The manufacturing and industrial sector in Colorado needed some help in providing lab space to deliver training in welding and other hands-on technical courses. Thus the Moible Learning Lab came into being. It can be transported to virtually any company or organization in Colorado and surrounding region to deliver customized high quality training, explains. John Vukich Director, Business & Industry Workforce Training Pueblo Community College.
Its home is a 40 foot trailer, custom designed, with a nearly a 9 ft. tall ceiling insolated walls and interior aluminum siding and an aluminum diamond plate decking for the floor. The lab is estimated to weigh 15,000 pounds and is pulled from site-to-site with a Mack cab-over truck that is dedicated to this lab.
The lab was designed using 3-D computer aided design software. It runs totally independent and has its own 100 KW diesel power generator thats transported with the lab to training sites. It was designed to be flexible in delivering an array of topics and can be converted in less than one day to teach Electrical Systems such as PLCs, Motors & Controls, and Instrumentation and Mechanical Systems such as hydraulics, mechanical power transmission, bearings and piping systems.
The current configuration is setup to teach welding for six trainees at a time and is outfitted with all new Lincoln Electric welding equipment including a fume mitigation system that was integrated into a common plenum ducting system that leads to the filtration units housed at one end of the lab.
Training costs through the lab vary by topic and length of training, however, an example would be 80 hours of welding training based on 6 trainees is $2495 plus reasonable travel expenses.
Significant partners in the project include: the PCC Foundation, Airgas, Lincoln Electric, Rexal, Aquila Energy and the PCC Facilities Department.
The project from concept to implementation was handled through the Business & Industry Workforce Training department (BIWFT) whose mission is to serve the needs of employers in terms of workforce development and training for their new and incumbent employees. The PCC Foundation provided funding support for 50% ($125,000) of the cost and the remaining 50% which was a combination of labor and material expenses was provided through the BIWFT department.
For more information please contact John Vukich Director, Business & Industry Workforce Training Pueblo Community College at [email protected]
