Been thinking about this for a while, occasionally I get to deal with PLC guy who used to work for Beckhoff and it looks good from the outside. Looks like an interesting area to get into.

Fill me in with the score.

Do you get to travel around a lot and meets lots of clients to spec for jobs? Good mix of out in the field and sat down coding? What are employers looking for? What’s the pay like? Opportunities to go freelance after a few years experience? What can I do to help myself get a job in this area? est search term for job sites?

I’ve got a little experience with modbus and a tiny amount with OPC, basic hobby level electronics, 17th edition wiring regs and I did a control systems module during my undergrad. Currently working as a developer.

I’ve been working with DCS systems for over 20 years. IMHO it’s a great move. There is a lot of work around at the moment, and you should find it easy to break into it. Salaried roles are typically c.30K Junior, c.45K senior, depending on experience. Contractor rates are typically c.30-50p/h, DOE and the industry sector.

The most typical way to start is to work for a small integrator, and basically eat s*** for 2-3 years, then go contracting. This is typically not a comfortable time (you will be thrown in at the deep end), but it gets you up the learning curve. You may me able to jump straight into a contract role, but it will probably be boring, and difficult to get good experience. A good agent is a massive help.

Where are you located? Drop me a mail of you want to discuss anything away from the forum.

Based on the south coast at the moment although willing to move. Partner is back in London after having to take a job there so that is a consideration.

I like the fact that it seems to span mechanical / electrical and some coding. What is the best way to tailor C.V e.t.c as I know half the battle with any job is learning how to get to the interview. Jobs add seem to be asking for people with E.E degrees but I know the bloke I worked with was originally a mechanic (race car) and managed to slowly move into it.

Anything worth reading up / studding or mini project worth doing to prove competence? This guy seems to do his coding in pascal and function blocks. Is that standard?

No, Pascal isn’t a commonly used language in automation. It’s far more common to use a proprietary language (Like S7 for Siemens) developed by the PLC Vendor.

You could taylor a cheeky CV which shows up in searches in Jobsite for PLC programmer, then start by doing the horrible jobs which no one wants to do? As places are busy at the moment, if they are flat out, the may take you on?

Can you pay for yourself to do a Rockwell / Siemens / DeltaV course? that might jump start your CV?

Hmm not keen on courses in general, private providers seem to take your money and give a very basic introduction. All the tutorial on line seem to only concentrate on ladder though. Hmm I’ll have a look around.

Looked more into this at lunch time. What are the most popular manufactures? I quite like the Beckhoff system from what I’ve read but are enough people using them?

Rockwell, Siemens, Emerson’s DeltaV are prob. the main players

Ok thanks. Been looking on ebay for some units to have a practice on and they are pretty expensive. I’ll have to look into alternative ways of learning.

Most modern systems allow you to run stuff in a PC as a ‘virtual’ controller, so you might not need any hardware, bar a laptop.

Thanks I’ll take a look.