Training/educational recommendations to be a better Tech

[ijustdunnoaname]

Maybe a bit off topic, but I want to be the best tech that I can be. I'm a licensed electrician and have been doing electrical work for all of my adult life. Since I've moved into tech work, I've taken two semesters of college PLC classes and am beginning a computer networking class this semester. I've also taken a company sponsored one week long HMI class.

I work full time and don't have the time to dedicate to a full-time education, but I wanted to get advice from the best of the best---What kind of additional training/education should I pursue?

 

[Travis Robinson]

Ron Beaufort PLC Bootcamp. You will learn more in a week than any other place bar none. How do I know? I am in a Hotel in South Carolina after my last day of Bootcamp. Best money my company has spent on training pereiod. There were 5 guys with me and each one would agree.

 

[iant]

Ron has been here many years and is well respected by all

 

[iraiam]

Home Lab?

I can say I learned a lot by building my own PLC Lab to test and program on, I do have some money tied up in it, but it was well worth it IMO, all the hardware is used so it's not as bad as it sounds

I have PLC 5 and CompactLogix racks to work on complete with discrete and analog I/O, all Ethernet capable, since I still have to support a large number of PLC5 setups. A used ControlLogix rack costs more than I could justify.

I also have a Cisco network lab that consists of several routers, layer 2 and 3 switches, it's largely obsolete hardware, but still runs the latest operating systems. One thing to note here, I keep to Manufacturing Networking I stay out of the Business IT stuff.

Last but not least, Process Control Engineers are big on calculus. I have run into Slope Intercepts, Linear and Non-Linear Interpolations, Exponentially Weighted Moving Averages, Low Pass algorithms, and numerous variations of all of these. I have a few calculus E-books for reference.

 

[MJC]

Iraim would you care to share some photos of how your system is done....I'm currently in the process of building some trainers...mine is going to be done on UHMW as backing for all the controllers.... I will post some photos asap

 

[iraiam]

I'll see if I can find some pictures, Currently it's just a stack of parts as I'm getting ready to drywall the room it's in. I should be able to snap a few pictures of my Cisco stack though. If I do find some pictures, be prepared to be very un-impressed, my lab has been called a dungeon PLC racks mounted to studs on an unfinished wall.