Apprentice Praises New High-Tech Facility at Royal Park

Apprentice mechanics are benefitting from a $500,000 high-tech expansion at the MTA’s Training & Employment Centre at Royal Park.

The investment is expected to benefit around 900 of the site’s 1100 students each year.

The workshop refurbishment is strongly geared towards the continued uptake of electric vehicles.

“We are positioning to meet the demand for where the industry is moving,” said MTA Skills & Facility manager Lachie Fotheringham.

“When the students come into our facility, we need to get them ready for whatever vehicle’s going to roll in the door of the garage they are working at.

“There are still a lot of petrol vehicles but the way things are escalating, it will become a 50-50 split.

“To have a state-of-the-art workshop, you need to accommodate both.

“We have installed EV chargers and have spent a considerable sum of money just to get enough electricity into that particular workshop.”

Once an old gymnasium floor littered with basketball and netball court lines, the workshop was completely gutted over the Christmas break and refitted with a high-quality epoxy floor, 13 hoists (up from six) and 75-inch screens on the walls.

“The old style of training would see students in the classroom where they’d run through some points on a projector,’” said Lachie.

“Now the trainer might do a little bit of theory in the classroom but then go straight out into the workshop where he can cast his computer onto the wall.

“So essentially we’re taking the training out into the facility and not having students sit in a classroom for five hours a day.”

Apprentice Paige Cole

Paige Cole is one student who couldn’t be more impressed.

“I think this facility engages everyone a lot more,” she said.

“Everything’s new, everything’s organised, we’ve got all the tools we need, we don’t need to waste time anymore looking around for things.

It’s all there, ready to use.”

“I decided out of school I may as well do something that challenges me as I wasn’t great with hands-on stuff, I was more book smart.

“So I thought I’d give the MTA a go and here I am, having nearly finished my apprenticeship.”

Tech Treasures

The MTA spared no expense when it purchased three EV PicoScopes at $12,000 a piece.

“We could teach them on a $2000 scan tool which is probably what most workshops have. But the capability of these gives them exposure to everything inside the vehicle,” Lachie said.

“We like to give them the best experience possible. It’s possibly not something they would have in a standard workshop but in a premium, high-end workshop, this is what you would expect to be used.

Paige Cole.