Heat transfer specialist Fulton has celebrated the 1000th trainee to undertake its Operator Routines & Maintenance course, just three and a half years after its introduction. The one-day course has been certified by City & Guilds.
The company also runs a complementary one-day course in Knowledge of Steam Systems, and has now added a third, in Water Treatment.
Fulton is a global manufacturer of steam, hydronic and thermal fluid heat transfer systems with manufacturing facilities in the US, UK and China.
The courses offer a mix of theoretical and practical operational assignments which Fulton claims bridge the gap between more expensive courses – those that can cost many thousands of pounds per employee – and straightforward “toolbox” training.
The Operator Routines & Maintenance course, which is designed for boiler operators, covers basic day-to-day operation and monitoring and provides employees with the knowledge required to monitor a boiler and ensure it is running efficiently and safely. It includes training in operational procedures, daily blowdowns, and checking of water levels, alarms, and so on. The course also examines the importance of correctly treated feedwater and what boiler inspectors will look for during routine insurance inspections.
City & Guilds certification adds value to the course and supports both the Safe Management of Industrial Steam and Hot water boilers Guidelines BG01 (SAFed) and INDG-436 (HSE) regarding operation and training.
Fulton customer services manager Jeff Byrne welcomed the 1,000th candidate as “a real milestone for the company”. He added: “We are delighted to have welcomed Muhammad Ateeb Farooq, our 1,000th trainee, who successfully completed the course and gained the City & Guilds certificate.”
The second course, Knowledge of Steam Systems, looks at the boiler system in depth, as well as auxiliary equipment including the steam and condensate loop. It is aimed at more experienced operators such as technicians and engineers.
The one-day Water Treatment training course is in line with guidance note document BG04. It is usually carried out on a client’s site for up to six people at a time. The course content includes: the reason for water treatment; pre-treatment methods; chemical treatment; total dissolved solids and blowdown; monitoring water treatment. It is intended to improve operational efficiency and management of cost as well as maintaining good steam quality, and the cost includes a water treatment site test kit.
Byrne said: “We have always promoted the benefits of operator training to our customers and we enjoy seeing technicians and engineers grow in confidence as they improve their knowledge. Training also proves invaluable to employers, as operators handle more of their own maintenance and repair and avoid call-outs to ‘boiler breakdowns’ that require no more than the simple flick of a switch to resolve. A Fulton one-day Operator Routines & Maintenance course could potentially save the cost of many expensive and unwanted engineers’ visits.”
As no two boiler facilities are the same, Fulton prefers to run courses at customers’ own sites so that technicians and engineers learn on the equipment they will be monitoring on a day-to-day basis. However, the in-house facility at Fulton’s Bristol headquarters can accommodate training for its range of electric, gas, oil or dual-fuel fired vertical and horizontal steam boiler systems.
0117 972 3322
jeff.byrne@fulton.co.uk
www.fulton.co.uk