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B.O.T. Radar Maintenance Certificate.

27K views 114 replies 52 participants last post by  Varley 
#1 ·
Around the time I left the sea I began to hear rumours that a Radar Mtce Cert would be made compulsory on all single R/O ships. Can anyone tell me if this actually happened ?
 
#109 ·
Did my BOT radar course in Riversdale in 1976, tail-ending the MRGC and C&G courses. In fact the course as a whole was called the MRRT -Marine Radio and Radio Technicians course. In 1973 when I started, the demand for R/O's was huge. by 1976 it had plummeted, and getting a job was tough. If you didn't have the radar ticket, there was simply no point in applying. I don't think it was a regulatory issue at that time though. I managed to get in with MIMCO - many weren't as fortunate after 3 years of damn hard work. We basically had to do a selection test - technical, practical etc. I flunked the practical but had outstanding exam grades so they put it down to nervousness (which was probably the case). Thank God! it would have damaged the young man I was, giving up my career before it had begun.
 
#110 ·
I passed my Radar Maintenance ticket at South Shields (thank you Jimmy Doig) in 1964 but went back to sea before the exam results came through. The Certificate was sent to the nearest Shipping Office to my home address which, since I had given my parent's address, was in Manchester. When I came back to the UK it was to the Tyne where I stayed in my usual digs for a week or so. I then took another couple of ships out of the Tyne before finally leaving the sea a couple of years later to take a job ashore with Marconi Marine - on the Tyne.

So it was several years before I thought about collecting the Certificate (which nobody had asked me to produce in the interim) so I thought that on a visit to my parents, I would drive into Manchester, find the Shipping Office and call in to collect the Certificate. That was when I discovered that the Shipping Office had been closed.

I have no idea what happened to my Radar ticket and I can't even remember where the Manchester Shipping Office had been located. It was somewhere in Salford but I can't recall ever seeing it.
 
#113 ·
at Shields
I passed my Radar Maintenance ticket at South Shields (thank you Jimmy Doig) in 1964 but went back to sea before the exam results came through.

.
That rings a bell, Ron. I took my MOT Radar at Shields in Dec 1956 (ticket no. 1180) - I dimly recall Mr Doig was our instructor even then. He was clever and eccentric: In the early afternoon he would warm up the primitive TV and have us watch Bill and Ben the Flowerpot Men for 15 mins before we got back to waveguides and such.
 
#111 · (Edited)
Interesting story Ron.
All that work for no piece of parchment and not a jot of difference to your life.
Worth remembering.

"In 1973 when I started, the demand for R/O's was huge. by 1976 it had plummeted, and getting a job was tough"

Absolutely as I remember it.
Full page advertising in the quality daily newspapers for R/O's almost immediately followed by mass redundancies.
 
#112 ·
AEI Escort Radars.
The labels for the switches around the CRT were cheap & nasty little transfer stick on things.
Whilst alongside in Kandla (Ran of Kutch) the 3/O, bless him, sprayed the wheelhouse with BP Imshi fly squirt. Every label came adrift.
Just to cap it all we also lost the football match against the local Fire Brigade.
Happy Daze
 
#115 ·
I don't recall Mimco being that bothered about the Radar Cert in 1971 (also Liverpool but MRGC). It remained on my todo list but the opportunity to do AMEC easily took more of my fancy than simply radar. But regulations would have made that an essential to remain as ECO had I chosen to do so but took a different step up the ladder instead.
 
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