F-gas certificate

[Crofter]

My crystal ball suggests that there will be a lot of f-gas cert engineers needed in the near future.

I'm toying with a career change but I'd be starting from scratch (I don't have any trade under my belt).

Is this a silly idea? I'm in my early 40s.

I've found places offering the course and they're a bit ambiguous about entry qualifications- it sounds like you could blag it if you had some relevant experience.

[nod]

Go for it 

 

Speaking to plumbers and gas fitters on site Hardly any know anything about HPs 

 

 

[SteamyTea]

55 minutes ago, nod said:

Speaking to plumbers and gas fitters on site Hardly any know anything about HPs 

But probably have a lot of opinion about what they cannot possibly work.

[Beelbeebub]

3 hours ago, SteamyTea said:

But probably have a lot of opinion about what they cannot possibly work.

Yeah local numbers merchants have one on display but warned me "unless you fit it to a new build you'll be cold" 

Edited October 3, 2023 by Beelbeebub

[JohnMo]

36 minutes ago, Beelbeebub said:

Yeah local numbers merchants have one on display but warned me "unless you fit it to a new build you'll be cold" 

But just a throw away statement, that just about meaningless. Without being matched to the heat loss calculation, that could be true for a new build or old build, equally it could be false for both.

[Beelbeebub]

1 hour ago, JohnMo said:

But just a throw away statement, that just about meaningless. Without being matched to the heat loss calculation, that could be true for a new build or old build, equally it could be false for both.

But indicative of thinking. 

 

The big advantage of gas is the installer doesn't have to think too hard about specifying it. 

 

Aside from huge houses pretty much any boiler will work. 

 

A 12kw boiler is about the smallest you can buy and that will do most houses. An 18 or 20+ will do all but the biggest or leakiest houses. If you over specify, they can turn down for the smaller property or just cycle more. If the rads are a bit too small or pipes too skinny just wack up the flow temp. The physical box is pretty much always the same size as the old one. 

 

So if you want an easy install with little chance of call back - gas boiler. 

Edited October 3, 2023 by Beelbeebub

[SteamyTea]

@Crofter

 

Do the F-Gas and learn how to size heat pumps, then you can sell a secondary service.

[SteamyTea]

1 hour ago, Beelbeebub said:

But indicative of thinking. 

We are a strange race of people in the UK.

We prefer manual cars because automatics are boring.

But hate the idea of having to change a heating setting or two, because it is difficult.

[BotusBuild]

@Crofter - I did a couple of years in renewables (a franchise business) several years ago (maybe too soon) and something I may go back to once my current job comes to an end. I had no prior experience, but did a HP course, an UFH course, a heat calc course, unvented hot water system course.

Was doing alright until the franchisor pulled the plug on us all 😞 

 

Go for it.

[TonyT]

Hi Crofter,

 

do you mind sharing the training provider details?

 

cheers

[SteamyTea]

28 minutes ago, BotusBuild said:

I had no prior experience, but did a HP course, an UFH course, a heat calc course, unvented hot water system course

I have a degree in renewable energy, I am still expected to do these sort of technicians courses.

Really does make one wonder what a science degree is for these days.

[JohnMo]

3 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

I have a degree in renewable energy, I am still expected to do these sort of technicians courses.

Really does make one wonder what a science degree is for these days.

Me also, left school did a 4 year apprenticeship, spent 12 years in RAF fixing jets, did a degree, spent life as a Mechanical Engineer, designing things way more complex than a domestic heating system, but don't qualify to enroll on heat pump design course to allow me to do MCS install.

 

We do live in a strange world.

[SteamyTea]

2 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

spent 12 years in RAF fixing jets

Friend of mine's brother did the same, but on helicopters.

Had to retrain, at his own expense, to work on civilian helicopters. They were often the same machines. Literally the same ones, bought off the MOD.

[Crofter]

10 hours ago, TonyT said:

Hi Crofter,

 

do you mind sharing the training provider details?

 

cheers

Can't find it now but it would have been on the first page of a Google search.

Courses cost around £900+VAT, 5d duration, and they recommend that you are working towards SVQ level 2 in refrigeration/AC engineering- which means you need to working in the industry already.

However they also say that you can sign up without these qualifications, if you can persuade them that you have relevant experience.

Could be a bit of a chicken and egg situation...

[Crofter]

11 hours ago, BotusBuild said:

@Crofter - I did a couple of years in renewables (a franchise business) several years ago (maybe too soon) and something I may go back to once my current job comes to an end. I had no prior experience, but did a HP course, an UFH course, a heat calc course, unvented hot water system course.

Was doing alright until the franchisor pulled the plug on us all 😞 

 

Go for it.

Sounds interesting! Did you go straight in to a classroom and start the courses, or did you get your hands dirty first?

[HughF]

My friend (m&e project manager on the embassy refurb teams) has just done his f-gas as he’s basically spending half the year doing daikin related stuff. He’s got an engineering degree but no other vocational training (nvq etc). 
 

If you get the c&g one, it doesn’t expire.

 

Only really required if you want to fit splits, or air/air… Monobloc air/water doesn’t require it, obvs.

Edited October 4, 2023 by HughF

[Dreadnaught]

I have a mono-bloc so no F-gas certification needed. I might guess without evidence that the majority of domestic installs are mono-blocs.

 

If you want a career in heat pumps, is F-gas certification really needed.  Could the Heat-Geeks course, or similar, be a better route in to the industry.

 

Utterly ignorant so I could be missing the mark. Just my tuppence worth.

[Beelbeebub]

I'm weighing up Fgas as I have a large number of retrofits to do. 

 

The industry does seem to be heading for monoblock, the primary advantage of which is no need for Fgas. 

 

The supposed other advantage is that it"plugs in" to our existing dominant heating system (wet radiators), but that is debatable as many retrofits (which will be the majority) also require changes to that system (bigger rads, pipes etc) 

 

I can see that going the air to air route whilst needing a complete system install (all new pipework, emitters etc) would allow for "overlaying" the HP system over the existing boiler & rads setup.

 

This has a couple of advantages 

- no disruption to existing heating hot water system, so can be installed in cold seasons 

- no need to wait until existing system needs replacement 

- no worries about new system being "insufficient" as old system is there as backup

- for combi systems no need to install a tank initially

- no worries about HP not being able to cope with cold snaps or being more expensive to run. 

- cooling in summer

 

Our current antipathy to air to air seems to be born from a British distrust of air-conditioning rather than anything else. 

[BotusBuild]

4 hours ago, Crofter said:

Did you go straight in to a classroom and start the courses, or did you get your hands dirty first?

It was mix. Heat calc stuff came first, then a bit of hands on with others, then classroom, then more involvement installing and commissioning

[BotusBuild]

To follow on from the above, IMHO, very few domestic heat pump installations on new builds will require a split system, most being the monobloc (closed) systems. I did have one about 10 years ago, but it was on a very large new build (7 bed, 5 bath, ~6,000 sq ft) and I had the manufacturer do the install.

[SteamyTea]

If you get F-Gas can you recharge car AC units?

[Crofter]

Fair point about whether f-gas is needed on most installations.

I'm probably being swayed by my own plans to install A2A. The more I've researched it, the more I like it. Seems a bit crazy that it's not more popular.

[HughF]

1 hour ago, Crofter said:

Fair point about whether f-gas is needed on most installations.

I'm probably being swayed by my own plans to install A2A. The more I've researched it, the more I like it. Seems a bit crazy that it's not more popular.

I tried to push my wife into having air-air but she wasn’t having any of it and wanted to stick with radiators…. I think she was put off with how noisy my cheap r290 mini split is at another property we stay at.

Edited October 4, 2023 by HughF

[TonyT]

13 hours ago, SteamyTea said:

If you get F-Gas can you recharge car AC units?

Don’t think you need f gas  certification for cars,

[HughF]

30 minutes ago, TonyT said:

Don’t think you need f gas  certification for cars,

Yeah, different set of regs iirc…