Market for small PLC jobs?

I've been out of the controls field for a few years (moved to software engineering), but I'm itching to return and polish my skills.

In your experience, is there a market for independent consultants/contractors working part-time on small (and low-cost) automation projects?

I'm picturing a client, perhaps a museum, has a broken exhibit that they need someone to redo or retro fit where time is not critical and they would like to keep expenses low. Or a plant with some idea that they just don't have the resources to execute on.

I could form an LLC, obtain insurance, market, but I wanted to see if there is even a market for this stuff...curious about the experiences of others.

Thanks!

Depends on area and who you know, but there are plenty out there doing it like that.

Epy said:

Depends on area and who you know, but there are plenty out there doing it like that.

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What I've been seeing on the independent route is to get in with someone (company) and basically work as a sub-contractor on whatever contract work they get. This frees you up on trying to find jobs all the time and keeps a fairly consistent base line of income/projects.

I spent 5 years contracting in the rust belt and my experience was that the small/easy PLC jobs are handled by distributors and maintenance people, while the larger and more complex jobs are contracted out. You can find some smaller mom and pop style manufacturers that will contract out small jobs sometimes, but depending on your area it might be difficult to find constant work.

I appreciate the perspectives. I think there are a good number of small manufacturers in the Southeast US ... what's the best way to network/market to find possible small opportunities? Mailers, LinkedIn networking?

LoganB is correct. In the north west Pa and NY area there are few small jobs that are just controls. Often a machine rebuild will require a program rewrite and that is where the work is.
Also the small players are cheap and pay slow. Plastic molders are notorious for not paying.

I work for an instrumentation distributor. For years, the company lost business because they avoided projects requiring very modest integration skills because the design, fabrication and commissioning was not what we did. We sold boxes.

We now partner with a couple guys who are virtually single guy garage shop operations. They design, farm out the panels, and commission the
job. We sell the instruments.

Sometimes we'll bill the job if the customer "doesn't want another vendor" and pay our integrator, other times the integrator does the project on his own. Usually the end-customer buys the instruments and we bill directly for that portion.

It isn't necessarily just PLC programming. The customer buys instruments because he wants the data - so it's frequently as much HMI work as it is PLC work. The PLC is just 'front end' for getting instrument data into a form to get it into a database.

Some distributors went into distribution from a service background and they're not likely to need integration services, but those in the 'we sell boxes' category might well be looking for services deemed too insignificant for the big boys.

Partnership in a business structure like this is key for sustaining work.

Danw summed it up perfectly. I would also look at networking with other companies of similar size and structure.

Look at the skill set within your company and make friends with companies that supplement those skill sets to provide a more complete solution.

Look at doing joint ventures with other companies that require your specific skill set.

Networking , networking and more networking.

Good luck if you decide to take on this venture.

Nothing more satisfying than determining your future in your line of work.

A tip i would give you is get a good accountant, learn the basics but let them sort out legal aspects of reporting. That will allow you to focus on engineering and other commercial requirements within the business.

Jimbojones said:

I could form an LLC, obtain insurance, market, but I wanted to see if there is even a market for this stuff...curious about the experiences of others.

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The "obtain insurance" part is what will make the small job thing untenable. If you are fully truthful about what your LLC intends to do when speaking with insurance companies most will run the second you say PLC. My insurance is from a division of Lloyd's of London and the costs are significant. My renewals are on an annual basis, with the entirety of the years fees due immediately.

Your best bet is to find a local Rockwell (etc) distributor and get cozy with them. Most of our business was sourced that way because they already had a large network of customers looking to upgrade hardware in their plants. You do a lot of HMI changes and a lot of conversions from SLC to CLX. Distributors LOVE selling hardware and not having to do the programming because then they have little to no responsibility to support. They basically become the middle men.

If you can find a distributor that needs more options for contracting the programming work, I would recommend targeting them first. Not many plant supervisors will hire for something as important as a controls job by surfing around social media, they want to go to people they've known for a while, and their hardware distributor is usually the first stop. Marketing comes far far down the list from networking, as RheinhardtP said.

AutoMax said:

The "obtain insurance" part is what will make the small job thing untenable. If you are fully truthful about what your LLC intends to do when speaking with insurance companies most will run the second you say PLC. My insurance is from a division of Lloyd's of London and the costs are significant. My renewals are on an annual basis, with the entirety of the years fees due immediately.

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check out Hiscox, very reasonable. I specified "Control Systems Integration/Automation"

I would go talk to the local craft breweries. They often have small controls systems that need minor tweeks, improvements, and repairs. It seems like small breweries are everywhere now. Of course there are usually free beer benefits also. I think most of the owners are very reasonable down-to-earth people that just want to focus on the beer and have someone else deal with the equipment. Some of them even have small canning or bottling lines.

jstolaruk said:

check out Hiscox, very reasonable. I specified "Control Systems Integration/Automation"

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When I spoke to them a few years ago they couldn't seem to understand that I wasn't an "IT guy" and couldn't offer the coverage levels required by a few of my bigger customers. I was unaware that they now had a specific integrator's package and will check it out.

Thanks!

Why would you want to return to lower pay?

Warning!!!

jstolaruk said:

check out Hiscox, very reasonable. I specified "Control Systems Integration/Automation"

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I really can't say clear enough, you are at risk. You need to be careful and/or review with them. This is your business, you can't run the risk of not having insurance. I was with Hiscox for awhile, then found out (not in a hard way, but still aggravating non the less) they don't actually cover system integration. It was a hard lesson in insurance. Had to fight to get premiums refunded and etc. If I would have been sued, I would not have been covered - end of story. I'm very thankful nothing ever came up.

Ended up though with a broker out of Arizona who actually speaks control systems and system integration (a quick google and I'm sure you'll find Geri). We are with Lloyds of London now as well. General liability isn't the big one. Errors and Omissions is where you pay out the wazzu.

Anyway for what its worth.