Friday, 21 September 2018

CAT And Genny Training From Sygma Solutions

When contractors are undertaking any sort of work that involves penetrating the ground there is the ever-present risk of striking an underground utility. This could be electricity, gas, water, telecoms, fibre optics, and more. The Health and Safety Executive produces a pdf entitled “Avoiding Danger From
Underground Services” (http://www.hse.gov.uk/pUbns/priced/hsg47.pdf) which states: “Underground services are widespread. Assume they are present unless you have been shown otherwise.”

Striking an underground utility can result in a number of problems. At the very least the contractor has to stop work until it has been repaired. The company will also have to pay for the cost of the repair, and there may be considerable collateral damage when the lack of the utility impacts on others. Costs can be such that it puts the contractor out of business. Even if this should not occur, the contractor’s reputation will suffer damage.

Then there is the health and safety aspect. There are estimated to be some 60,000 cable strikes every year in the UK, resulting in many serious injuries.

It follows that cable avoidance must be an absolute priority for any contractor and there are several tools available to help with this. Two of these are the CAT and Genny – Cable Avoidance Tool and Signal Generator. However, it is not sufficient to purchase these and simply read the instructions.  CAT and Genny training is critical in order for operatives to fully understand how to use these tools in order to ensure that utilities are located and avoided.

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CAT 4 And Genny 4 Training From Sygma Solutions

When you are a contractor engaged in any sort of excavation – which most contractors are, unless you are just a painter and decorator – the most important thing that you can do is to avoid hitting any underground utilities when you dig. If you don’t know exactly what is under the ground, at best you might hit a water pipe which will make you wet. At worst you will hit an electricity cable which can easily kill, or a gas pipe which can cause a huge explosion and do the same.

Any sort of cable strike is bad because, again at best, you will have to stop work and stand idle until the utility concerned has repaired it. This could cause you loss of income as you have workers doing nothing, but it could also result in a very large claim for loss of income from businesses affected by the damage caused by your workers. It could also result in claims from the company employing you, and loss of reputation in addition. It has not been unknown for a contractor to go out of business as the result of a cable strike.

This is why the CAT and Genny course that we provide at Sygma Solutions is essential training for your operatives. The CAT and Genny are the two most important tools for underground utility location, but the sad fact is that the majority of operatives do not understand how to use them to their fullest capabilities, nor yet understand their limitations.

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Monday, 17 September 2018

How to choose the best CAT and Genny Training

Cable avoidance training
If you are building a career in the utility detection industry it is essential to understand how to use the latest range of Cable Avoidance equipment and new technologies and learn from experts on how to consider the best locating practice that will ultimately reduce the number of cable strikes that take place.

CAT Training is an important part of many construction and excavation processes in order to avoid buried cables strikes. There are many qualifications in CAT and Genny Training that are available for operatives in the utility location and avoidance industry and offer the value required to have an outstanding career in the industry.

CAT Courses are a combination of basic textbook knowledge and practical hands-on experience taught by experts in the field. There are broad range of qualifications available to any professional willing to grasp the advanced knowledge.  It all depends on what they seek to achieve which makes the selection process easier.

Choosing the best CAT training
There are many industry related qualifications that can help boost your career in utility location and avoidance. The end result should something to consider while pursuing future qualifications in this field.

Are you seeking advanced knowledge, hands-on experience or the ability to boost your skills and confidence in your career path?  Choose a training provider that can offer you whatever you seek to achieve.

Many CAT courses are organized as assessment only, while others offer holistic training experiences with on-site activities as well as theoretical learning opportunities.  There are a number of different methods and details that these courses cover such as the reasons for using buried pipe and cable locators, understanding health, safety & financial implications and how to avoid danger during  underground services.

For those who already have a certain level of training, there are bespoke training courses available that are designed to offer both theory and practical experience necessary for your particular skillset and experience.

The Genny Training Course
Cable Avoidance Tools are powered by Genny, or Signal Generators, designed to detect signals from metal services. CAT have various modes that allow the user to detect signals from below the surface of the ground.  The Genny mode allows the CAT to detect radiated tones to detect and avoid water valves or plug sockets with a direct connection to the source.

How to build your career in Cable Avoidance Industry

What is Cable Avoidance?
Buried services pose a major hazard to construction workers. Excavations which have been poorly planned and prepared for can cause cables or pipe damage leading to expensive  repairs, project delays and most importantly, personal injury.  

Cable Avoidance is designed to help professionals in this field use the latest tools to locate cable underground during ground work activities so these hazards can be avoided. Therefore, Cable Avoidance Tools (CAT), are important for those working in utility location and avoidance fields in order to detect any potential danger that may arise in the future. 

Choosing a career in Cable Avoidance
Having a career in the cable avoidance and utility sector requires the ability to detect cable underground and perform ground work surveys. As utility strikes can be damaging, having a hands-on experience and in-depth knowledge in cable avoidance is a way to curb the risk associated with cable strikes and improve accurate detection of cable location in the industry.  

Excellent training in Cable Avoidance would improve your utility surveying knowledge, boost your confidence and skills, and primarily teach you how to use the necessary equipment to detect cable locations.

Training
The CAT or Cable Avoidance tool is widely used to detect signals naturally radiating from metallic surfaces, buried cables and conductors. Cat and Genny Training provides participants with the necessary knowledge needed to operate the equipment and correctly trace underground services.

An effective Level 2 Cable Avoidance Training course should cover hands-on training using actual locators to detect and trace the route of buried services, both on and off site. It should also cover the different types of buried services that exist, current legislation and best practices concerning detecting buried services, the safety implications of not using a locator and skills associated with the ancillary equipment.

Friday, 17 August 2018

Training For Operatives In Buried Services Location To HSE and British Standards Institution Levels

There are so many underground utilities running just a few feet below the surface of the ground that the safest thing when considering any sort of excavation is to assume that there are some where you want to dig, unless you know for a fact that there are not.

Cable strikes of one description or another occur every day up and down the country. Many cause some minor inconvenience while a utility is repaired, but others cause serious injury and death. In fact, there are on average around 12 deaths a year as a result of striking utilities. Striking a water pipe is bad enough, but hitting a power cable or gas pipe is more than serious.


HSG47 is a guide produce by the Health and Safety Executive and is aimed at all those involved in commissioning, planning, managing, and carrying out work on or near underground services. It outlines the potential dangers of working near underground services and gives advice on how to reduce any direct risks to people's health and safety, as well as the indirect risks arising through damage to services. In addition, it explains the three basic elements of working safely, which are planning, locating and identifying buried utilities, and carrying out excavation safely. HSG47 training is available from a number of training companies.

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Features Of The RD8100 Underground Utilities Locator

Radiodetection manufactures a range of underground cable and pipe locators, the latest of which is the RD8100. This is their most advanced range of high precision cable locators and has been built on 40 years of experience. The RD8100 locators also offer optional GPS and usage logging which automatically generate data for customer reports or for in-house quality and safety audits in order to ensure best quality working practices. The locator includes features such as current direction and iLOC which combine with the Tx Transmitter range in order to provide highly accurate location even in tough conditions. 


Michael Faraday discovered the principles of electromagnetic induction in the early 19th century, and it is known that it was being used as early as 1910 in order to locate buried cables. While it is not necessary to understand the theory of electromagnetic induction in order to use the equipment correctly and successfully, nonetheless Radiodetection RD8100 training will help users to feel more confident about their work.

Friday, 13 July 2018

Locating Underground Utilities Before Undertaking Groundwork Is Critical

If you are the director of a contracting company that is engaged in any sort of ground work you will no doubt be very aware of the necessity for locating underground pipes and cables before undertaking any actual digging. Even so, you may not be aware of the appalling number of cable strikes that occur in Britain every year. Estimates vary, but an often quoted figure is around 60,000. Several of these result in serious injury and death.


Of course, the cost of repairs is one thing, but the University of Birmingham produced a report in January 2016 (http://assessingtheunderworld.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/IBuild-Cost-of-Strikes-Report-General-Anonymised-FINAL-1.pdf) which indicated that there is a ratio of 29 – 1. In other words, if you have a cable strike which costs £1,000 to repair, the true cost in terms of indirect and social costs such as downtime on site, loss of business by companies affected, and a whole lot more, is £29,000. 

It follows that locating and identifying underground utilities through the use of a CAT and Genny is critical in reducing the number of these incidents. The combined network of underground utilities – gas, water, electricity, telecoms, sewage – totals over 1.5 million km. This is five times the length of the UK road network. Furthermore, the utility industry undertakes about the same number – 1.5 million – of street works every year in order to maintain and upgrade the various systems. 

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