damn thing has to work at the end of the day, period.

 

[500e]

"The damn thing has to work at the end of the day, period." Had to look correct as well.

 

[Jelly_Sheffield]

Firstly I dont think the nationality makes any difference, having worked with many nationalities over the years…

Cultural differences are very much a real issue in working globally, although it's not that any nationality is "wrong" or "worse" just that companies don't put resources into highlighting and mitigating for situations where staff are going to have wildly different expectations or ways of doing things... Until it's already become a huge problem.

In my experience the behaviour mentioned by @Erie Fred is particularly common with Indian graduates who don't have a lot of exposure to international working cultures and norms.

And it's linked directly to a very hierarchical management culture in India, that ultimately has its roots in their class system.

You see the same (with more conciliatory, less entitled language) from some Latin Americans, because they have a very rigid idea of chain of command.

I'm more surprised that Chinese engineers are behaving that way, as my experience there is that even people in seniority will tend to follow the more general S.E. Asian trend of being deferential and conciliatory to a fault, making it hard to get straight answers for fear of offence.

But then again, they might react emotionally to recieving direct criticism, as [once one is no longer a child] that is reserved for the most severe situations, so it comes across as either infantalising or excessively harsh.

its just the Im young, educated and know everything attitude.

There's always a bit of that, with young people...

But when talking about graduates, those people aren't good hires.

Smart people with degrees are easy to find these days, people with good communication and team working skills are still rare.

There's a great quote from a speech given to a bunch of ChemEng students by a VP from Dow:

"Every year during hiring I meet with a selection of young people who honestly believe their academic knowledge and ability to earn a top ranked degree entitles them to a well paid job...

They are bitterly disappointed to discover that in the real world no one wants them.

Because what they fail to understand is that THIS IS A PEOPLE BUSINESS.

Engineering is a team sport played by thousands of people co-operating to do a bit better than the day before and to avoid the other team getting the drop on them."

You were probably similar when you were young. I know I was.

From my own experience I knew enough as a wet behind the ears 18 year old to recognise that in a shop floor environment, even when I did know better, lauding my book knowledge over others would rapidly make the whole team think I was a [rude word for a lady's bits], and stop helping me.

That was a hard place to work with some toxic (and some great) supervisors, and I learned a lot from my colleagues about human relationships and how to "play the game" of workplace politics enough not to make enemies or get used as a scapegoat by management.

Looking back at my career, coming back to industry after Uni with that experience of being on the shop floor, seems like it gave me a 4-5 year career head start over the other graduates I joined with.

Suggesting to one of the high flying graduates that they wasted 3 years at university as it certainly wasn't engineering they studied can be a bit awkward when the come back as your boss a few years later. It can be difficult, I can assure you, though she laughed about it later.

Ooooph!

That said, the fact she both did come back as a manager, and could laugh about it, suggests that she was actually able to take the important bit of the message on board and grow as a professional.

Words to the effect of what you said is the first thing I would (more gently) tell new grad scheme entrants on their first day...

And having seen the other side as a visiting lecturer at a couple of different uni's it's very obvious that most existing curriculums don't prepare young engineers with the non-technical transferable skills to deliver projects in the real world.

 

[addjunkie]

And having seen the other side as a visiting lecturer at a couple of different uni's it's very obvious that most existing curriculums don't prepare young engineers with the non-technical transferable skills to deliver projects in the real world.

I worked for an oil company, and the graduate direct hires were hired from uni and they attended like an induction/ orientation few weeks ( promised the world if they sold their soul). They were then cast across the company on a 3 year scheme. A year on each assignment. Offshore they were given to us to play with and introduce them to the real world. Some flew others foundered. It wasnt till years later and I was a bit higher up the pecking order that I learned there were really two schemes. The 3 year to then be an office based engineer type…slow progress. And the 10 year fast track ear marked for stardom scheme. One or two of the better ones really stood out, just how quickly they grasped just about everything including dealing with people.

Big engineering is about getting an eclectic selection of various skills to interact as a team, not always easy. Because almost every engineer always knows best!