Forty Days of Verified Experience
The EFNARC certificate requires 40 days of documented spraying before the final practical assessment. A classroom cannot teach what a nozzleman learns on the 30th shift: reading the surface, watching the material behave, adjusting to the load that arrived, keeping the thickness. The 40 days are the scheme's evidence that the operator has done the work.
The Form
The experience is recorded on the EFNARC work experience form and signed by a supervisor, shift boss, project manager or another responsible person who saw the work. The form records the project, the site, the dates, the equipment used and the number of days, with the name, position and contact details of the person signing. Experience older than 5 years does not count.
Hand spraying days count towards the Hand Spraying certificate and robotic days towards the Robotic certificate, because the competencies are different. The 40 days for the Hand Spraying scheme mirror the Robotic scheme. The days are production work on a site, under a supervisor who can correct the technique, and a demonstration on a training wall does not count towards them.
How We Check It
We contact the signatory to confirm the days, and we ask for photographs of the operator spraying on that site where they exist. Experience that cannot be confirmed is not counted. Experienced operators submit the form before the course. New operators build up the days after the simulator module, on their own site, and submit the form before the practical assessment.
Why It Cannot Be Skipped
Supervised practical experience is the one step in a nozzleman's pathway that cannot be shortened. The order is site induction and authorisation, underpinning knowledge, supervised practice on work that is not the structural layer, a verification of competency on the plant being used, then certification. Distance, angle, pattern, reading the material and reading the ground are motor skills and judgement, and a screen or an examination does not teach them.
Every boom has its own geometry and speed settings, so even an experienced robotic operator learns the movement paths of a new machine on a wall that is not part of the work. By hand, the skill is holding distance and angle for a whole load while fatigue, awkward geometry and the hose work against it. Distance drifts out first as the arms tire, and nothing on the wall changes quickly enough to show it.
Candidates Short of the Days
A candidate without the 40 days can still do the theory, the examination and the simulator. The simulator records nozzle distance, angle, pattern, layer build-up and rebound for every scenario, which is how a new operator is assessed before they have a site record. They then build up the 40 verified days on their own site and return for the practical assessment, at a CGC assessment day or on an active job site by arrangement with the examiner.
Start the work experience form now, with the supervisor's name, position and contact details on it, so the days can be confirmed when the course is booked.
We run EFNARC nozzle operator courses for Robotic and Hand Spraying, on your site or at other locations by arrangement. The course pages have the modules and the enquiry form.
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