Safety Qualifications

electrical engineer by education (degree from a foreign University) . That and the fact that you havn't electrocuted yourself yet would be fine by me.

My opinion of certificates is that they prove nothong and provide little intrisic insulation!

I've met plenty of qualified people whe were incompitent and plenty of unqualified people who were. (also vice versa).

I have a ton of certifications, since I work in Nuclear. None of them take the place of good old common sense. Since you have a degree, then you get the theory. Be careful, take your time, and know when you have reached the limit of your understanding.

Now, as far as protecting yourself from liability, thats another matter.

If you feel you can do it, then go for it.

Excellent post ... You get my vote.

'and know when you have reached the limit of your understanding.'

Yeh that is soooo true, that's what separates the quick from the dead!

( And I'm down to live #5 already )

Del

Perhaps, what u need now is not really only the academic qualification but experience qualification. academics can only give u the fundament but not the real industrial safety required. there/4 for the first few practical exp. get an exprience engineer on industrial sfety / troubleshooting to take u through even if u still want paper qualification.

Steps in safety:

1. savety to yourself (troubleshooter)

2. safety to the user

3. safety to the equipment

4. safety to the machine

goodluck

I've got a liability insurance, now I guess I have to talk to an electrician with an industrial field experience.

From what I know now, the maintenance staff have to wear a special 600 volts safety equipment which include fireproof clothing including dicky, flash proof faceshield with incorporated hard hat and finally high voltage gloves to approach a live circuit. I cannot really imagine an effective troubleshooting in such an armor.

I know common sense plus my 30-something years of experience in dealing with electricity should suffice, but I'm well aware that although I was on occasions zapped by 30kV (CRT) 600V poses much more serious threat.

So there are two sides to the story: -one if they let me work on the equipment without formal credentials/certification;

-second to know what are the practical aspects of such an environment that I should know of for my personal safety and safety of others and the equipment.
If you could further share your thoughts/experience I would appreciate that v.much

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For all electrical repairs/installations, it is illegal to work on live circuits unless the electrician is certified by the governing body (main electricity company) to do work on the live circuit! You can isolate as an electrician all LV suppliers (depending on local codes of course, you may have to notify the local electrical supplier first)The heavy duty equipment is to remove the main fuses,(remembering to open the smaller circuits first) do the lock out and then check to see if it is all off and grounded! After that, you are free to do your work!(even when it is all isolated, test, test, test!) I would check your insurance to see if your policy covers you for live wire work!( bet it doesn't!)

As stated above( or below) Do what you know and don't be affraid to ask for advice, it is free and far cheaper than replacing a whole panel!

That's just bonkers...

I used to work on production test years ago, scopes, monitors , all sorts, plenty of voltages higher than 600v ... only safety equipment was for handling CRTs.

Mind I did get a 2kv belt off a power supply test rig that the designer had just built.... 2 terminals labelled 6.3v ac !!! Shame he neglected to mention the 6.3v was on top of 2kv.... I was not ammused and immediately built a safety shutter over terminals and relabelled it!

What sort of equipment is 600vac?

most industrial stuff is 480 3 phase, the components are rated for 600 volts, 1phase to ground is 260 volts, between the phases is 480.

normal precautions apply, not any different than 240

Trouble shooting & doing actual live repairs are different things.

lock-out tag-out, is sufficent.

your level of comfort, is determined by the quality of the designs you will be working on. if things are strange such as multiple power sources in the same panel, no proper disconnects, lack of documentation [prints], lots of casual [no documentation] modifications.

use your meter, protect yourself. In the past electricans would lick a finger & take a quick swipe to see if a circuit was hot!

Maybe things are different in canada. Gloves when testing live, is plenty for me.

The back wall of the H R Live concert venue has four 600VAC tie-in's and very unexperianced people, learning live production work there, everyday. Watch where you set your drink, please, sir.

We used to frown on letting new people use the T-bar with the rubber tape all over it down at the local theater.

Used the same T-bar system, at the carnival, for hundreds, if not thousands of live hook-ups to Cat Power. (I did launch an ameter when I sneezed, once. Flew at least 400 feet off the roof when 400A Delta Power hit it; must have been the bond).

I think the cool calm of connecting these systems in the rain, is something one has to experiance for themselves. Nothing quite as energizing. No test will prepare you for the day you make your first hook-up without dying.

After proper training, all I do now is start trouble by insisting we replace the dangerouse systems with approved gear. It doesn't work, though, because there is nobody to force the venues or the rental companies to bring enough proper gear to the show or throw out the garbage as it's found. Then, if I won't perform the stunt, I not only get replaced as a trouble making trend setter, trying to set a new standard; but the gear gets fixed and I am no longer needed, as the children can now work without risk of danger and under the conditions required, as per the new training course and testing.

Looks to me the only reason is to start a fight and replace the people who have been performing without any required cert.

I agree; no certification can prove your reliability to take such risks. Why then, is everyone so eager to enforce these regulations, via technical safety courses when real world situations continue to be in use?

Shouldn't the companies who force these situations on the working person be forced to meet these standards of safety at a level they actually control, before we need to proof every single person who might come in contact with such a situation?

It seems the people who take these risks for decades may not test well or don't feel they need to prove to any new comers they have been perfoming quite fine, without any clear standards. All because of budget restraints by bean counters, not ignorance of the latest safety systems, I assure you. There is a certain freedom from liability for the group who allows these poor standards, intentionally. How many "regulators" would walk the steel at 250 feet and pull the rope in the wind storm, with live voltage in the grid or the cable tied to the wet rope?

Not to sound apithetic, but doesn't the sound of being forced to learn about OSHA and "Best Practices" and having to test to a level of compitence; actually become a show stopper when the deal is set and the show must go on and someone who knows better MUST perform out of ethical standards, to make it actually happen?

Who wants to hire such a stickler to regulations, in a budget orientated situation or when we all know you cannot work with all those gloves and masks and aprons on, at 65 feet above the floor in an automation rig; while hanging from a safety belt?

Not the producers I have worked for.

Maybe we need to remove the steel fuse boxes from the walls and improve the obvious location of the circuit brakers by distributing them at every connector, first? That will never be required though, will it? I know, I tried to get out of the biz selling the worlds safest electrical connector. Guess what? No one wanted anything, that good. It wasn't good for business for the guys whos technology was eclipsed. It still isn't, today; ten years later.

Ever see three fase, flat stamped baryllium copper blades in a water tight aluminum rotory casing, with "non-defeatable sequential circuitry" and a local braker, in line, with LED power eye?

You won't, either. It won't help to go to school, you still cannot have one.

Every single show we power requires at least one live hook up, in one of the main theaters we have worked for years. Many outdoor shows equate to the same conditions because of water, wet connectors and soaked or cracked 10 year old cables. It doesn't take a degree to know everyone can die if the gear is bad or a hand is shaky in the live box. They can get a scrape every day we use them for portable power.

The simple fact is, the educators who would have us believe the ONLY solution is education in the classroom, are self serving thier imperical desire to form every single event into a "known" formula", where nothing is out of the ordinary.

If only the world's problems can be forced to go away by competency testing... Then all the crap gear will disappear and the gremlins will never riun the show? The manufacturers will magically stop producing gear we wish we had never seen, right? Our gifted specifiers will stop bringing crap to the show?

I think we should just do away with the people who are too smart to fall for this new age of super students and devised, self serving learning programs. Get rid of the lot of them old hands; so "proper fullsail trained students" can take over the biz. They have expensive aducation bills to pay off and no industry connection to let them in, do they? They will work for lots less, cuz they already have money for the $20 thousand dollar school. Why not ruin the careers of the current slogs taking up those jobs, by testing them on unreal circumstances, driving them crazy with proper situations which don't always present themselves? So they can be replaced, that's why.

I realize there should be accountability. How many of us have had to deal with less than perfect situations and made it happen for years, all without a single written test?

I like the line about common sense not being common.

Remember, when it used to be rock and roll? People died at the shows and they still had them anyways. It was just part of doing business then, and it will continue to be so in the future, whether we test every single person or not. No one likes the way it is, do they?

Until the allen-bolt, type clamping or binding connector is removed from the available electrical inventory and the out-dated "Edison" connector is replaced in every home in the US, and "certified" ground is officially required in every single location in the world requiring temporary power; we will still need a few people who aren't programmed to fight the conditions, in order to get the job done, won't we?

What's the point of driving a person to hate him or herself for lowering thier standards, every single day? Does it make someone feel better to know tested, certified personell are performing these illegal tasks, with proven perfomance records showing they have agreed NOT to do so, as basic competency?

Hendrix would have never made it. Neither would a bunch of the greatest people I have ever met in my entire life, in the years I have performed, uncertified. Joplin, The Beatles, they would have never made it. I know some folks who were there when it rained at Woodstock, keeping the generators running in the rain for days. They would have never gone for it.

How is it that the most wealthy people of the world, who control the largest sums of money, have less than a nineth grade education, for most of modern time?

You had electrician's gloves???? I only had thick rubber soles.

wOW

great real world stuff

I only worked in a few factories

I've sat in safety meetings where we were told you must do every repair power off, followed by graphs & charts explaining that downtime was up & we need to work faster.

It's an effort to remove the liability from mgt. if there's an accident, it's your own fault, since you weren't following the rules & you signed the paperwork saying you would.

Work safe, but spend less time doing it?

every boss looking over your shoulder, asking when will it run?

And how many of the management team went to the funeral?

None but they did send some lovely flowers

All of the safety equipment you mention is, of course, required. Here in Sacramento, at least the company I work for, certification is required for the power you describe.

Yes, the armor is worrisome and cumbersome, but you will get accustomed to it and find a way to succeed. Just maybe the armor will enable you to troubleshoot again in the future. Arc flash is no joking matter (I'm sure you know that).

I am required to wear all that stuff to work 480 3phase if I am working a hot circuit. If the circuit is locked out and verified safe the safety equipment is not required, after verification of safety.

Here are a few sites that might help or at least lead you in the right direction.

And do not lick your fingers first or stand in water that is what the helper is there for, your the one with the education, he is there to work.

http://repairfaq.ece.drexel.edu/sam/safety.htm

http://nnin.unm.edu/safety/Hi_Voltage_Safety.html

http://www.ehs.uci.edu/programs/safety/hvoltageprog.html

http://www-training.llnl.gov/training/hc/HVResearch/HighVoltage.html

http://www.elec.canterbury.ac.nz/resources/laboratories/high_v/safety.shtml

http://www.spellmanhv.com/tech/faq_detail.asp?id=2

joshua

and http://www.ul.com/industries/

joshua

thanks Josua for good links and all for their advice.
600V because it's Siemens and that's what they use.

I suggest you find out about high voltage switching, you get different institution that offeres training. according to what you say, 600vac 3 phase it's different ball game than 240vac

Kaztronics--

Lots of good replies on this one already, but one or two gaps and uncertainties get my input:

In the USA, the division point in the standard electrical codes is 600V and below, or over 600V. One reply asked why 600V instead of the 460V or 480V he knew about--well, 480V is the common one in the USA (and it was 440V a few decades ago), but 575V and a little higher is very common in Canada as well as a number of other places.

I suggest you contact the drive manufacturers for their class schedule on installation, programming, troubleshooting, and repairing drives. A certification from them, saying you are factory trained in the appropriate topic(s) will be good; an additional benefit is having some additional manuals, schematics, and information. When I was going into industrial control, I attended such classes from Toshiba (in Houston TX) and Baldor (in Fort Smith AR). They helped a lot.

Another post mentioned the requirement of government licensing before doing this type of work. In the USA, nearly all jurisdictions accept an EE type degree as proof of training and experience to allow you to take one of the master or journeyman electrician's licensing exams. I would hope that they would respect your degree even though it is from a university in another country; certainly it would not hurt to have a letter of recommendation from someone more closely tied to the traditional educational or training route.

These drives, particularly the larger ones, handle a lot of power, so protecting yourself from flash burns in case of an accidental grounding or shorting is important. However, much of your work doing repairs will be done after de-energization. Therefore, I suggest you invest in the very minor cost of proper lock-out and tag-out devices and cards, as well as even attendance in a class studying that topic. The manufacturers classes and manuals will give some basic warnings on these areas of safety, including how to ensure that the DC bus is dead.

As I tell others around me, BE SAFE.

Regards--John M.

thanks John M. for your input.

I think I'm in a quasi Catch 22 situation: my client that I do work 5-6 years as a free lancer (power supplies, small power modules, CNC displays etc.) is in a partnership with Siemens; so if I get a foot in the door and gain a contractor status, then certainly I can be certain of an access to Siemens training program. Otherwise I'm not sure if they want to talk to me, but if they do then this should help me to put the foot in the door.

I'm in preliminary stages of discussing it and want to gather as much information as I can. Thanks to all who contributed in in this process.

Kaz O.

As far as safety is concerned, Google "Arc Flash Safety Training".

Since you said drives (vs contactor) I presume that they are VFD/VSD drives. One common way to do that is to rectify the AC to DC, then use SCRs to take the DC back to AC at the specified frequency. BEWARE of the capacitors in the DC section!!! You will need to bleed them down (slowly!) to work on the equipment safely.

KilowattO, thanks, I just did it yesterday, a lot of info.

If everything plays out as I hope it will, I may call upon you gentelmen for some more specific info.
Thanks again to all for the prolific output.