Wednesday 14 May 2014

More than Meets the Eye: The Work of an Electrician

As an electrician in Vancouver you often get asked about your trade. Does it pay well? Is it dangerous? Do you specialize in a certain area? Depending on the sector which employs them, an electrician or electrical worker may fill their days repairing fixtures and wiring or installing intercom systems and lighting. Basically anything in which volts, watts, circuit breakers, transformers or fuses play an essential role. Electricians are highly trained. It usually takes about four years to become qualified. The traditional method has been to serve as an apprentice, although now it’s becoming common to first attend a technical school.

Principles Duties

The principle duties of an electrician involve the maintenance and installation of complex electrical appliances and equipment. With a high degree of critical thinking they must be capable of diagnosing system malfunctions and employing correct procedures e.g. repairing or replacing faulty parts. They may be intimately involved in inspection, equipment-testing and future recommendations.

Behind the Scenes

Being an electrician in Vancouver, you realize that most of the electrical work in the city goes unnoticed by the majority of people. It happens in factories and businesses. Electricians and electrical engineers specialize in certain areas. They may focus intensively on installation or maintenance, design or application, often of specific types of mechanical and electrical systems. Every industry, from industrial production to media production employs its own specialized electrical engineers!

Independents

Of course these aren’t the electricians who normally come to your door when you have an outage. Normal commercial and residential electrical work is carried out by independent trade’s people and electrical companies. When someone needs an electrician in Vancouver to conduct panel upgrades, fixture installations, trouble shooting or repairs, they generally ring up one of their local independents. In a way, independent electricians are the face of the electrical industry. But there’s a lot going on behind that face.