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hi sorry to butt in guys, but how are you supposed to learn how to work with gas if you are not allowed to work with gas, all these gorgi guys are going to retire eventually, who will do the work then...????????????
hi sorry to butt in guys, but how are you supposed to learn how to work with gas if you are not allowed to work with gas, all these gorgi guys are going to retire eventually, who will do the work then...????????????
you can sit your ACS if you have experience of working with a registered gasinstaller(RGI). Thats hard to get but so it should be, the prefered option by the industry and the people you will be doing work for is a apprenticeship, either for school leavers or adults.
Do most plumbers not go as far as gas qualifications? ive been looking into becoming a plumber and i have decided not to get gas qualified immediatley... for 1, i think working with gas cannot be learned well on a fast track and 2, its bloody expensive to train. Im going to get the lower certificates and work for a year or 2 before attempting the gas side of things..
Hmm!
Some old chestnuts bubbling away here!
Gas fitters where until about the 1970's regarded as part of Plumbing and still are. But they where thought of as semi skilled by some, simply because they could not usually do the full range of a Plumbers job. Whereas a Plumber was expected to be able to do the full range of a gas fitters job.
The reason they seem to be two separate trades now, is because of the old British Gas company. They moved into the domestic central heating market and demanded that their gas fitters start fitting central heating. It was a marketing ploy not a skills move that separated the two. On one site we where pretty "pally" with BG guys and some of the lads would go down to a neighbouring site in their dinner hour and help the BG gas fitters by telling them how to do the central heating. I must admit I suppose a few pints where part of the bargain.
Anybody looking into the history of BG will probably find the reasons why the domestic heating industry is like it is now. They virtually dominated the whole domestic heating market and dictated to it.
I suppose you could say its a bit like the ceiling fixer and the joiner. The joiner installed suspended ceilings but it became a market on its own so some joinery company's started to specialise in ceiling fixing. You could go on, a brickie and a plumber both learn drainage but its usually specialist drain layers who now do most of the work.
I have worked on site's where the company I was working for has been doing the plumbing and another the central heating, gone to another site where, we where doing the central heating and the other company the plumbing.
Its the same with roof work and flashings.
However the Plumber has to learn, drainage, central heating, gas fitting and possible basic electrical. In Scotland Plumbers wired the houses out as they protested when electricity first came out that the electricians where pinching their gas installation work.
Incidentally the original central heating engineers went to a property usually large properties, measured up and then went back to their factory and made the rads and pipes usually by casting them in iron.
That is why they are called engineers and not pipe fitters.
The Plumber also did the fitting of the rads and pipes, but not the engineering.
Now as I explained the gas fitter/plumber/central heating engineer all do it.
And we have not even mentioned glazing yet!!!
Lets be honest, its all about earning a crust and what you think you can do to earn one and interest of course.
All this inter trade war and perhaps qualification snobbery is just silly.
If you go on a course all you learn is what somebody else has found out. The British Standards change nearly every year because they find new things out all the time. The ACS is done every five years because technology changes. So I don't suppose anybody can say they know it all.
Hmm!
Gas fitting is part of Plumbing and always has been. Contrary to what people may say it is not a specialist trade at all. The gas fitters started doing domestic central heating not the other way around. The Plumber was installing central heating virtually soon after its invention and a supply of heating component parts where readily available on the market.
The term "central heating engineer" refers to the time when an engineer would have to measure up a job and then go back and cast the parts in iron at the foundry hence the "engineer" and not just heating fitter.
Obviously a Plumber could not make the parts, but shared the same technology and had a bit more specialised Plumbing technology as well. However when parts became freely available the Plumber started to do central heating usually biased more to the standardised parts for domestic heating market than the commercial/industrial both of which sides as well as domestic I have worked on with other Plumbers.
In modern times the "central heating engineer" is usually associated as being the person who does commercial/industrial and only a bit of domestic heating work, the rest of the domestic work is usually done by a Plumber or sometimes specialist heating only company's.
The confusion comes from BG wanting to expand into all kinds of new markets and don't forget their heating engineers fix washing machines and dishwashers as well. I suppose their gas fitters could be called multi skilled.
The reality is everybody is looking toward what ever they can do to earn a crust. The idea you can stick to just one specialist trade is now out dated. That is partly why it all needs opening up.
Competence has a deffinition: Someone who has relevant training, qualification and experience. This is usually something tested in court. The gas industry use ACS is proof of competence. This is relied upon because of the systems in place are overseen by UKAS for approved ACS centres carrying out the assessments. This makes it much easier in court, because most people who have not done ACS and stand in the dock, have not got a chance, why are they there in the first place? This could include DIY fitting. So if your a DIY person and you have not gone through ACS, then if the gas work goes badly wrong you will have big problems defending your actions in court.
May be? Case in Norwich recently, involving retired plumber with no registration and no ACS, was prosecuted.
No He was a plumber all his life, but did not hold ACS. ("I've been doing this all my life why should I have some jumped up regulators tell me how to do my job") Typical attitude of someone who thinks, they know it all and can't be taught anything, or someone who has been crap at the job all there life and is frigthened of being exposed?
Competence? will normaly only be tested in court.
If you have passed ACS, you've prooved competance.
Reply to the thread, titled "DIY Gas Fitting" which is posted in DIY Plumbing Advice on Plumbers Forums.
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