Interview with an electrical engineer

Features of work in an interview with a power supply design engineer

1. How long have you been designing?
I have been designing for 6 years, since 2012. Started as a student while working as an electrician.

2. Where does your work begin?
Work, as a rule, begins with communication with a potential customer. It is necessary to understand what he wants to get in the end result. It is necessary to collect initial data, make a list of necessary works, sections of the project. After that, it is necessary to provide the Terms of Reference, which will describe all the features of the work. The terms of reference can be made in the form of a kind of questionnaire, which specifies the design features, the equipment used, the availability of approvals, etc. For example, the terms of reference may state: “to provide for the crossing of Rossiyskaya street by the HDD method, to provide couplings from Raychem, the cable of the Energokabel plant”. Recently there was a project: a customer came with a request to design a 35 kV overhead line, the transmitted power is 1 MW. During the pre-project survey, we came to the conclusion that it is much easier to build CL-35kV using a cable made of cross-linked polyethylene. During this project, several atypical solutions were provided - a branch from the 35 kV overhead line, the overhead line transition point - 35 kV cable line, BKTP 35 / 0.4 kV. All this was proposed to the customer and after approval - the development of working documentation.

3. What normative documentation do you use in the design process?
Everything depends on the project. If these are external networks, it all starts with Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 87. If this is an overhead line-10kV, 0.4kV, we look at the standard designs of manufacturers, if CL, the standard project is A5-92. If the customer asks to make the layout of the power cabinet (ASU, SC) - GOST 32396-2013. Each section of the project documentation has its own list of "standards". This list may take up more than one page.

4. Do you coordinate the design decisions that you are preparing, at what stage does this happen?
Of course, the coordination of design decisions takes place in the design process or, if there are ready-made solutions from practice, at the initial stage of coordination of the TOR. As a rule, the project is built on a few key points, and the rest of the (current) decisions are adjusted to them..

5. How do you choose brands of used equipment and materials?
The material used is agreed with the customer at the initial stage. I can recommend the best option, using the experience of past projects. Although there are exceptions. In a recent project, 5 PTS 2x1000 10/0.4 were required on one site. Started designing two double-circuit VLZ-10kV, simultaneously sending requests for prices from various manufacturers of PTS, after that it was transferred to the customer, and he decided which manufacturer to choose, which took a rather long period of time, but this is more an exception than a rule.

6. Where do you usually look for and find design orders??
Are there ways to find customers? Projects on external networks, as a rule, come from former colleagues, or by word of mouth. Once a customer came to me, because he saw my project in an energy sales company, he liked the quality - he applied. For more specialized orders - the Internet, labor exchanges, specialized forums.



Martynenko Denis. Krasnodar
Lead to Telegram Power engineer blog

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