Disappointment !!!!

Jim

Nice to see you posting for the first time on here and surfing through the site and yes there is a lot of information out there.

It does sound like a dream job when you first look at it and I am also a bit of a dreamer myself and then reality bites.

Its is and industry that I have been in now for a considerable amount of years and in general has been good to me, but then again the offshore life does not suite everybody.

You will have to brush up on your Electrionic and Electrical skills and also learn something about Hydraulics to get a nose in the door with the companies.

The bulk of work is in the oil industry, with work in biology, research and documentaries being a dream for most of us.

There have been links to plenty of courses put up on this site which if you trawl futher I am sure you will find.

It is not the easiest time to get into the industry at the moment but if you get trained up and stay keen you will probably get there eventually.

All the main employers can be found on the internet, with details of there systems which will give you some sort of idea of the ROV’s that are out there.

All the Best

Thinsub

Ah Gin Club, Happy Days.

Jim,

I was in a very similar position to you. Most of my experience was in the software industry, keen sports diver and sailer and a few useful hobbies. I did the Fort William course early 2008 (paid for by £5800 career development loan), and after a lot of leg-work I got my "break" November of the same year – I’m now designing, building and operating ROVs and tools, and I’m currently on a subsea repair job in the Indian Ocean.

Few points:

1) The courses are useful if you don’t expect them to automatically lead to a job. If you look at it as an introduction to ROV work, a way of seeing if you will enjoy doing it, get on with the type of people you might be working with etc, then its a very useful thing to do. I HAVE found a lot of the stuff they teach to be highly relevant as well, but as has been said here you need some other basic background. Paying £5k for what boils down to a "taster" might be a bit too steep for you though! I don’t feel I wasted my money, since it was great fun and confirmed for me that it was an industry I was interested in.

2) Software engineering is actually relevant in a lot of ways. Its a logical and technical profession where you have to think things through step by step. "debugging" a faulty ROV is a very similar logical process to debugging a bit of code, and if you’ve ever built your own PC the innards of a modern electrical ROV won’t look too scary.

3) If you don’t have professional experience, do you have any relevant interests or hobbies? I’ve welded, fixed engines and played with electronics as part of hobbies, so although I’d not done any of that professionally, I emphasised it on my CV under "Interests and hobbies". Repairing motorbikes and even playing with radio controlled models all give you skills which are relevant. Scuba diving has turned out to be useful to know about, but potential employers don’t seem too interested in it.

4) Try playing around with electronics at home – maybe build your own basic ROV using off-the-shelf parts. It will give you an excellent idea of what to expect. I think this was one of the key points for me getting a job – I was partway through my own attempt at an ROV (just for fun) and it gave me something to talk about at interview.

As a suggestion, depending on what sort of software you are used to writing, you could look at companies that build AUVs and see if they need a software programmer – you’ll get some nice practical experience at the cutting edge, and it might lead to a more hands-on, offshore job. Most of the money in AUVs is in the defense sector at the moment, so look at BAE systems, Allen-Vanguard and similar and see if they are recruiting. AUVs are also big in oceanographic research, so it might lead to your dream job as well!

Otherwise, all the comments already on this site about getting electronics, mechanical or hydraulic qualifications apply.

If you decide to go for it, good luck! I have to say its been great for me so far. Even the time in the workshop is interesting, and theres always something new going on. Certainly better than working in an office in front of a computer all day, at least in my opinion!

LEM

Move to the US and start applying. I got my foot in the door because I had a buddy who had a lot of sway with his project manager, who in turn approved me to get hired. Now I had some low voltage/ residential electrical skills from other jobs, but most of my working life has been cooking and tending bar. Don’t let anyone fool you into thinking you have to have all sorts of technical degrees and years of experience building rockets at Area 51 for the Navy. If you’re not an idiot, have a good amount of common sense , know how to turn a wrench, can handle the offshore life and have the drive to do a good job, you can make it in this game. I don’t know if I would call it a "dream job", but I do enjoy most of it and I’ll never go back to the Monday thru Friday life again. Granted, it may be a different story in the UK than it is here in the States. If you go by what most of the people who post here think, all us Yanks are a bunch of fat chuckle heads who don’t know Šhiτ. All I can say to that is, "At least I have a job". Take it for what it’s worth. Either way, good luck.