Antenna rigging

Any Service leaver with a head for heights might be interested in a career in antenna rigging. Riggers install radio communication systems serving a variety of end users – anything from people having conversations to entire computer networks transferring data. Whatever the communication, it is converted into radio waves and transmitted through space between transmitter and receiver.

Riggers can install a variety of antennas to carry these signals, with just one example being a mobile phone tower with cellular antennas on its top. They cast a 360-degree ‘shadow’ over about six kilometres so that anything up to around 200 to 250 conversations can take place at any one time. Each individual antenna points in a specific direction; these are calculated and aligned at installation.

For point-to-point links a microwave dish is often used. Large ones are easy to recognise; they look like large kettledrums on their side and enable information to travel 30 to 40 kilometres. Instead of a diffused transmission, this construction produces a focused beam that can be pointed precisely at the receiving antenna.

Depending on training and experience, a rigger will erect these and other types of antenna, at anything up to 500 feet. Today’s rigger also needs to know Health & Safety practices, including how to select, inspect and use personal protective equipment – helmet, harness and fall arrest – and then consider the best system for lifting and installing antennas and feeders.

Rigging requires people with:

-mechanical aptitude

-basic communications understanding

-the ability to work outdoors throughout the year

-team-working skills

-a head for heights.

Few UK companies will employ people without civilian certification. The communications industry has a very good Health & Safety record and certification has to be reassessed periodically to keep standards high.

Industry entrants should attend a telecommunications rigger training course that should cover:

-safe access to all potential work areas using personal protective equipment

-rescue procedures

-in-depth antenna installation.

As an example, Xi Training Ltd courses have a hands-on approach and, although you cannot learn this job from a book, practice is supported with some classroom work.

The next step is to find work. Few organisations will now give inexperienced riggers a full-time position. The big employers now find it better to select from recruitment agencies. This is good for freelance riggers in a number of ways:

-they can pick and choose work that interests them

-varied contracts allow potential for travel

-contract work means being your own boss, with the freedom to choose when and whether to work.

Agencies can easily be found by surfing the Internet using key words. The more specific the better, and try to work with a good search engine.

After some time many people worth their salt can gain more long-term work with one client, and this can even lead to a full-time position. However, there can never be a guarantee of regular employment because the work tends to be feast or famine – a great deal one minute and little the next. The way to be employed full-time as a contractor is to be multi-skilled as a rigger.

Pay varies hugely between about £7 and £60 per hour, depending on experience, employer and location/complexity of the job. At the upper end of this scale, this can allow the expense of training and buying personal protective equipment to be recouped very quickly.

Over the last 12 months the telecoms market has seen some highs and lows, stability has returned in this sector with the recent new build of 3’s network and the start of the other mobile operators upgrading from 2 and 2.5G to 3G. Middle and Far East markets remain positive for riggers willing to travel while, in the UK, the countrywide instillation of wireless data and Internet access is keeping rigging firms busy. Future areas for work include broadband, 3G, TETRA and day-to-day maintenance contracts.

Mobile phone technology is constantly being updated. The industry is presently gearing up to install systems to cover the third generation. In the not too distant future we will have enhanced Internet links, global positioning systems, MP3 players and, one day, even real-time video links. This will require updating of existing towers and the building of a substantial number of new ones to cope with this increased traffic.

As business interests move forward nationally and internationally, there will always be a need for better and faster communications systems. This means jobs in rigging for those willing to develop their skills through training. This is the only way to keep one step ahead in the fast-moving world of telecommunications.

Steve Lewis can be phoned on 01524 782333 or e-mail him on Info@lars.co.uk