Training...Who, What and Where

[jstolaruk]

Regarding your last post......theres not a lot of love between us and them and hasn't been for a couple of years.

You may want to consider wiping the slate clean and starting anew. Because you will need them someday, even if you do decide to avoid using any AB products its sometimes difficult not to use one of their unique offerings. And you want to do the best job for your customer, right?

 

[Steve Bailey]

You do not have to purchase your AB products from the distributor in whose "territory" you happen to find yourself. If you don't like something about the local person, get in touch with a different distributor.

 

[WildeKurt]

I quite often order stuff from a distributor out of town (my 'home' distributor like Englewood Electric) when I'm on the road due to the level of service I get and the availablility of parts. I've found many local distributors carry very little of what I need in terms of automation parts.

 

[Plastic]

I was pretty grumpy when I posted what Plastic cited, and I removed; please forgive my foul mood.

I have provided service, training, and emergency parts for my Rockwell Automation customers for a over a decade, but you could certainly find a few with a low opinion of my effort and attention. It's probably a mutual feeling.

If you think you're going to get good local support from a distributor who is hungry for your business and you don't have a history with, by all means go for it.

See if the training coordinator will give you a couple of names of former students who you can ask about their training success.

Mr. Roach,
Please accept my apology.

My intent here is not to bad-mouth Allen Bradley, or certainly not target you. I merely used your quote, agreeing with the comment about a distributor in Michigan being “hungry”.

We have had NOTHING but SUPERIOR experiences with Allen-Bradley / Rockwell Automation products, services, support, and support from AB distributors all over the country.

We have been installing Allen-Bradley products since 1979, and installing control systems sing early 1980’s (PLC 2-30). We were AB Authorized Systems Integrator in the 90’s. I personally have specified, designed, programmed and commissioned, at least 500 programmable controller projects, from simple Micrologix, to Manufacturing Cells with up to 1,000 I/O.

I have moved on, and am now with a smaller Automation provider. Our customers are not as ingrained, and loyal to AB, so they are dictating what controls we supply. We certainly will provide what ever the customer requests us to provide. We are learning all kinds of new stuff.

My work day consist of supporting multiple projects. We are still 97% AB Compact Logix, Control Logix, MicroLogix, FactoryTalk ME, PanelView Plus. But we are also 3% “whatever the customer wants”.

I don’t have any tattoos, but the AB Quality Octagon is etched in my brain. Rockwell Automation hardware products are ROCK-SOLID. We have probably had less than 0.1% product failures.

There are a lot of people grumbling about the price of software. But honestly, I think the Tool-Kit is a Kool thing. My laptop is always current with product that we will be buying “off-the-shelf”.

My opine is that this is wide open market, and I wish Rockwell Automation thrives and prospers. The survival of AB is as important to me as the survival of GM. (Michigan Blood speaking).

Plastic