| Author | Message | ||
     Bartimus |
My company, Tempurpedic, is looking for an Electrical Controls Technician, with Allen Bradley and Siemens step 7 experience. We have been interviewing many local candidates, but very few have controls experience, let alone any PLC experience. If you can troubleshoot electric controls, robotics, automated equipment, and Allen Bradley PLC's, we may have a job for you. The pay is between $20 - $25 an hour to start. Many benefits to working here. Free Tempurpedic mattress after your 90 days. Employee pricing on beds, decent benefit package, Medical, Dental, Vision. We have a fairly good maintenence team, the plant is heated in the winter, and air conditioned in the summer. Other perks are: great riding season, great riding roads throughout the state. A 10,000' mountain in your backyard with a road to the top that makes the Dragon look like a Lizard. We get cold weather, a little bit of snow, but otherwise decent weather. I'm just putting this out there because we have had absolutely NO luck finding skilled trades locally. The company will NOT pay to relocate you, and will NOT pay for you to come and interview. That is all on you. But... This could be for you if you have been looking to move to a WARMER climate, or less populated area. Albuquerque is the largest city in New Mexico, and it's not very big. Two major highways, I-40 and I-25 intersect here, and it is only 3 hours to Beulltiful Colorado! It would be nice to see another Buell in the parking lot!  PM me if you want more info. | ||
| Strokizator |
I don't know diddly about controls but does your company need a good mattress tester? | ||
| Bartimus |
No, that's what the night shift guys do | ||
| Prior |
Bart, I assume you're the anchor third shift guy? | ||
| Bartimus |
I wish! I'm the guy that has to interview all the woodchucks that think they know how to fix automated equipment.  | ||
| Rohorn |
Odd question - how bad is the PLC learning curve for someone with lots of old A-B NC controller (hand written G code) experience, C++ with microcontrollers (AVRs with Arduino IDE), some PID tuning experience with Omron units, and, yes, old H-P calculators in RPN? I'm not looking to move out of Denver (stuck to a mortgage), but jobs similar to mine that require PLC experience pop up around here as well. Used to live in Tularosa a while back - all my "rides of a lifetime" are in New Mexico. | ||
| Bartimus |
It's basic ladder logic. Not hard to grasp if you've worked with code before. The Allen Bradley stuff is pretty easy to learn, the Siemens stuff can be difficult though. Tule! Just a short ride up to Ruidosa and cloudcroft nice rides down there. If you know any control types up there, give them a holler. We have about a month to fill this position. | ||
| Pmjolly |
What type of applicants have you seen? I am not interested in relocating. I am just curious. I have basic PLC training on Allen Bradley. I'm a state licensed master electrician with 25 years experience here in Texas. | ||
| 99savage |
Good luck - They are rare indeed and when you do find one, he, it is always a he, will think he is a GD artiste & be wrapping his petticoats about him & stomping around all indignant at every perceived lack of respect for his great talents. Eventually he will get a better offer & flounce into the sunset. Wish the community colleges offered training - I would learn it just to avoid searching | ||
| Rohorn |
They are rare indeed and when you do find one, he, it is always a he, will think he is a GD artiste & be wrapping his petticoats about him & stomping around all indignant at every perceived lack of respect for his great talents. Sounds like too many middle managers/sales/engineers I've had to work with in the past. It is always the same companies looking for PLC techs here around Denver. Do they have a problem finding good techs or a problem keeping good techs? | ||
| Prior |
We have a heck of a hard time finding good technicians as well in the heavy equipment industry. Many can cover the basic hydraulic systems, diesel engines and electronics, but when it comes down to diagnosing machine based issues, they are lost. I'm certified on most of John Deere's construction equipment and am always amazed at the number of techs and even engineers that fail the diagnostics portion of our certification classes that I help teach. Theory is one thing, but putting it to practice is another thing all together and it's becoming a lost art. Swapnostics is the trend anymore. Bart, You're interviewing and examining these guys? What happened to the Bart that quit a job to go stomping around Utah with me and hang out with Jebabiah Bueller in Blanding UT? Have you finally grown up, a bit? Baby Bart | ||
| Mr_grumpy |
You need ME, Alex. I'm the best diagnostic technician I know, I can't be arsed with this replace the unit philosophy, that's why I gave up working in the motor trade. If it stops I need to know WHY & if if I spend x thousands replacing the faulty unit, is it going to blow again due to an external fault. Also, most of the time it's cheap little part that's knackered & you can't buy it separately unless you're a main dealer. I was trained to repair not replace! Nobody seems to do it any more not in cars, trucks, plant whatever. It's so wasteful. I'll get down off my hobby-horse now, but it's one of those things that makes steam come out of my ears.  | ||
| Bartimus |
Alex, I hope to NEVER grow up! That being said, I have calmed down some of my wandering ways due to my health. It's just not what it used to be, and also, it's hard finding like minded riders willing to go off on a long ride. I ride by myself most of the time, folks with commitments tend to stay closer to home, while I'm more into the all weekend kind of rides that require 600 mile days. As for work, I worked my way up through the ranks, apprenticing as an electrician, going to school when I worked at NASA to become an electronic tech, and finally going to college to get my EE. In many companies, you have people that are trained in ONE trade, a mechanic, or machinist, or an electrician, or an electronic tech, or PLC experience. More and more, companies want to hire people that have multiple skills, so nobody is a "specialist" but well rounded, and able to fix anything. Grumpy has a point, and i've seen it in many of the plants I've worked in. Some techs just can't troubleshoot. they just want to replace things until the problem goes away. Which doesn't resolve the problem until you find the root cause. In my trade, Electricians basically bend conduit, and pull wire. Some know more, many don't. To find one that can actually read a schematic, instead of a one line drawing is a big bonus. To find one that actually has experience plugging a laptop into a machine, and using ladder logic to troubleshoot to component level, is a real bonus. Alot of companies leave PLC's to Engineers, others expect their techs to learn it, and use it. The big downside to having all these skills is, companies don't want to pay for it. They want to pay you the same thing they are paying a mechanic or electrician. In fact, they are getting three trades in one, and should pay accordingly. IMHO $24 isn't enough pay for someone that is capable of diagnosing a gearbox problem, determining if a motor is bad, or if it's the VFD, or using ladder logic to determine if a sensor inside of a device has gone bad and is not sending the right signal. that's just my 2 cents on the pay subject. Savage, Ive seen what your talking about, but at times I feel it is justified. When you have a Mechanic, that at midnight, can fabricate a part on a mill or a lathe, to replace a broken part that is not in stock, that also can read schematics, and troubleshoot electrical controls to the component level, using all the tools the company provides, ie; DVM, Laptop, HMI's, etc. That individual is truly a multitalented tradesman, and deserves to be looked up to. They have taken the initiative to improve their skills to the level that they can basically do anything with nothing to keep the production line running. Now, if they only have one skillset, and they think they are a god... They are just morons, that have no clue OK, now let me hop down from my soapbox, I have some riding to do, out in the desert today. | ||
| Kenm123t |
Bart you should try heavy mechanical we have the same issues but we travel to more than one site and work on pnematic thru all of the modern hvac and machine languages. throw in the generators and it gets fun. You start with electrical folks I have to start with pipefitters and plumbers that are afraid of books much less electricity and computers | ||
| Oldog |
Good luck - They are rare indeed and when you do find one, he, it is always a he, will think he is a GD artiste & be wrapping his petticoats about him & stomping around all indignant at every perceived lack of respect for his great talents. Eventually he will get a better offer & flounce into the sunset. Nice........ } I should post pix of what my employer just finished, and what I built the controls for...  PLC Programming / control systems thats what I do for a living ( stomping off in a huff petticoats rustling ... )  }I have to start with pipefitters and plumbers that are afraid of books much less electricity and computers you are not looking in the right places .. several of the fitters I worked with here in NC and in AR, were quite savvy computer users, My room mate was drawing up a 3 d truck bed for a work truck as a learning experience... of course I saw several get run off as nearly useless......  Hey Bart enjoy the ride, (Message edited by Oldog on January 10, 2012) | ||
| Kenm123t |
thats why the union scum is gone useless the have no talent just want a protected check not a job just a check | ||
| Reepicheep |
AHHHHHHHHHH. (picturing Jim in Petticoats)  | ||
| Iamike |
It used to be fun to repair component level equipment but I haven't done that for several years. Now it's just 'change the board or radio out and send it in'. One of my co-workers was passed over for an engineer position that he was well qualified for. Then our manager asked him to train the new guy. My co-worker told him to "stuff it, if I don't qualify then why should I train him?" It was funny because yesterday we had a network problem that the engineer couldn't solve and after a little discussion my co-worker said he should tear down the channels that are acting up and rebuild them. It worked. We laughed about that later on. | ||
| Mr_grumpy |
I know that feeling Mike, I got asked to show a new guy the ropes & he trailed around with me for a week. He's now driving the truck & I'm on the dole, go figure. | ||
| Oldog |
you ok reepi? yeah budda in a dress .. eeeeeewwwwwwwuh | ||
| J2blue |
Bart, can you recommend any good primers on PLC? At my current job we have an aging group of PLC's used to control various solenoid devices via computer console located in a safe zone. The proprietary crap gets to be very expensive... if not impossible to interface with. In our case the company and their dongles no longer exists so if the dongle goes bad we lose one whole computer interface. And if that happens we would have to have an all new PLC control system designed and installed. | ||
| Oldog |
J2, look into citect scada easy to learn and supports a huge number of devices, not cheap, easy to use, and flexible. whos plc? (Message edited by oldog on January 11, 2012) | ||
| Bartimus |
Jody, what do you mean by "primers"? training? A good place to learn about PLC's is PLCS.net. If your asking about a system I would recommend to upgrade to, it would depend on what your company wants to spend. Allen Bradley is like the Cadillac of the PLC world, and is priced accordingly. Expensive. Direct Logic, is a fairly inexpensive copy of AB, that I've seen used in a few plants with good results. The Dongle is basically your license to use the product. You need to get away from those, although, I've seen companies keep a license on a thumb drive, and use it on multiple laptops, much like a dongle. With AB, if my laptop crashes, and everything is lost, all I have to do is contact them and they will re-issue my licenses. My Seimens software can just be reinstalled, and the existing license reused. Same with my TI software, machineworks. Another reason to go with a company that will be around for a long time, not a local fly by night company, good tech support! | ||
| J2blue |
Training, not explosives! Because of costs we'll probably have to nurse our system for a few more years. I'm not at liberty to say much about it publicly. | ||
| Bartimus |
Jody, check out plcs.net. Lots of good basic Plc stuff there as well as a good forum full of smart folks that can answer all your questions. Off topic, how's the riding lately? Getting some ride time in? Don't forget Springfast in may. Looking forward to some great rides this summer! Is there still a lake city ride planned by the Colorado buellers this year? |
