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j wilson Posted: Aug 30, 2008 09:24 PM	Foam School I am looking to attend a Foam school as a beginner. I looked at CPI and Graco's school that is listed on their site. Any experience, advice, or recommenations on these schools or any others ? Is there any type of accreditation or anything I should look for in these 2-3 day programs ? I would also like to get some info on the marketing aspect of the business as I am in rural North Dakota.
mason Posted: Sep 01, 2008 09:15 AM	There are many good training schools around the country including the ones you mentioned plus the PRTC in La Grange Ohio, BASF, NCFI, CorBond, Air Tight, Demilec, Icyenene, Bay Systems, Entech Equipment and many others. Some are accredited through the trade association Spray Polyurethane Foam Alliance (SPFA). Some also provide onsite training for an additional fee. Along with hands on training, you should also check out SPFA's Accreditation courses 101- BE for Building Envelope, 101 Fundamentals of SPF, 101-R for Roofing applications. (I provide these courses from time to time along with others) After training hundreds of applicators myself, I have found that a good instructor requires 3-5 days to teach the basics of spray technique, equipment maintenance, troubleshooting and handling of the material. After that is a 6 month to 1 year learning curve where the applicator becomes more proficient and experiences things in the field that you just cannot duplicate in a classroom or training session. It is very important to have a technical person available to help troubleshoot problems in the field during this 6 - 12 month period. They should be able to return your call within a few hours. Nothing worse than being shut down and having no way to spray without help. I also recommend that you buy your equipment and receive your training from folks that are familiar with the brand of foam you would be spraying. Stay away from the 1 day training courses. That is just enough to get you in trouble. Be sure to check their references. Obtain at least 10 and call all of them.

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Comments

j wilson

Posted: Aug 30, 2008 09:24 PM

Foam School

I am looking to attend a Foam school as a beginner. I looked at CPI and Graco's school that is listed on their site. Any experience, advice, or recommenations on these schools or any others ? Is there any type of accreditation or anything I should look for in these 2-3 day programs ?
I would also like to get some info on the marketing aspect of the business as I am in rural North Dakota.

mason

Posted: Sep 01, 2008 09:15 AM

There are many good training schools around the country including the ones you mentioned plus the PRTC in La Grange Ohio, BASF, NCFI, CorBond, Air Tight, Demilec, Icyenene, Bay Systems, Entech Equipment and many others.

Some are accredited through the trade association Spray Polyurethane Foam Alliance (SPFA).

Some also provide onsite training for an additional fee.

Along with hands on training, you should also check out SPFA's Accreditation courses 101- BE for Building Envelope, 101 Fundamentals of SPF, 101-R for Roofing applications. (I provide these courses from time to time along with others)

After training hundreds of applicators myself, I have found that a good instructor requires 3-5 days to teach the basics of spray technique, equipment maintenance, troubleshooting and handling of the material. After that is a 6 month to 1 year learning curve where the applicator becomes more proficient and experiences things in the field that you just cannot duplicate in a classroom or training session. It is very important to have a technical person available to help troubleshoot problems in the field during this 6 - 12 month period. They should be able to return your call within a few hours. Nothing worse than being shut down and having no way to spray without help.

I also recommend that you buy your equipment and receive your training from folks that are familiar with the brand of foam you would be spraying.

Stay away from the 1 day training courses. That is just enough to get you in trouble.

Be sure to check their references. Obtain at least 10 and call all of them.

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