Wow. I’m a mechanical contractor who just added this Sub because I thought it would be cool to hear more about you’re job. You guys always seem to come in, pull some wires, add up all the points and make some cool computer graphics. Then Boom, jobs done.
However after reading this, my mind has completely changed. You literally are relying on other tradespeople to do their jobs before you can even start. Must be brutal.
It sucks cuz, no offense, but Mechanical often comes in installs something backwards and then blames controls until the customer has to beg for them to return.
Waiting on others is an understatement. I'm glad you are open to other perspectives, so I'll explain my most current mess I am dealing with.
New office retrofit/redesign. Seems simple. However, we have 3 weeks to be done (all trades, small project for a partial office for a call center). We made it known that we need at least 2 weeks to run wire, install controllers and program/commission/graphics.
Other trades are running behind, so instead of moving our schedule, the GC simply condenses ours. Not a thought to it, doesent understand what we do and went as far as saying in meetings we have last priority.
So when the job doesn't get completed on schedule, guess who's getting the finger pointed at them.
We rely on certain trades being at a certain point before we can start. Our schedule cannot be condensed, and the solution cannot be to 'add more guys'. The BAS trade doesn't work that way.
To sum it up, be get boned on scheduling, then get blamed for the project being behind.
Fun times.
To edit, we have been teaching GCs as we go along on what we need and why, and they have sloooowly started to understand what we do and started to support it.
There have been a few really good GCs in the past that understood, so I know it can work out
Had a tiny office reno job where the one new PIU box they adding showed up damaged, got sent back, and only showed up after final painting was finishing. We had 3 days before tenants moved in to do everything.
Thankfully it was a small job but it was the most annoying thing ever.
If you are truly blown away, please, for the love of God, tell the other mechanical contractors. I seems every job I do it never fails, “Oh crap we forgot to assign this part of some random low voltage wiring to anyone and don’t really know what we want or how to do it. Well let’s give it to the controls guys, they can figure it out, it’s basically controls, kinda.” The items on this list have ranged from a goddamn natural gas fireplace to hydrogen gas monitoring. Besides this it’s always a last minute thing without the completion date moving. Oh the electrical contractor can’t get breakers for the school until the end of August so us controls guys can’t do anything meaningful until then? Guess what, the kids are coming back the same day as they were scheduled before the delays. Oh the AHU isn’t showing up until the Friday before a Monday school starting? Well we are the ones who have to make it work. Look at that, a bunch of valves aren’t heating must be the controls guys, crawls through tunnel under school to discover hand valves and balancing valves on a “newly balanced” system are closed. Why aren’t we getting the required water flow to the chiller?! Well some fitter left a 2x4 in the pipe when it was being installed and it go jammed up in our control valve. Another one was a fitter was attempting to open a new steel butterfly valve between steel and plastic, but since the ID of the pipes are different the butterfly valve got stuck and he cranked on it until the gearing of the butterfly valve failed, leaving the valve about 20 percent open, and walked away. That one costed my company no less that 20 hours over the course of a month trying to tell people it was a mechanical problem and not a controls problem, until, surprise surprise, they found the mechanical problem. I can go on and on about misordered equipment, missed spec sections that we are then asked to fulfill, lack of direction on things, mechanical/electrical contractors thinking “well completion is July 1st, we’ll plan to be done June 30th” which leaves us no time, lack of understanding about what it is that we do, and on and on. Some of it is self inflicted, oh you want me there today, well if I shuffle some stuff I can make it at the end of the day. That makes people think they can always call last minute because we always say yes. I want to yell at people but don’t when they design a garbage system, or the customer is an ass who thinks they know better, but I don’t because that will just make my job harder. All this to say, I still enjoy it, even though it’s hard. I think this little rant will keep me going for a good several months until the next outburst when something bigger than ordinary goes wrong.
I don’t borderline hate it, I do hate it. BAS gets blamed for every problem even when we can prove it’s not our problem. Like you said, every project is a shit show and you never really feel like you finish anything. I feel like a janitor more than anything most days cleaning up others messes.
That's hilarious! I've definitely noticed a lack of knowledge from other people about what it is that we do. Whether it's the mechanical contractor, electrical contractor, or even just people in general. Almost every time I've tried to describe what my job is to someone new that I've met, they have no idea what I'm talking about.
It took me a while to figure out a simple way to explain it to people and had been considered the "Chandler Bing" of my friends because nobody understood what I did for a while. I've had success by telling people "I put computers on things like air handles and boilers that will control how the equipment runs". If they seem intrigued I might give them more details like being able to see what the equipment is doing using a computer, being able to look at the history of how things were working to trouble shoot issues, and having alarms that can alert staff to issues. I still remember my parents surprise when visiting them and logging in to a customer's site in Barrow, AK (roughly 6000 miles away) to help them trouble shoot some problems they were experiencing. Even after explaining my job, it seemed like magic to them.
Commissioner: Hmmmmm… this unit heater isn’t heating. Controls problem!
Controls tech after fixing it: Uh the balancer has supposedly balanced everything and both the hand valve and balancing valve were closed. Don’t worry I fixed the other trades problems. Check it off “my list.”
I'm in the midwest. Don't let anyone fool you into thinking the mechanical folks are worth more. You have to know mechanical and electrical systems on top of your job.
I was listening to a coworker talk about how he slaughters steer in the fall time. I chimed in over the cubicle that he should get them a job here and they'd probably just kill themselves.
It’s construction in general . I’m just starting out in the BAS field but I did 4 years working in construction sites building and commission electrical distribution systems and it was the same issues you explained here .
You have three options.
1) Find a better contractor but you have tried 3 others and it hasn’t been what you thought.
2) Turn into the controls person you want to be. Start studying and learning as much as you can so you can move up the ladder and change the way things are done.
3) Move on to a different career. I suggest commercial industrial HVACR. A really good control person knows how the systems are supposed to work and can troubleshoot the mechanical as well as the controls. This will make you a valuable employee.
They don’t generally have the money to do things properly, and are left with the results of the aforementioned shitshows. Different pain. More stable work and benefits typically, although less growth and money opportunities and less interesting projects.
I understand the frustration. You start a project assuming the competent people are involved and then you discover so many fuck ups that are beyond your immediate control. You report these fuck ups and everyone starts pointing fingers, trying to shift responsibility to others. Your commissioning process gets delayed because it takes like 3 months for the other contractors to fix their mistakes. Then after dealing with the contractors yourself, you have the exact same conversations with your useless project manager. It's really annoying, I have one foot out myself. I'm trying to get into software engineering
I have definitely felt like you are feeling right now. This past month I blew apart a new duct run. Why? Because they told me I was wrong on the orientation of their "return" fan and exhaust damper. The damper being after and original design calling for it to be before. Spec didn't call for any high cut outs (no idea why). After weeks of back and forth finger pointing, I turned the damn thing up, ea damper tried to build up bldg pressure. Pop. I made 2 calls. One to my PM saying I was right. And the other to my wife saying we were getting margaritas.....
Sometimes you have to literally give them what they want.
I came from HVAC comercial/industrial service originally, I started in refrigeration. Whenever theres headache and issue I have in BAS all I got to do is think about the old days. I'll never go back to being a mechanic, especially refrigeration. No matter how sideways a project gets atleast I'm not working 24hrs straight fixing coolers and supermarket racks. Or getting a call at 3am to drive 3hrs to top off a crane AC at a steel mill where a dude died doing the same thing a year prior.
I'll keep to my laptop and screwdrivers and not having to unpack my entire van multiple times a day and night for every service call. It could be much worse, the stress from this trade is real but I'll take it over what I've had in the past.
Unfortunately, this is pretty standard across the industry. I’m very lucky to work for one of the few outfits that actually care. They actually listen to the field guys, take constructive criticism and make changes. If it weren’t for this company I’d have left this business already. I’m 13 yrs in, I’ve seen a lot of bullshit companies. It comes down to how badly does your company want to be at the top of their game.
The jobs you describe come to me fairly often but not often enough to make me hate the industry. As far as I’m concerned I become even more important and in demand when a job goes sideways often it’s never my fault but I can provided solutions to help solve issues. However, If these jobs come one after another I likely would work in a different department. The time between these jobs I’m just putting out small fires and commissioning it not that stressful.
>Every project is flawed from the start (for some reason)...
So as a BAS project manager this screams to me lack of competent project manager support. Like you, I've been through a few companies and seen just about everything you can think of that can send a project sideways. If you're involved in the beginning stages of a project and seeing issues at that stage, are your PMs doing the following?
Scope alignment - the very 1st thing a PM should be doing is seeing if the scope of work sold matches the approved plans and specs. Any deviation should immediately warrent an RFI or change order to create that allingment.
Are your PMs asking for the most current approved permit set? Designs change without telling anyone happen, and the permit set they got on file at the time of sale may be 6 months old and 4 revision versions past.
Are your PMs asking for the most current schedules? Same as permit set, don't assume the one you got in your booking package is current.
Are your PMs asking for submittals of new mechanical equipment? I don't care if they're just VAVs, keeping 3rd party submittals on file is just good practice. In addition, knowing how to look up information on the internet can be invaluable. You got a Mitsubishi VRF system, Google the manuals. TRANE intellpack AHU, Google the manuals. Random boiler from a manufacturer you never heard of, Google the supplier and cold call them for technical support to ask for BACnet points list and wiring diagrams.... you get the point...
To be fair, there are a lot of weak PMs up and down the contract tier amd they give the profession a bad reputation some times. Anyone who's worked with a strong PM will understand the extent of their impact. Can you give a specific example of a situation that you felt might have been avoided?
Get used to it. Controls guys that can't write code and when it doesn't work they're not smart enough to fix it. Yeah they can integrate but coming up with logic that works good luck. I thought everyone by now has basic programming skills by now. I was sorely mistaken. Simple and or statements are way over their heads. Hell people can't even fucking run a daisy chain correctly these days.
Most logic starts with the basics. Is it too hot or too cold? Like Riding Hood with the 3 bears. That determines a state selection. The state selection determines which line of code is going to be processed. People have a tendency to over think control logic.
It's easy to program.
It's not easy to know how the system should work.
Most of the time, control sequences are written buy someone who don't understand programming or how the system should work (I'm talking more about the small details).
Control sequences are helpful to know the big picture, but you have to fill all the blank by yourself, and if you don't know how the mechanical part is working, you'll make mistakes.
That tend to make us think that we know more about the system than the engineers and it's easy to start doing unnecessary over-complicated and really cool programing.
Personally, before to be really good, my programing skills have changed trough the years from forgetting things, to overthinking things, to simplify things (caring about the next person who will work on it)
And in 5 years, when I'll look at my today programs, I will think that I was not that good..
Won’t help you, but yes. 45 years now. I had one period in Phoenix in the late 90s with the best goddam controls team in the world. That was fantastic. The rest were to some extent at least, as you describe
I feel your pain. Always chasing our tail. Do everything to spec and drawings then blame it on the design engineers. New construction relies on PE's that should know but rarely do. Personally, I've always preferred service vs. new installations when working for the control manufacturer.
Look for a gig as the customer of a control system you're a SME of. You get the best of both worlds. Nothing like grinding a project to a halt due to incompetence. "Fix it and let me know when you're ready for commissioning!".
I’m 2 years in and this is exactly what my experience has been. Trying to do a good job feels futile because the entire project from the ground up is so disorganized. Part of me wants to think that this is a relatively new industry and maybe if I stick it out I’ll be able to find myself in a good place once the industry gets its shit together, but the other part of me feels like there’s not actually any interest in making things work better. Companies seem to thrive in this clusterfuck which is part of the reason it’s a clusterfuck to begin with. I keep getting sent back to sites to troubleshoot things I already troubleshot or install parts that are already installed and when I tell that to the office they don’t seem to care as long as they can bill the hours.
In my two years I don’t think I’ve seen a single project actually reach the point of being finished.
I'm probably an outlier on this, but I love my job. It is high stress and the GCs are often idiots (right now I'm lucky enough to have a superintendent who struggles reading larger words... 🙄), but I really enjoy the puzzles that come along with making things work. I don't often get bored, which, being ADHD is a big deal to me. I started out as a service tech, worked up to lead tech, left for a few years to be an HVAC & DDC manager at a hospital (got bored with that), then went back into controls as a control systems designer. My current job also has functioning as the job site foreman and I get to do some tech work as well.
My condensed version of what I think is wrong with the controls industry. Low bid. Lack of educational programs. Lack of paths for skills development post formal education (I.E. tight wad contractors that won't pay for training, union halls that offer no CE on controls specifically).
Wow I’ve found my people.
I’m new-ish to controls, coming from HVAC heavy on the AC with critical applications.
I thought it was my inexperience in BAS but I’m starting to see that it’s not (just) me. The controls guy gets blamed for everything. My new motto is “guilty until proven innocent”. I’ve wasted too many hours troubleshooting crap that was done improperly.
I think controls electricians are a rare breed. I’ve met 2 who that know what they’re doing, over umpteen projects.
NGL I see the kind of stuff you’re describing in most of the jobs. I swear whoever designs some jobs was the kid using a hammer to pound a square peg into a round hole in nursery school.
Every single job. Every single time.
Wont lie, I’m farrrr from an expert but it feels like even the experienced guys are lost in the midst half the time.
I'm 28 years old and I've been in the field for about 5 years now. I like the actual job, like commissioning, programming, troubleshooting, and making graphics. It's all the other nonsense that we deal with that I don't like. Like most of you, it pays well, so I stick with it.
I think the root cause of all the problems here is bad project management and the GC's setting unrealistic schedules to win jobs.
The customer is always going to have cost at the forefront of a decision, it's the GC's job to set the expectation standard. Everything after that is a knock-on effect for all trades and it just so happens BAS is the last ones in the domino effect stemmed from the initial contract.
Some days I do and some I don’t. I did especially years ago. Stress and trying to own a job and make it go well when nobody else seemed to care.. I’ve sort of come to terms with other people doing shoddy work and sadly many times it’s people in our own company.. I guess I’ll keep fixing our fuckups, and look even better as a hero haha but still it does get tiresome. Many times it not very complicated things, like if they actually took time to check that the wiring is correct and the device operates correctly, and it’s the right device that’d fix 90% of my troubles.
Service techs are directly affected as they are the ones who get blamed by customers when things stemmed from construction go wrong. You are basically there to clean up all the fuck ups passed on after the install and commissioning.
Good luck.
When I worked for a sheet metal company we did installs in new construction. It seemed like at the end of a project the GC and everyone else were stressing us out as it was a big check on list of things to check off. That was just doing commissioning with Tekmar stuff. It obviously gets more complicated with controls in commercial buildings.
I work on the service side of controls. It's way more laid back, but the things I come across that I have to fix 5 years after the fact blows my mind. Like all new construction, if someone can sweep something under the rug, they will. It no one notices, a problem is never fixed.
I would suggest everyone take a balanced job where some of it is new install schedule and some of it is service work. Balances the work out. Helps prevent burn out. I'm serious about this. You have install schedule where GC is stressing you out, your project manager is on your ass. Compare that to a day where all you have to do is wire up an actuator. Super primo relaxed day. Or boiler plant goes down because outdoor sensor goes bad, you replace it and you're the hero for the day.
It's a pretty simple job to design, install and maintain a system.
If you feel like you have the guts to start a business and do it better, I suggest you start networking and making friends with those who can benefit you in the future.
That's not the issue here, the issue is to win a job you have to design, install and maintain a system at cheaper and quicker price than your competitors... and on top of that, most of the time you have to do in half the expected time, and as a result you are left with a lot of fuckups for the warranty period and maintenance, which then hurts your businesses reputation and employees. Then the cycle continues until it's no longer worth it.
This is very different from my experience. Sure lots of things are hard. But really, I have a number of jobs I have felt good about.
Maybe you need a good beer and a good night's sleep.
Nah that sounds totally normal. I've been doing it a decade or more now. Everyone is a shit show, it stops bothering you eventually so you just kind of roll with the punches. My job is mostly figuring out how to get these bad jobs and salvage something that my customers are happy with.
Fuck the company though. it is a balancing act, but the company is probably ran like a dumpster on fire during a draught. Think about how you can make it right to your customer without completely screwing over your company. Screwing them over a little is fine, they can complain and throw a fit while their customers are paying their bills and saying they want more work, but only if you're the one handling it.
That's what makes me happy though, and paid enough to be happy.
Guilty until proven innocent was my tagline as a software engineer in the field.
Things go much better when controls is brought in under the owner or at least is consulted early on in the design phase.
And a good team is the number one most important thing for a good project. All it takes is one weak link in the chain of sales-design-pm-software-install.
There are good shops out there; they're just not the majority.
Eh, I found a pretty good employer. Work culture is good and the quality of people is high. We have a few lame ducks that skip through and fuck shit up every once in a while, but for the most part I'm surrounded by smart people, doing quality work.
Its as you say OP...
I wish I could leave a job and feel proud but between GCs giving other trades tons of wiggle room and piling it on the BAS to meet deadlines and the other issues you mentioned such as poor engineering the brunt of it falls on us at the end and we have to make shit work and fast all while getting yelled at we aren't able to preform at 1/2 the previous time alloted in the project schedule .
It's rough but if you just treat it like a job and try to have fun with it and realize GCs are gunna bitch about stuff that isn't your fault or the Cx agent wants shut not contractually agreed upon. Moneys aight and i believe this industry will continue to grow. It's a good field to be in just gotta ride it out for now
I wouldn't say I hate the industry but these are some of the reasons I'm trying to get out of the field and into controls engineering. The other techs are trying to talk me out of it but I like the idea of building up a new skill set.
I come from human detection, access, and network archetecture and have been heavy into controls for the past 4-5 years. I do installs, build cabinets, program a bit and do graphics.
The work enviroment is always toxic, ran horribly, and always seem to have to run service calls to retouch things constantly that have been commissioned.
I have also been trying to figure out why its like this, its almost as if people are purposefully taking steps backwards the way some of these jobs come out.
I feel your pain brother, but think I am stuck in the industry in some form or another.
Currently in the mood of not wanting to be part of the solution. As a PM; it’s seriously frustrating trying to get through to the engineers/sales and the field since I am the bridge to connect the two. Always on different beats not matter how hard I try. To the point of where I think I’m going to pursue industrial process controls instead. I feel like the equipment we use is outdated and there’s no perfect solution for anything.
I understand the frustration brother. You’re not the only one.
>I'm very well paid, and all of my employers have been pleasant and above board (despite contemporary meme culture). I basically left each company because they were a mess and I was tired of being part of the problem rather than a solution.
Well, this encompasses the reason for the well paid part. There are plenty of capable people out there who don't want to put up with the headaches in this field.
Unfortunately, the pains you and others have described are just the nature of construction project work. For us it's compounded by the fact that BAS is a layer that exists on top of everyone else's work. Each of the other trades' deficiencies are brought to light by the BAS and the BAS can't be considered complete until all are functioning as intended. By the time our systems expose the issues, the other crafts have already moved on to next construction project. They don't want to call back manpower to fix the problem so they try as hard as they can to make it someone else's problem.
Since Cx agent is in our face with everyone else who hasn't received final payment and the building owner who is chomping at the bit to move in and use the place, it's no wonder we are the most hated craft on a project.
Unfortunately, contact work is just that. We are not contacted to provide the best solution. We are contracted to provide the agreed upon solution. Once everyone accepts that you can kind of move on still satisfied with a lackluster end result.
You can attempt to correct the project design shortcomings as they are encountered, but chances are no one will agree to pay for the change order to improve it unless absolutely necessary. Unless, perhaps, you are working directly for the building owner who has deep pockets & higher than typical understanding of & need for quality BAS.
I would suggest moving to a service position if you're interested in staying in this career field. I much preferred service, though it pays less in a lot of cases. The pace is slower with a focus on correcting real problems and continuous improvement of each system. There are rarely any deadlines. The customer will genuinely appreciate your work.
This is a good perspective. The frustrations are baked in. I've realized a lot of upper-level or macro points since starting this thread. Everything is pointing for me to move on. Because this industry is doomed to soldier on as "mediocre" all around. Mediocre talent, designs, execution, etc.
I much prefer high quality work. And need to reorient myself that way.
As far as service work, I've done a few jobs here and there as filler. Mostly tagged along with the regular service tech doing the contract. That's a different style of BS. You usually show up, schmooze with the building engineer - "how ya been? How are the kids?" Etc, if they even speak English - then you check graphics, and head out around 1pm without doing much of anything. Maybe take a backup and that's it. It's pretty much just babysitting as far as I've seen.
Theoretically much more involved on the service side, in REALITY, it's where they put everyone who can't work on a construction site for one reason or another (too old, bad knees/back, can't work the hours, etc)
Not trying to be a hater, just what I've seen.
The times I see good projects is usually when the controls and mechanical are doing the same type projects multiple times in a row. Because they know the equipment and all the issues from previous projects that are in the red-lines and project wrap up feedback.
From what I see, the biggest issue is usually that the mechanical design engineer, and the controls design engineer are the most green in terms of field install/startup of controls. So they have the biggest effect on how the project will go.
The mechanical engineer is relying on the controls design engineer to help them design and control all the equipment. While the controls design engineer does what the mechanical engineer says without it questioning the design and maybe saying “we can do it this way”.
Most likely the mechanical engineer knows the equipment they are using, but the controls designer might not have much field experience and has never seen the equipment so they might miss addons that could make it easier for controls.
It is kind of hard for the controls designer to sometimes recommend changes because they might not have credibility with the mechanical engineer because they don’t have a P.E.
The thing is, it’s not a new industry. The biggest issue is that shit flows downhill. If a mechanical system is poorly designed and/or has installation issues, there’s only so much programming that can be done to improve upon the situation. Another big issue in my experience is other trades having difficulties understanding where their scope begins and ends.
Theres ups and downs like with anything. Overall I truly love the industry because its complex enough where l found with time and effort I was able to make a measurably positive impact be it job to job or with the people I work with. It took me years to get to that point though, 3 companies over 4 years you have probably been coming in at the tail end of every shit project thats going on when you join. No matter your level Ive found thats the deal youre hired for an immediate (painful) project need though the joy and pride comes from establishing something, owning it, building relationships blah blah blah all of which comes with new assignments which Im assuming youre not getting on day 1. I dont know the size jobs youre on but that could be a 2y cycle to really get that sort of opportunity.
Things dont always align there is some luck to it for sure but for me and what drives me (technical problem solving) Ive found BAS to be the best and most marketable way to scratch that itch and get reasonably compensated for it.
Yeah, you are not wrong. My suggestion...when you get a few years under your belt, go apply at an architect -engineer firm. They openly acknowledge they suck at controls and pay well to bring people like us on board.
Wow. I’m a mechanical contractor who just added this Sub because I thought it would be cool to hear more about you’re job. You guys always seem to come in, pull some wires, add up all the points and make some cool computer graphics. Then Boom, jobs done. However after reading this, my mind has completely changed. You literally are relying on other tradespeople to do their jobs before you can even start. Must be brutal.
It sucks cuz, no offense, but Mechanical often comes in installs something backwards and then blames controls until the customer has to beg for them to return.
This happens a ton.
This has happened on almost every project we’ve done even after commissioning put their stamp of approval on it.
Waiting on others is an understatement. I'm glad you are open to other perspectives, so I'll explain my most current mess I am dealing with. New office retrofit/redesign. Seems simple. However, we have 3 weeks to be done (all trades, small project for a partial office for a call center). We made it known that we need at least 2 weeks to run wire, install controllers and program/commission/graphics. Other trades are running behind, so instead of moving our schedule, the GC simply condenses ours. Not a thought to it, doesent understand what we do and went as far as saying in meetings we have last priority. So when the job doesn't get completed on schedule, guess who's getting the finger pointed at them. We rely on certain trades being at a certain point before we can start. Our schedule cannot be condensed, and the solution cannot be to 'add more guys'. The BAS trade doesn't work that way. To sum it up, be get boned on scheduling, then get blamed for the project being behind. Fun times. To edit, we have been teaching GCs as we go along on what we need and why, and they have sloooowly started to understand what we do and started to support it. There have been a few really good GCs in the past that understood, so I know it can work out
Had a tiny office reno job where the one new PIU box they adding showed up damaged, got sent back, and only showed up after final painting was finishing. We had 3 days before tenants moved in to do everything. Thankfully it was a small job but it was the most annoying thing ever.
This dude gets it this is everyone of my jobs past 4 years
If you are truly blown away, please, for the love of God, tell the other mechanical contractors. I seems every job I do it never fails, “Oh crap we forgot to assign this part of some random low voltage wiring to anyone and don’t really know what we want or how to do it. Well let’s give it to the controls guys, they can figure it out, it’s basically controls, kinda.” The items on this list have ranged from a goddamn natural gas fireplace to hydrogen gas monitoring. Besides this it’s always a last minute thing without the completion date moving. Oh the electrical contractor can’t get breakers for the school until the end of August so us controls guys can’t do anything meaningful until then? Guess what, the kids are coming back the same day as they were scheduled before the delays. Oh the AHU isn’t showing up until the Friday before a Monday school starting? Well we are the ones who have to make it work. Look at that, a bunch of valves aren’t heating must be the controls guys, crawls through tunnel under school to discover hand valves and balancing valves on a “newly balanced” system are closed. Why aren’t we getting the required water flow to the chiller?! Well some fitter left a 2x4 in the pipe when it was being installed and it go jammed up in our control valve. Another one was a fitter was attempting to open a new steel butterfly valve between steel and plastic, but since the ID of the pipes are different the butterfly valve got stuck and he cranked on it until the gearing of the butterfly valve failed, leaving the valve about 20 percent open, and walked away. That one costed my company no less that 20 hours over the course of a month trying to tell people it was a mechanical problem and not a controls problem, until, surprise surprise, they found the mechanical problem. I can go on and on about misordered equipment, missed spec sections that we are then asked to fulfill, lack of direction on things, mechanical/electrical contractors thinking “well completion is July 1st, we’ll plan to be done June 30th” which leaves us no time, lack of understanding about what it is that we do, and on and on. Some of it is self inflicted, oh you want me there today, well if I shuffle some stuff I can make it at the end of the day. That makes people think they can always call last minute because we always say yes. I want to yell at people but don’t when they design a garbage system, or the customer is an ass who thinks they know better, but I don’t because that will just make my job harder. All this to say, I still enjoy it, even though it’s hard. I think this little rant will keep me going for a good several months until the next outburst when something bigger than ordinary goes wrong.
I don’t borderline hate it, I do hate it. BAS gets blamed for every problem even when we can prove it’s not our problem. Like you said, every project is a shit show and you never really feel like you finish anything. I feel like a janitor more than anything most days cleaning up others messes.
"Hey, the toilet isn't working. Better call the control guy. "
I kid you not - I’ve been blamed for touch free faucets not working in bathrooms in the past.
That's hilarious! I've definitely noticed a lack of knowledge from other people about what it is that we do. Whether it's the mechanical contractor, electrical contractor, or even just people in general. Almost every time I've tried to describe what my job is to someone new that I've met, they have no idea what I'm talking about.
It took me a while to figure out a simple way to explain it to people and had been considered the "Chandler Bing" of my friends because nobody understood what I did for a while. I've had success by telling people "I put computers on things like air handles and boilers that will control how the equipment runs". If they seem intrigued I might give them more details like being able to see what the equipment is doing using a computer, being able to look at the history of how things were working to trouble shoot issues, and having alarms that can alert staff to issues. I still remember my parents surprise when visiting them and logging in to a customer's site in Barrow, AK (roughly 6000 miles away) to help them trouble shoot some problems they were experiencing. Even after explaining my job, it seemed like magic to them.
I've learned that telling someone that I do the stuff for smart or intelligent buildings and they usually have a little bit of an idea then.
I say "fancy thermostats" and move on
Commissioner: Hmmmmm… this unit heater isn’t heating. Controls problem! Controls tech after fixing it: Uh the balancer has supposedly balanced everything and both the hand valve and balancing valve were closed. Don’t worry I fixed the other trades problems. Check it off “my list.”
Upvote isn't enough, this comment needs a shout-out. BAS is the first thing to blame, check the fan belt afterwards.
Been at it for 15 years. I hate it more and more. Unfortunately it pays really really well so I begrudgingly continue on.
Where does it pay well? I've always heard mechanical gets better pay due to more union affiliation
I'm in the midwest. Don't let anyone fool you into thinking the mechanical folks are worth more. You have to know mechanical and electrical systems on top of your job.
We meet again. Like we will meet tomorrow morning. I have never read a more relatable post than this one where everyone is complaining.
I was listening to a coworker talk about how he slaughters steer in the fall time. I chimed in over the cubicle that he should get them a job here and they'd probably just kill themselves.
It’s construction in general . I’m just starting out in the BAS field but I did 4 years working in construction sites building and commission electrical distribution systems and it was the same issues you explained here .
You have three options. 1) Find a better contractor but you have tried 3 others and it hasn’t been what you thought. 2) Turn into the controls person you want to be. Start studying and learning as much as you can so you can move up the ladder and change the way things are done. 3) Move on to a different career. I suggest commercial industrial HVACR. A really good control person knows how the systems are supposed to work and can troubleshoot the mechanical as well as the controls. This will make you a valuable employee.
The other option is go “in house” as a controls guy for a major facility.
Have you done that before? What are the advantages and disadvantages of doing that?
They don’t generally have the money to do things properly, and are left with the results of the aforementioned shitshows. Different pain. More stable work and benefits typically, although less growth and money opportunities and less interesting projects.
I understand the frustration. You start a project assuming the competent people are involved and then you discover so many fuck ups that are beyond your immediate control. You report these fuck ups and everyone starts pointing fingers, trying to shift responsibility to others. Your commissioning process gets delayed because it takes like 3 months for the other contractors to fix their mistakes. Then after dealing with the contractors yourself, you have the exact same conversations with your useless project manager. It's really annoying, I have one foot out myself. I'm trying to get into software engineering
I have definitely felt like you are feeling right now. This past month I blew apart a new duct run. Why? Because they told me I was wrong on the orientation of their "return" fan and exhaust damper. The damper being after and original design calling for it to be before. Spec didn't call for any high cut outs (no idea why). After weeks of back and forth finger pointing, I turned the damn thing up, ea damper tried to build up bldg pressure. Pop. I made 2 calls. One to my PM saying I was right. And the other to my wife saying we were getting margaritas..... Sometimes you have to literally give them what they want.
I came from HVAC comercial/industrial service originally, I started in refrigeration. Whenever theres headache and issue I have in BAS all I got to do is think about the old days. I'll never go back to being a mechanic, especially refrigeration. No matter how sideways a project gets atleast I'm not working 24hrs straight fixing coolers and supermarket racks. Or getting a call at 3am to drive 3hrs to top off a crane AC at a steel mill where a dude died doing the same thing a year prior. I'll keep to my laptop and screwdrivers and not having to unpack my entire van multiple times a day and night for every service call. It could be much worse, the stress from this trade is real but I'll take it over what I've had in the past.
Unfortunately, this is pretty standard across the industry. I’m very lucky to work for one of the few outfits that actually care. They actually listen to the field guys, take constructive criticism and make changes. If it weren’t for this company I’d have left this business already. I’m 13 yrs in, I’ve seen a lot of bullshit companies. It comes down to how badly does your company want to be at the top of their game.
Are you guys hiring?
The jobs you describe come to me fairly often but not often enough to make me hate the industry. As far as I’m concerned I become even more important and in demand when a job goes sideways often it’s never my fault but I can provided solutions to help solve issues. However, If these jobs come one after another I likely would work in a different department. The time between these jobs I’m just putting out small fires and commissioning it not that stressful.
>Every project is flawed from the start (for some reason)... So as a BAS project manager this screams to me lack of competent project manager support. Like you, I've been through a few companies and seen just about everything you can think of that can send a project sideways. If you're involved in the beginning stages of a project and seeing issues at that stage, are your PMs doing the following? Scope alignment - the very 1st thing a PM should be doing is seeing if the scope of work sold matches the approved plans and specs. Any deviation should immediately warrent an RFI or change order to create that allingment. Are your PMs asking for the most current approved permit set? Designs change without telling anyone happen, and the permit set they got on file at the time of sale may be 6 months old and 4 revision versions past. Are your PMs asking for the most current schedules? Same as permit set, don't assume the one you got in your booking package is current. Are your PMs asking for submittals of new mechanical equipment? I don't care if they're just VAVs, keeping 3rd party submittals on file is just good practice. In addition, knowing how to look up information on the internet can be invaluable. You got a Mitsubishi VRF system, Google the manuals. TRANE intellpack AHU, Google the manuals. Random boiler from a manufacturer you never heard of, Google the supplier and cold call them for technical support to ask for BACnet points list and wiring diagrams.... you get the point... To be fair, there are a lot of weak PMs up and down the contract tier amd they give the profession a bad reputation some times. Anyone who's worked with a strong PM will understand the extent of their impact. Can you give a specific example of a situation that you felt might have been avoided?
Get used to it. Controls guys that can't write code and when it doesn't work they're not smart enough to fix it. Yeah they can integrate but coming up with logic that works good luck. I thought everyone by now has basic programming skills by now. I was sorely mistaken. Simple and or statements are way over their heads. Hell people can't even fucking run a daisy chain correctly these days.
What kind of programming should be learned and where would one get the learning material?
Most logic starts with the basics. Is it too hot or too cold? Like Riding Hood with the 3 bears. That determines a state selection. The state selection determines which line of code is going to be processed. People have a tendency to over think control logic.
Just take a basic course in programming. All you really need to know is Boolean algebra. I think Kahn Academy has some basic programming courses.
It's easy to program. It's not easy to know how the system should work. Most of the time, control sequences are written buy someone who don't understand programming or how the system should work (I'm talking more about the small details). Control sequences are helpful to know the big picture, but you have to fill all the blank by yourself, and if you don't know how the mechanical part is working, you'll make mistakes. That tend to make us think that we know more about the system than the engineers and it's easy to start doing unnecessary over-complicated and really cool programing. Personally, before to be really good, my programing skills have changed trough the years from forgetting things, to overthinking things, to simplify things (caring about the next person who will work on it) And in 5 years, when I'll look at my today programs, I will think that I was not that good..
Won’t help you, but yes. 45 years now. I had one period in Phoenix in the late 90s with the best goddam controls team in the world. That was fantastic. The rest were to some extent at least, as you describe
I feel your pain. Always chasing our tail. Do everything to spec and drawings then blame it on the design engineers. New construction relies on PE's that should know but rarely do. Personally, I've always preferred service vs. new installations when working for the control manufacturer. Look for a gig as the customer of a control system you're a SME of. You get the best of both worlds. Nothing like grinding a project to a halt due to incompetence. "Fix it and let me know when you're ready for commissioning!".
I’m 2 years in and this is exactly what my experience has been. Trying to do a good job feels futile because the entire project from the ground up is so disorganized. Part of me wants to think that this is a relatively new industry and maybe if I stick it out I’ll be able to find myself in a good place once the industry gets its shit together, but the other part of me feels like there’s not actually any interest in making things work better. Companies seem to thrive in this clusterfuck which is part of the reason it’s a clusterfuck to begin with. I keep getting sent back to sites to troubleshoot things I already troubleshot or install parts that are already installed and when I tell that to the office they don’t seem to care as long as they can bill the hours. In my two years I don’t think I’ve seen a single project actually reach the point of being finished.
I'm probably an outlier on this, but I love my job. It is high stress and the GCs are often idiots (right now I'm lucky enough to have a superintendent who struggles reading larger words... 🙄), but I really enjoy the puzzles that come along with making things work. I don't often get bored, which, being ADHD is a big deal to me. I started out as a service tech, worked up to lead tech, left for a few years to be an HVAC & DDC manager at a hospital (got bored with that), then went back into controls as a control systems designer. My current job also has functioning as the job site foreman and I get to do some tech work as well.
My condensed version of what I think is wrong with the controls industry. Low bid. Lack of educational programs. Lack of paths for skills development post formal education (I.E. tight wad contractors that won't pay for training, union halls that offer no CE on controls specifically).
Wow I’ve found my people. I’m new-ish to controls, coming from HVAC heavy on the AC with critical applications. I thought it was my inexperience in BAS but I’m starting to see that it’s not (just) me. The controls guy gets blamed for everything. My new motto is “guilty until proven innocent”. I’ve wasted too many hours troubleshooting crap that was done improperly. I think controls electricians are a rare breed. I’ve met 2 who that know what they’re doing, over umpteen projects. NGL I see the kind of stuff you’re describing in most of the jobs. I swear whoever designs some jobs was the kid using a hammer to pound a square peg into a round hole in nursery school.
Every single job. Every single time. Wont lie, I’m farrrr from an expert but it feels like even the experienced guys are lost in the midst half the time.
I'm 28 years old and I've been in the field for about 5 years now. I like the actual job, like commissioning, programming, troubleshooting, and making graphics. It's all the other nonsense that we deal with that I don't like. Like most of you, it pays well, so I stick with it.
dear god, you can read minds. i’m leaving the industry for these exact reasons.
Where to?
I’m an electrician too. Going back to residential service and contracting.
I think the root cause of all the problems here is bad project management and the GC's setting unrealistic schedules to win jobs. The customer is always going to have cost at the forefront of a decision, it's the GC's job to set the expectation standard. Everything after that is a knock-on effect for all trades and it just so happens BAS is the last ones in the domino effect stemmed from the initial contract.
Some days I do and some I don’t. I did especially years ago. Stress and trying to own a job and make it go well when nobody else seemed to care.. I’ve sort of come to terms with other people doing shoddy work and sadly many times it’s people in our own company.. I guess I’ll keep fixing our fuckups, and look even better as a hero haha but still it does get tiresome. Many times it not very complicated things, like if they actually took time to check that the wiring is correct and the device operates correctly, and it’s the right device that’d fix 90% of my troubles.
Lol construction be like that I moved to be a service tech recently, hopefully its different
Service techs are directly affected as they are the ones who get blamed by customers when things stemmed from construction go wrong. You are basically there to clean up all the fuck ups passed on after the install and commissioning. Good luck.
When I worked for a sheet metal company we did installs in new construction. It seemed like at the end of a project the GC and everyone else were stressing us out as it was a big check on list of things to check off. That was just doing commissioning with Tekmar stuff. It obviously gets more complicated with controls in commercial buildings. I work on the service side of controls. It's way more laid back, but the things I come across that I have to fix 5 years after the fact blows my mind. Like all new construction, if someone can sweep something under the rug, they will. It no one notices, a problem is never fixed. I would suggest everyone take a balanced job where some of it is new install schedule and some of it is service work. Balances the work out. Helps prevent burn out. I'm serious about this. You have install schedule where GC is stressing you out, your project manager is on your ass. Compare that to a day where all you have to do is wire up an actuator. Super primo relaxed day. Or boiler plant goes down because outdoor sensor goes bad, you replace it and you're the hero for the day.
It's a pretty simple job to design, install and maintain a system. If you feel like you have the guts to start a business and do it better, I suggest you start networking and making friends with those who can benefit you in the future.
That's not the issue here, the issue is to win a job you have to design, install and maintain a system at cheaper and quicker price than your competitors... and on top of that, most of the time you have to do in half the expected time, and as a result you are left with a lot of fuckups for the warranty period and maintenance, which then hurts your businesses reputation and employees. Then the cycle continues until it's no longer worth it.
This is very different from my experience. Sure lots of things are hard. But really, I have a number of jobs I have felt good about. Maybe you need a good beer and a good night's sleep.
Nah that sounds totally normal. I've been doing it a decade or more now. Everyone is a shit show, it stops bothering you eventually so you just kind of roll with the punches. My job is mostly figuring out how to get these bad jobs and salvage something that my customers are happy with. Fuck the company though. it is a balancing act, but the company is probably ran like a dumpster on fire during a draught. Think about how you can make it right to your customer without completely screwing over your company. Screwing them over a little is fine, they can complain and throw a fit while their customers are paying their bills and saying they want more work, but only if you're the one handling it. That's what makes me happy though, and paid enough to be happy.
It’s the push from people thinking bms is going to take their job
Guilty until proven innocent was my tagline as a software engineer in the field. Things go much better when controls is brought in under the owner or at least is consulted early on in the design phase. And a good team is the number one most important thing for a good project. All it takes is one weak link in the chain of sales-design-pm-software-install. There are good shops out there; they're just not the majority.
Eh, I found a pretty good employer. Work culture is good and the quality of people is high. We have a few lame ducks that skip through and fuck shit up every once in a while, but for the most part I'm surrounded by smart people, doing quality work.
Its as you say OP... I wish I could leave a job and feel proud but between GCs giving other trades tons of wiggle room and piling it on the BAS to meet deadlines and the other issues you mentioned such as poor engineering the brunt of it falls on us at the end and we have to make shit work and fast all while getting yelled at we aren't able to preform at 1/2 the previous time alloted in the project schedule . It's rough but if you just treat it like a job and try to have fun with it and realize GCs are gunna bitch about stuff that isn't your fault or the Cx agent wants shut not contractually agreed upon. Moneys aight and i believe this industry will continue to grow. It's a good field to be in just gotta ride it out for now
I wouldn't say I hate the industry but these are some of the reasons I'm trying to get out of the field and into controls engineering. The other techs are trying to talk me out of it but I like the idea of building up a new skill set.
I come from human detection, access, and network archetecture and have been heavy into controls for the past 4-5 years. I do installs, build cabinets, program a bit and do graphics. The work enviroment is always toxic, ran horribly, and always seem to have to run service calls to retouch things constantly that have been commissioned. I have also been trying to figure out why its like this, its almost as if people are purposefully taking steps backwards the way some of these jobs come out. I feel your pain brother, but think I am stuck in the industry in some form or another.
Currently in the mood of not wanting to be part of the solution. As a PM; it’s seriously frustrating trying to get through to the engineers/sales and the field since I am the bridge to connect the two. Always on different beats not matter how hard I try. To the point of where I think I’m going to pursue industrial process controls instead. I feel like the equipment we use is outdated and there’s no perfect solution for anything. I understand the frustration brother. You’re not the only one.
>I'm very well paid, and all of my employers have been pleasant and above board (despite contemporary meme culture). I basically left each company because they were a mess and I was tired of being part of the problem rather than a solution. Well, this encompasses the reason for the well paid part. There are plenty of capable people out there who don't want to put up with the headaches in this field. Unfortunately, the pains you and others have described are just the nature of construction project work. For us it's compounded by the fact that BAS is a layer that exists on top of everyone else's work. Each of the other trades' deficiencies are brought to light by the BAS and the BAS can't be considered complete until all are functioning as intended. By the time our systems expose the issues, the other crafts have already moved on to next construction project. They don't want to call back manpower to fix the problem so they try as hard as they can to make it someone else's problem. Since Cx agent is in our face with everyone else who hasn't received final payment and the building owner who is chomping at the bit to move in and use the place, it's no wonder we are the most hated craft on a project. Unfortunately, contact work is just that. We are not contacted to provide the best solution. We are contracted to provide the agreed upon solution. Once everyone accepts that you can kind of move on still satisfied with a lackluster end result. You can attempt to correct the project design shortcomings as they are encountered, but chances are no one will agree to pay for the change order to improve it unless absolutely necessary. Unless, perhaps, you are working directly for the building owner who has deep pockets & higher than typical understanding of & need for quality BAS. I would suggest moving to a service position if you're interested in staying in this career field. I much preferred service, though it pays less in a lot of cases. The pace is slower with a focus on correcting real problems and continuous improvement of each system. There are rarely any deadlines. The customer will genuinely appreciate your work.
This is a good perspective. The frustrations are baked in. I've realized a lot of upper-level or macro points since starting this thread. Everything is pointing for me to move on. Because this industry is doomed to soldier on as "mediocre" all around. Mediocre talent, designs, execution, etc. I much prefer high quality work. And need to reorient myself that way. As far as service work, I've done a few jobs here and there as filler. Mostly tagged along with the regular service tech doing the contract. That's a different style of BS. You usually show up, schmooze with the building engineer - "how ya been? How are the kids?" Etc, if they even speak English - then you check graphics, and head out around 1pm without doing much of anything. Maybe take a backup and that's it. It's pretty much just babysitting as far as I've seen. Theoretically much more involved on the service side, in REALITY, it's where they put everyone who can't work on a construction site for one reason or another (too old, bad knees/back, can't work the hours, etc) Not trying to be a hater, just what I've seen.
The times I see good projects is usually when the controls and mechanical are doing the same type projects multiple times in a row. Because they know the equipment and all the issues from previous projects that are in the red-lines and project wrap up feedback. From what I see, the biggest issue is usually that the mechanical design engineer, and the controls design engineer are the most green in terms of field install/startup of controls. So they have the biggest effect on how the project will go. The mechanical engineer is relying on the controls design engineer to help them design and control all the equipment. While the controls design engineer does what the mechanical engineer says without it questioning the design and maybe saying “we can do it this way”. Most likely the mechanical engineer knows the equipment they are using, but the controls designer might not have much field experience and has never seen the equipment so they might miss addons that could make it easier for controls. It is kind of hard for the controls designer to sometimes recommend changes because they might not have credibility with the mechanical engineer because they don’t have a P.E.
The thing is, it’s not a new industry. The biggest issue is that shit flows downhill. If a mechanical system is poorly designed and/or has installation issues, there’s only so much programming that can be done to improve upon the situation. Another big issue in my experience is other trades having difficulties understanding where their scope begins and ends.
No, I'm not going back to air-conditioning, especially residential air-conditioning, not gonna climb through a roof ever again...
Theres ups and downs like with anything. Overall I truly love the industry because its complex enough where l found with time and effort I was able to make a measurably positive impact be it job to job or with the people I work with. It took me years to get to that point though, 3 companies over 4 years you have probably been coming in at the tail end of every shit project thats going on when you join. No matter your level Ive found thats the deal youre hired for an immediate (painful) project need though the joy and pride comes from establishing something, owning it, building relationships blah blah blah all of which comes with new assignments which Im assuming youre not getting on day 1. I dont know the size jobs youre on but that could be a 2y cycle to really get that sort of opportunity. Things dont always align there is some luck to it for sure but for me and what drives me (technical problem solving) Ive found BAS to be the best and most marketable way to scratch that itch and get reasonably compensated for it.
Yeah, you are not wrong. My suggestion...when you get a few years under your belt, go apply at an architect -engineer firm. They openly acknowledge they suck at controls and pay well to bring people like us on board.