Job Opportunity: Control Systems Engineer {final call}

Norton Consultants Pty Ltd is currently seeking to employ a Control Systems Engineer with LV Controls and DCS/PLC/SCADA system design and configuration experience to join our growing team. Based in our office in Melbourne, Australia, occasional travel to all corners of Australasia and parts of the Pacific region may be required.

The successful candidate should meet the following requirements:

  • Bachelor of Engineering degree (Electrical) and qualifications acceptable for Graduate entry to the Institution of Engineers, Australia (IEAust).
  • Minimum 2 years experience in an industrial environment.
  • Resident in, or hold permits to live and work in, Australia.
  • Be a self-motivated team player.
  • Be experienced with trouble-shooting, configuring and programming of DCS, PLC and SCADA hardware and software (CitectSCADA an advantage).
  • Have an above-average understanding of control system design strategies.
  • Able to design and trouble-shoot industrial communication systems.
  • Have a good working knowledge of low-voltage electrical control and distribution systems.

This position would ideally suit a Graduate Electrical Engineer with an interest in Aviation and Aircraft Refuelling systems, currently working for a major petrochemical or heavy industry company and wishing to expand his/her horizons across a variety of clients and industries both large and small. A salary package of up to A$75,000 will be negotiated with the successful candidate.

"It's not a job. It's an adventure." - Mark Walsh (this NG)

If you, or anyone you know, may be interested in this position, please send a brief resume and contact details to me at the address below.

Thanks and regards,

Cameron Dorrough Director

-------------------------- Norton Consultants Pty Ltd Email: cdorrough(at)rmna.com.au Web:

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Reply to
Cameron Dorrough
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I can (probably) do that

I doubt that you'll consider spraying Gel Coat at my Dad's fiberglass shop to count.

nope

Others may disagree with the 'team player' part, but sure!

What's 'SCADA' again?

I wrote the book (well at least _a_ book, and it won't hit the presses for another month so I can't say anything about favorable reviews).

I've written comm software for various 8-, 16- and 32-bit microcontrollers, does that count?

You probably mean in an industrial setting, not in a 4-box airborne imaging system, don't you?

That's _all_? No wonder you have to look so hard.

All in all I suspect I'm better qualified for designing PCS's and DCS's, with their accompanying auto-tune software, than I am for speccing industrial control systems. This has more to do with the fact that all my experience pertains to itty bitty clean things (well, except for the diesel speed control) than it does to any root knowledge, I'm sure.

But thanks for asking.

Geez I'm in a weird mood today...

Reply to
Tim Wescott

Hey, it is only a Graduate-type position. We can't afford to put on someone with 10-20 years experience at $100k+ salary and have them sit on their backside for 6-12 months making cups of coffee whilst we retrain them for stuff they've never done in their wildest dreams..

Tim, I suspect you are actually seriously over-qualified.

No problem. Thanks for the reply :-)

You certainly are! Take it from me - coffee probably won't help ;-)

Cameron:-)

Reply to
Cameron Dorrough

Hello Cameron,

A nice cold Coopers might :-)

Regards, Joerg

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Reply to
Joerg

Oops -- I got caught up in 'isms'. Over here 'graduate' is used in the context of 'graduate degree' (Master's or Doctorate), 'graduate student' (pursuing Master's or Doctorate). When one speaks of education level one usually says "Bachelors", "Masters" or "Doctorate". Apparently when you say 'graduate' you mean 'newly graduated'.

So I suppose US$55k/year maybe makes sense.

Are you going to send him off looking for a can of vacuum to charge a vacuum line, or do you leave that to your blue collar workers?

Reply to
Tim Wescott

...

That reminds me of the summer I hired on as an assistant maintenance mechanic at a construction site. When Boss man asked me to find a left-handed monkey wrench, I gave him one out of my tool box. He said that it looked right handed, I said, "Adjust it." It had a left-handed nut that I had filed out of bar stock. They didn't razz me after that.

Jerry

Reply to
Jerry Avins

Jerry Avins wrote in news:xfKdnTTciqXoEG snipped-for-privacy@rcn.net:

Food for thought-- they don't razz postal employees who say "I'm feeling a little funny today" either ;)

Reply to
Scott Seidman

Back when I worked a real job, we had a new-hire that got in a little tiff with the guys when they sent him for a belt stretcher. (Conveyor belt stretcher). He was so paranoid about getting joked he wouldn't believe this one was real.

Reply to
Steve Cothran

Thanks for the insight - I did not know that.

The general rule of thumb Down Under (according to the IEAust who have lots of rules and probably no thumbs ;-) is that 0-5 years after graduation from Uni (Bachelors, Masters, whatever) you are a 'Graduate' and after that you are... a 'Professional Engineer'. A scary thought for some.

If he can get me a cup of coffee first thing each morning, brewed just the way I like it, I might consider keeping him on. ;-)

Cameron:-)

Reply to
Cameron Dorrough

The first company that I worked for which actually tried to have a traceable documentation process had ECN* forms with a box marked "RESPONSIBLE ENGINEER" for me to sign. I always wanted to take my little red pen and put "IR" in front of "RESPONSIBLE".

  • We had ECO forms, too, but executing an ECO was to admit that it was under Manufacturing's control, and therefore was something that they should know how to fix -- so everything stayed under ECN control.

The ECN status was really intended as a fast way to get documents saved for prototypes, but since no one _ever_ got anything into ECO control they had problems with traceability -- so rather than just start using the process that was in place they fixed things by making the ECN process ever more byzantine.

Eventually we got some new management who kicked some butt, told Manufacturing that they couldn't call it done until it was under ECO control, told Engineering they had to actually finish things, and generally made things better.

Reply to
Tim Wescott

When I see ECNs and ECOs used in the design process I want to know what really kicks the chain of changes off. Often there is no clear indication in the paperwork that the required changes had any definite starting point, although I know there must have been one).

My own chain uses PRF's, CP's and WI's.

For any problem a PRF (problem report form) is raised - one problem per form. The PRF is reviewed and either elicits a simple response if the problem is trivial in nature (usually pointing out the page number of the manual where the relevent clear instructions are located) or are submitted for a CP (change proposal) to be generated. Once this CP has been reviewed and accepted it leads to the appropriate WIs (work instructions) being generated (these are equivalent to the ECN's I suppose). WIs have a sign off by the people doing the stated work and the whole changed product is again submitted to a final review. This final review may kick off another round of CPs if there are any remaining problems (in which case the review was not as final as everyone would have been hoping).

Reply to
Paul E. Bennett

I think the ECN/ECO system comes from the US military. The system is to have every part with a unique revision level. In the company that I worked at the rev level was numeric for parts under Engineering's control and alpha for parts under Manufacturing's control. Engineering Change Notices were for pre-production parts and could happen fairly easily -- the process was mostly informal, with the only signature required coming from the (ir)responsible engineer and the project manager. Engineering Change Orders were for parts in production; with a lot more people who cared about the changes, and making sure they got implemented, the ECO process required significantly more review.

Both the ECN and ECO would contain work instructions for dealing with down-rev parts, usually choosing one of 'just use up the old ones', 'modify the old ones this way' or 'trash the old ones and replace'. An ECO _could_ result from a problem report + change proposal, but the process behind the ECO's was always being tuned. Being cynical I never paid much attention to it, because I knew it would be different the next time I was called upon to redesign something.

Reply to
Tim Wescott

Hello Tim,

There is one more level commonly used in industry: The deviation. That is usually the easiest and quickest way to authorize a before-the-fact change with the least amount of bureaucracy. But one has to be very certain that it's all kosher. If it goes wrong then the Klieg lights will turn to one of the few signatories on the form.

Regards, Joerg

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Reply to
Joerg

Yes, forgot that. Best done with the knowledge and assent of the customer.

Reply to
Tim Wescott

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