Training & competence
Autoclave operator training
General composites training does not teach somebody how to run a pressure vessel at 425°C. Our programme does — and it now carries a dedicated safety module.
New · Safety module
What to do when a cure goes wrong at hour three.
The safety module is the part of the programme we were asked for most often, and the part we think matters most. It is built around the situations that actually hurt people: pressure held where it was not expected, a door approached too early, an over-temperature with a full charge inside, and the decision-making of an operator alone on a night shift.
- Pressure hazards — stored energy, why a vessel is dangerous long after the heat is off
- Door interlock discipline — what the interlock proves, and what it does not
- Emergency shutdown — the difference between stopping a cycle and making a vessel safe
- Exotherm and runaway — recognising it early, and the correct response
- Reporting and near-miss culture — why the incident nobody logged is the one that repeats
Module 05 · Safety
At a glance
- Duration1 day
- DeliveryOn site or at Poole
- Group size4 – 12
- PrerequisiteNone
- AssessmentWritten + practical
- CertificateIssued on completion
Can be taken standalone by teams who already operate equipment, or as part of the full operator programme.
The programme
Five modules, built around the machine you actually run
01
The process
What a cure cycle is doing chemically and physically, why ramp rates and dwells are specified, and what actually goes wrong in a laminate when they are not met.
02
The machine
Vessel, circulation, heating, cooling, vacuum and pressurisation — what each sub-system does and what its failure looks like from the panel.
03
Loading & instrumentation
Charge layout, tooling mass, thermocouple placement and bagging discipline. Where most uniformity problems are actually created.
04
Running a cycle on CPC
Recipe selection and approval, pre-run vacuum integrity check, monitoring a live cure, responding to alarms, and producing the batch record afterwards.
05
Safety
The new safety module in full — pressure hazards, interlock discipline, emergency shutdown, exotherm response and incident reporting.
06
Troubleshooting
The faults operators meet most: instrumentation noise, a burner that will not light, slow cooling, a vessel that will not start. Diagnosis before escalation.
Why it pays
A trained operator is a cheaper risk control than a second autoclave
Scrapping one large aerospace part typically costs more than training the whole shift. Most of the cures we are called in to investigate failed for reasons an operator could have caught.
01
Fewer scrapped parts
Bagging and thermocouple discipline are learned skills. The difference between a trained and untrained charge is visible in first-pass yield.
02
Faster fault resolution
An operator who can distinguish a sensor fault from a process fault stops the right things and calls out the right people.
03
A defensible competence record
Customer audits increasingly ask who is authorised to run the equipment and how that was assessed. Certificates and assessment records answer it.
Book
Book your training session
Tell us the equipment, the number of people and whether you want delivery on site or at Poole. We will come back with dates and a quotation.
Running mixed equipment? We tailor the machine module to what is actually on your floor — including third-party autoclaves and ovens we support under AnyOEM Retrofit".
Prefer to talk it through?
Call the Poole office and ask for training. We will tell you honestly whether your team needs the full programme or just the safety module.