ABYC Marine Electrical Cert, should I get one?

[frozenhawaiian]

here's the thing about getting your ABYC certs. you can study up, learn the material and pass the exam but if you still lack a good working knowledge of marine electrical systems you will NOT be a competent marine electrician. bear very well in mind that most boat fires are caused by faulty wiring, when people hire you to do electrical work on their boat they are putting their trust in you to do it right. "good enough" doesn't cut it when you're a hired tech working on someone else's boat. getting your ABYC cert is all well and good but if you don't already know the trade and/or if you're serious bout doing it for work I highly recommend spending some time working alongside a competent certified marine electrician. I'm not saying this to sound harsh but I've seen some terrifying electrical work done by ABYC certified electricians who just studied enough to pass their exams but lacked any actual working knowledge.

[Dsanduril]

We've been cruising the less beaten path for the last couple of years. By trade I'm an electrician - although not a 'marine' one. Most of the projects that might require ABYC certification are planned ahead for the off season. People re-wiring or putting in new gear or swapping out gear. In those cases you're competing with local technicians, closed yards, work visa requirements (if you get found out), etc. Nobody wants to import and swap out their inverter in the middle of the good season, they'd rather do it, along with all their other projects, while the boat is in NZ (for instance) for the off season.

Underway the three things I come across again and again are alternators, generators, and windlasses (and the refrigeration mentioned above) . Those are all key to people keeping themselves underway, and can fail at inopportune times in remote locations. They're also the things that start to get over the heads of many otherwise DIY people. Brushes and diodes are easy to deal with (if you have the knowledge and the spares), generator AVR/run capacitors seem to fail all the time, windings a bit tricky without a shop. Of course you'll have to 'compete' with those of us who do what we can for free.