I am a nationally certified (NOCTI) Electromechanical Engineer that got chewed up and spit out after working non-union jobs in industry as a maintenance technician for a couple years as a young 'n dumb kid right out of school. I have kept my skills sharp enough to wire up my own offgrid solar DC systems, remember enough theory to do calculations and read schematics. I enjoy the feelings of satisfaction and capability that comes from sucessfully putting together a good wired system.
But im kind of scared to get back into the career field knowing how dangerous it can be and how little money I was paid before. On one hand I feel like I could use my highly technical skills to make good money but on another every company i’ve ever worked fucked me over with promised training that never happened and severely understaffed stressed out teams who didn’t have the time or energy to spend training a newbie.
I assume its like this everywhere, but I guess im trying to ask if theres still any places left in this country (US) or hell even the world that will treat me right and not understaffed to hell. What is contracting work like and should I try to get into an electricians union? I really don’t know if I want to get back into this career field and I don’t know if I want to commit to a 2 year apprenticeship contract.
Also Im kind of an environment guy who cares about clean energy and would love to be helping out the planet a little through my work so ideally I would like a solar or wind gig. But I hate high places. I know beggars can’t be choosers but as a fantasy I could see it would be sweet to work on a ground level solar array out in the desert.
Im pretty good with computers and IT, I use linux daily, can ssh into a public server, have set up some local services on my own network. A lot of the older guys have appreciated my help navigating companies old poorly organized intranets for schematic scans and work orders.
I am single and willing to relocate.
Electromechanical with certs, good with tech? You gotta get away from “technician” roles if you want to stop being shit on.
Seems like industrial automation would be up your alley. A lot better chances to find a decent salaried position where you won’t be abused. Tons of room to stretch technically and career-wide, good application of mechanical/dynamics and required electrical along with digital computer controls.
However, downside is you’ll likely end up in a manufacturing role, where on-call work when a production line is down will be mandatory. And it’s not exactly clean energy, if anything manufacturing will always be a polluter.
I agree with this commenter. To further make yourself an appealing candidate learn the basics of ladder logic and PLCs.
I have programmed PLCs with ladder logic before specifically allan-bradley SLC 500 and still have my certs for it. In industrial work we would keep a cleanly programmed plc on hand and reflash the program onto a malfunctioning PLC as needed. Sometimes I would pay attention to the input-output lights and look at the ladder logic schematics to troubleshoot a faulty sensor. Is it a big deal to know how to work with PLCs? Should I market that skill a little more in my resume?
It’s certainly worth mentioning, especially if you’re talking about industrial automation.
I’m a welding engineer and in 10 years of working in automotive manufacturing all of the controls engineers I worked with were electrical engineers who did basically ladder logic on PLCs all day every day. PLCs and ladder logic are the back bone of pretty much all industrial automation, of which the automotive world uses extensively
Thank you very much this advice helps a lot.