Engineering Industrial Training Board EITB

[john fletcher 1Participant @johnfletcher1]

[john fletcher 1Participant @johnfletcher1]

30/40 years ago lots young men (mostly men) left school and join an EITB training course. I'm a member of MENS SHED and to help with the basic metal working training I/we would like copies of the lathe and milling training manuals as issued to the lads. They were very well illustrated, we haven't a lot of money available so could you be generous. I'll pay the carriage. John

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

Oh happy days, I remember all those manuals but sadly long gone I'm sure you have searched online & still around but at a cost unfortuanateley.

Tony

[derek hall 1Participant @derekhall1]

I too was a "graduate" of the EITB.

Cannot help with any manuals I binned them ages ago….wish I hadn't

Derek

[martin perman 1Participant @martinperman1]

Mine like the others went years ago but they appear to be on Amazon.co.uk and not to badly priced.

Martin P

Edited By martin perman on 01/02/2022 21:26:58

Edited By martin perman on 01/02/2022 21:27:19

[donkeyParticipant @donkey]

I have lathe 1, lathe 2, milling 1 and machining for toolmaking and experimental work.

they can be yours for ten pound plus postage. cannot post until next week as I am away for four days.

Brian

[HOWARDTParticipant @howardt]

I did a year under EITB in 1967/8 at Hinckley near Leicester. Early days I believe for this type of training. We didn’t get a manual just a drawing for what we had to make, still have most of the items and using some. Initial workshop over the winter was in a wooden hut before we moved into a new dedicated workshop built onto the college building. Enjoyable days with a good grounding for workshop practice.

[HOWARDTParticipant @howardt]

I did a year under EITB in 1967/8 at Hinckley near Leicester. Early days I believe for this type of training. We didn’t get a manual just a drawing for what we had to make, still have most of the items and using some. Initial workshop over the winter was in a wooden hut before we moved into a new dedicated workshop built onto the college building. Enjoyable days with a good grounding for workshop practice.

[Bo’sunParticipant @bosun58570]

Does the EITB exist today in some form? My guess is no. Practical training seen to have gone awry somewhat these days, unless it's a training scheme to get the unemployment figures down.

[Henry BrownParticipant @henrybrown95529]

I'm with HowardT on this one, I remember we had modules for the first year and then a yearly day book for the next four years to record what we'd achieved, we just had to work to engineering drawings.

That was when we spent the first 12 months in the Apprentice Training Section learning pretty much every general engineering discipline, during that time we spent the a week here and there in specialist areas such as the gear and white metal shops and inspection and then chose a discipline to follow.

A first class apprenticeship which has stood me well through my working life and still does.

Good luck with the search, I still have my general training modules along with my indentures somewhere but no specialised modules I'm afraid.

[colin branniganParticipant @colinbrannigan54160]

I left Secondary Modern school in 65 and went to a Further Education college on a pre-apprenticeship engineering course containing mechanical and electrical practice and theory including technical drawing and science, we were also shown how to write application letters and how to conduct oneself in an interview.

At the end of that college year you sat an exam and if your mark was high you went on to G2, above average was T2 and average you went on to MECP2, needles to say I ended up on the craft course. I had several apprenticeship offers and the company offering me the post was part of the EITB, i was never given any books but the books I bought were Chapmans and Engineering Practice, a blue one, The first year of the four year apprenticeship was fulltime in college, that would be 66 which at seventeen was great, lots of girls attending commercial and pre-nursing courses, I also remember a log book one had to fill in every day.

Anyone remember the forty hour practical exam in year four?

Colin

[Swarf, Mostly!Participant @swarfmostly]

Posted by Bo'sun on 02/02/2022 09:17:36:

Does the EITB exist today in some form? My guess is no. Practical training seen to have gone awry somewhat these days, unless it's a training scheme to get the unemployment figures down.

When I researched EITB some years ago, the only trace of the organisation still extant was the EITB Staff Pension Scheme!

My recollection of the EITB in operation was not as an actual training body (though I'm not disputing that such a body existed). As I understood it, EITB was established to counter the problem that the large engineering firms performed, and paid for, virtually all the training, only to have the smaller firms 'poach' all the trainees once they'd completed their training. So the EITB exacted a levy from each engineering firm, according to their head-count. Firms then reclaimed funds from the EITB for each training exercise they performed.

The system was a bit vulnerable to abuse – I remember that, as a young electronics engineer, I was for a while encouraged by my employer's training manager to attend the IEA exhibition, the Physical Society's Exhibition and to attend various semiconductor maufacturers' seminars on microprocessors. 'Well, it's all training, innit!'.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Edited By Swarf, Mostly! on 02/02/2022 10:24:55

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

I went though EITB 1970-74 & years later had apprentices use the scheme, to my eye it was dumbed down at the end with loads of theory writing involved but very little practical metal cutting, it's how the world has evolved I suppose. My last apprentice I think was doing NVQ's ??

Tony

[Mike HurleyParticipant @mikehurley60381]

If you are talking about BASIC metalworking skills, I would have thought that the very reasonably – priced Workshop Practice series would be another choice. OK, they won't be as detailed or in-depth as EITB manuals, but for the price don't they do cover most things the average chap needs to know?

While the basic principles remain the same, often older manuals / books do refer to outdated practices or even those that we (well some people at least!) now might consider dangerous – which could be something to be considered in your environment.

Just trying to be objective & helpful and in no way trying to criticise.

regards Mike

[ian vollerParticipant @ianvoller79273]

Same year and course that I did Colin, except I then did a 9 week block release from Reavells every year for 4 years at college. Don't remember a 40 hour exam but then I don't remember what I did yesterday.

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

From memory-

There's lots of good stuff on the netty going back to about 1900

Some you can buy, some can be downloaded for free

There are some really good south bend manuals on the net and there are US WW2 military instruction manuals for machinists

[derek hall 1Participant @derekhall1]

I had a very similar experience to you Colin.

Regarding the EITB and at the risk of straying off topic.

I did my apprenticeship 1974 to 1978. First year of apprenticeship many of us spent away from home (at 16) and I was based at Lowestoft College, living in "digs" and based full time in the machine shop for our first year basic training. During this time we did have one day a week "day release" either doing the Craft based course, or Technician based course or if you were really brainy, the ONC course.

At the end of this year we went back to our place of work, but in my case I was changed over to the S.I.T.B (Shipbuilding Industry Training Board) very similar to the EITB apart from marine bias… We still had to go one day a week to a local Tech college though..

Day release used to be 0900 through to 2000 (as it included an evening class)…a long day….

We used to have practical phase tests such as making a dovetail male and female bits using hand tools and a drill and the gaps had to be good enough to not allow a feeler gauge in (no idea what the size of feeler gauge was though). We also used to make several tools in the first year that I still use!

I agree about the distraction of young ladies attending nursing, art and other courses – Day Release at Tech always had its distractions and we used to try and arrange our breaks to coincide at the same time !!

I don't recall the 40 hour practical test though, maybe my course was slightly different.

I still have my log books!

Regards

Derek

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

I still have the log books gathering dust in my wardrobe, my hand writing has certainly gone down hill in the last 50 years.

Tony

Edited By Tony Pratt 1 on 02/02/2022 12:25:07

[NorboyParticipant @norboy]

I have also been looking for the EITB Lathe 1 and Lathe 2 books. If anybody has these and would be willing to part with them, please pm me.

Norboy

[Mike PooleParticipant @mikepoole82104]

My apprenticeship was from sept. ‘72 to aug.’76 run under EITB guidance. The first year was run as a series of 5 week blocks with one block split into 2 weeks welding and 3 weeks sheet metalwork. Three 5 week blocks at the Tech.College were also part of the first year. The second year was when you got to choose which trade to follow and to an extent the most successful in the first year were given first choice. The electrical instructor called me to his office for a talk and from being a passionate metalworker he turned me to the dark side and electrical maintenance. The second year was supposed to be another year in the electrical training workshop with another set of block release at tech. The instructor returned to wales at Christmas and decided to go contracting with his brother so we were sent to the shop floor about nine months early. We moved to various areas in the factory which were all quite different, Press shop, Paint shop, Tool room, and various body build areas which were very different, we were making 5000 Marina bodies a week on one floor and 8 Rolls Royce bodies a day on another. The Rover P6 body was the last floor to run piecework in the factory and was a very different atmosphere, if a machine broke down the operator would be straight round to fetch you to fix the machine but the measured day worker didn’t care and would wait for someone to notice they had stopped. Our apprenticeship finished on your 20th birthday or after three and a half years so being August born I had an extra 5 months on apprentice pay compared to my mates. My absolute hate was the logbook and skill sheet task, I filled most of it in in the last few months with a number of semi fabricated jobs to get the skills ticked off. Some people produced beautifully written and illustrated logbooks but mine was an appalling mess to be hidden from any EITB inspection. I still have my EITB certificate of training somewhere but my indentures mean more to me. I think I still have the EITB module J2 and J22 books somewhere but much of it will be of little use these days.

Mike

Edited By Mike Poole on 02/02/2022 13:32:54

[Nick Clarke 3Participant @nickclarke3]

Turning II manual is on Scribd and the Lathe I manual comes up on a google search but on a closed Russian site

[mgnbukParticipant @mgnbuk]

My absolute hate was the logbook and skill sheet task, I filled most of it in in the last few months with a number of semi fabricated jobs to get the skills ticked off.

+1

I was constantly pestered by the Training Offcer from the Halifax Group Training organisation that oversaw the EITB appenticeships for all the local engineering companies to get mine up to date and (eventually) completed.

While I was overseen by the Halifax GT office, I completed my training at Bradford Technical College between 1977 & 1981. I was one of the two first "technician" apprentices set on by Halifax GT & that required doing HND level college courses rather than C & G. Halifax Technical College didn't offer these courses, so I did the First Year Off the Job training & the FE element at Bradford. Being electrically biased, most of the time (around 12 weeks out of the year IIRC) was in the electrical section, but we also spent time on bench work (fitting), turning & milling, sheet metalwork, welding (gas & stick) and forge work for a couple of weeks at a time, mixed throughout the course. Friday afternoons were technical drawing in a classroom.

We also had the 8pm finish on the weekly college day – difficult to stay focused at the end of the day.

I have my module & log books in a box up in the loft & all the other certificates etc. in the "job application" file. Can't recall the module numbers, but something like "Electrical installation 1 & 2 " – I could risk going up in the loft to find out if it were of interest.

All gone now. In '77 there were 13 of us in the Electrical section on the First Year course, 3 of whom were technicians & all bar one were employed. The one who wasn't was sponsored by his GT office, who placed him before he finished the course. The next year there were 3 entrants, all sponsored, & the course closed after that. with the instuctor taking early retirement. Last time I walked past there (around 15 years ago) the old training school area was offices.

Nigel B.

[Jordan PalmerParticipant @jordanpalmer60621]

Does anyone have any available for sale? I am currently a second year student doing welding and fabrication. If so could let me know. Cheers

[john fletcher 1Participant @johnfletcher1]

I didn't get the EITB booklet which I was after, but instead got copies of the two excellent books from Arurotrade, one on lathe work by Neil the other on milling by Jason. I'm a helper at the local "Mens Shed" and I am trying, to get members to safely use a lathe and milling machine. These two books, full of very good quality explanatory pictures and are for us, a better alternative.

It is also good to hear from readers how the EITB such a good lurning base future work life (not forgetting the girls) and I'm sure Swarf Mostly, is correct re poaching of staff, it still goes along around where I live.John

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