Bad time to be an aircraft technician?

[ravfooty]

Hello,

Have been reading recent threads about on here about the state of the industry at the moment, ie badly trained licensed technicians, RAF redundancies with great interest.
I am considering doing a foundation degree at Kingston University in aircraft engineering that leads to a Jar66 license, and was wondering whether in light of these developments maybe i'd be making a bad choice. I already work in the industry in a none technical role and thought this would be a good way to progress.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on what its like to work in the industry at the moment.

[matkat]

ravfooty I think You have already answered Your own question.
Good luck

[smudgethecat]

dont even think about it, its grim and getting grimmer, licensed enginers are undervalued, poorly paid for the responsibilty held and treated generally shabbily by the industry as a whole, stay in a non technical role you will be treated far better and given more respect, better still get out of aviation competely and take up somthing really lucrative like plumbing (anyhow the licensed engineer wont exist much longer the A licensed mechanic will see to that!) sorry if this sounds all doom and gloom but its the way it is im afraid

[Blacksheep]

Not to mention the grizzly old geezers like me who are busy exporting your jobs to Asia, eh? ;)

Good Luck indeed!

[Hoof-Arted]

I think my advice to you would be go for it , I have been a Licensed Engineer for 25 years and havent regretted a minute of it . I have never been treated with with any bad respect if anything my experience is the opposite and when you get a few years experience under your belt the pay is not bad at all,for example an LAE with a couple of types and a few years experience will earn anything from 30k upwards in todays market,also if you do the Kingston degree and dont like hands on maintenance it will stand you in good stead for an office job,ie maintrol, tech records, planning ,that type of thing.
Also the chance of LAE,s being a thing of the past because of the A licence holder is just not going to happen,this is a certification privelige that used to be called Limited and simple and that is exactly what it still is. So if you can afford the time out to do the degree go for it ,and I wish you the best of luck for the future.

[freikorps]

i would have to agree with smudge, its a job to avoid, i work for a well known ltn based airline/engineering company and its dire im afraid ,my son was recently talking about following his fathers footsteps so to speak, thank god he has realized the error of his ways and is now studying law, its not a career i would advise anyone to go into the way its degenerated over the last few years

[matkat]

Hoof-arted,You are by far the exception to the rule

[A10 Gunner]

The luxembourgish NAA is using the FAA A&P to convert it to a EASA B1.1 license without sitting any module in a Part 147 school.
They call it 'grandfather right'.
The only requirement:
You had to be employed with a luxembourgish Part 145 at the time they introduced JAA in Lux 01.June 2001.
That's what I call taking it easy !
And no authority made any effort to stop this.

[Blacksheep]

Despite my tongue-in-cheek post earlier, I'd like to say that, although there are no doubt, companies that will hire a gash licence holder just to make up the numbers, most employers are as interested in your CV as they are in the licences you hold. Certainly you need the right licence to apply for a job, but applicants with tickets they found in a Corn Flakes packet are easy enough to spot.

As to the career, mine's been pretty OK so far.

BTW freikorps, my children who went into law found themselves slaving sixty hours a week for peanuts for the first ten years. They're just starting to make a bit of money now. Almost as much as a Britannia LAE in fact. And for every newly qualified lawyer just entering the profession, their chances of one day getting a partnership are about the same as for any of us making CEO.