At three to six months I was hardly competent but given in 1976 90% of the systems installed were pipe schedule, coupled with the fact all we had were 1/2″ upright and pendent sprinklers, I was actually laying out sprinklers and sizing the pipe pretty much on my own.

Forgot, we had 17/32″ sprinklers to but that was left to the guys who could do hydraulic calculations the Jack Wood way. Hundreds of old time designers attended one of Jack Woods three day hydraulic calculation seminars at Viking in Hastings, MI.

In the first year I had lots of excellent supervision and I was fortunate to be taught by one of what I would consider to be the best in the industry. Two, three and four times a day he would drop in to see how I was doing and take the time to tell me what I was doing wrong and allow me to correct my errors. He wouldn’t tolerate anything less than perfection, this sometimes drove me nuts but served me well over the years, but he gave me enough room to learn without getting frustrated.

At the end three to six months I could lay out a simple system of a few hundred heads, I would get most of it right but it was always checked before it went out the door.

Point I was making was I doubt a totally green trainee could lay out a system with calculations given after just a few months given all we have to work with today.

My first NFPA #13 was about 130 pages and maybe 8″x5″ big. If you wore jeans you could fit it in your hip pocket.

If it’s changed this much in the last 30 years what will the next 30 bring?

No doubt there are a number of inspectors around the country that do an excellent job while not being NICET certified but NICET certification appears to be the way many states are heading. Not that it will make them better in itself but anyone doing inspecting should be working towards that NICET. It’s a big deal now and going to get bigger.

1. I am not sure where you find in the article that I am calling for Level II inspectors be allowed to inspect. I do not propose that any particular NICET level (II or III) for inspections of systems. You wrote about the chemical plant that you inspect. I would take it a step further and state that the most important issue is an individual’s actual ability to do the work needed. Certification (regardless of the level) is just the starting point. A wise service provider is going to make sure that the inspector is qualified for the particular project and the scope that has been contracted. If you read the article again, I am simply pointing out the consequences of a state or jurisdiction requiring NICET certification. I am not calling for a lowering of standards–quite the opposite.
2. Your last paragraph baffles me. I do not belittle the job of layout techincian. I do not know where that comment comes from. I started in the industry as a layout technician and have held a level IV certifciation since 1990. if you felt qualified after 6 months, you were a lot faster than me.
The thrust of the article is to spur discussion and thought regarding NICET certification since it is the most recognized organization for setting layout and inspection techician standards in our industry but NICET certification may not always be the best (or only) solution for qualifying individuals. That does not mean that I do not think it is a excellent vehicle.
I agree with most everything you write and if you look again at my article, you will see that.

Again, thanks for your comments.
Russ

@Arthur Gould

We’re not training anyone and what’s even more perplexing is you can’t find anyone that is interested enough to even give it a look as a career.

And when you do hire how do you train, where do you start? How many months will a trainee work before the company realizes the first dollar out of their efforts? Six months? A year?

Even in this recession if you were to bus 12 NICET III certified inspector’s into Atlanta and give each one a car for the week I just have to think all 12 would have jobs with good pay and benefits by the end of the week. With the way laws are being written the job is nearly recession proof and nobody is interested.

Why?

I bring this up because I’m NICET certified in layout and in the states I am licensed in laws and regulations permit NICET III or IV to perform inspections so even if construction jobs go to zero I’ll still have a job. Where else, what other industry is there, where you can you say something like this?

For the record I’ve been a layout technician since the mid 70’s and I had to read and study NFPA real close for six months before I felt qualified. Don’t belittle the job, there’s a lot more professionalism to it than most would think until you’ve done it.

As of of April 3, 2009 the NICET registry contained the following numbers for water based inspectors.

NICET Level I 1,164
NICET Level I 1,244
NICET Level I 482
Total 2,890

Does allowing NICET II holders to inspect increase the number of inspectors for a state?

It doesn’t appear have as much of an impact as we might think.

Georgia is one of those states that require Level III to inspect and consequently 83 of the countries 482 (17.2%) Level III’s on the registry live in Georgia. In addition to the Level III’s Georgia has 44 Level I’s and 37 Level II’s.

Florida requires NICET II to inspect and the impact on Florida’s registry numbers is 196 Level I’s, 178 Level II’s but only 38 Level III’s.

Adjusting for the total population for Florida’s 18,328,340 Florida has 1 qualified inspector (NICET II or III) per 84,853 population.

With Georgia’s 9,685,744 population there’s one qualified inspector (NICET III only) out of 116,695 population.

Of course this doesn’t tell the entire story for while I have nothing published to base it on I think Florida has more sprinkler systems per million inhabitants than Georgia does.

I do not agree with Florida’s decision to grant inspectors authorizations to NICET II certificate holders because I am thinking of a fitter type with two years total experience and find it hard to believe he can conduct a diesel engine driven fire pump test. In two years he might have done four or five diesel engine pump tests and on the sixth one he is qualified to be running it?

How about an interim type license? Let’s say NICET II’s can inspect wet systems only or maybe even wet or dry systems only in non storage type facilities freeing up the NICET III’s for the more complex inspections as they gain more experience?

Near me we inspect a chemical plant that has 44 systems of all types along with a couple large pumps. I can’t believe there’s a single NICET II certificate holder with two years experience that is qualified to inspect that complex.