Electrical and Plumbing Technician Lab

Course Description

Electrical and Plumbing Technician Lab equips students with training across multiple building trades, specifically covering rough and finish work in electrical systems, plumbing installations, and air conditioning systems.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, BCV is the Building Construction Vocational prefix and the leading zero identifies postsecondary adult vocational instruction. Daytona State publishes this at 150 clock hours, offered fall, with BCV0081L as corequisite and a $21.25 laboratory fee.

This course covers three separately licensed trades in 150 hours, and it is important to be clear about what that does and does not produce. It produces a technician who can work competently under supervision across electrical, plumbing, and air conditioning rough-in and finish — which is genuinely valuable, because a great deal of construction work is exactly that. ⚠ It does not produce a licensed electrician, plumber, or air conditioning contractor, each of which requires documented experience and examination on its own track. Read the licensure note below before making career plans around this course.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Describe electrical theory sufficient for safe installation work.
• Describe the electrical code framework governing installations.
• Identify conductors, cables, boxes, and devices and their applications.
• Perform electrical rough-in, including boxes and cable runs.
• Describe grounding and bonding and why they matter.
• Install receptacles, switches, and fixtures correctly.
• Describe circuit protection, overcurrent devices, and GFCI/AFCI protection.
• Test and troubleshoot a basic circuit safely.
• Apply lockout/tagout and verify de-energisation before working.
• Describe arc flash and shock hazards and their controls.
• Describe plumbing systems: supply, drain, waste, and vent.
• Identify piping materials and select them appropriately.
• Cut, join, and support piping using appropriate methods.
• Perform plumbing rough-in to layout.
• Describe drainage slope, venting, and why they govern layout.
• Set and connect fixtures.
• Test a system for leaks and pressure.
• Describe backflow prevention and cross-connection control.
• Describe air conditioning system components and operation.
• Describe refrigeration cycle basics.
• Perform basic air conditioning installation tasks under supervision.
• Describe ductwork, airflow, and condensate management.
• Describe refrigerant handling requirements and the certification they require.
• Apply trade-specific safety practice throughout.

Optional Outcomes

• Describe load calculation at an introductory level.
• Describe low-voltage and control wiring.
• Describe solar photovoltaic installation at an awareness level.
• Describe water heater and tankless systems.
• Describe indoor air quality and ventilation.
• Obtain EPA Section 608 certification.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• Electrical theory for installation
• The electrical code framework
• Conductors, cables, boxes, and devices
• Electrical rough-in
• Grounding and bonding
• Devices and fixtures
• Circuit protection and GFCI/AFCI
• Circuit testing and troubleshooting
• Lockout/tagout and verification
• Arc flash and shock hazards
• Supply, drain, waste, and vent systems
• Piping materials
• Cutting, joining, and supporting pipe
• Plumbing rough-in
• Slope and venting
• Fixture setting
• Leak and pressure testing
• Backflow prevention
• Air conditioning components
• The refrigeration cycle
• Basic AC installation
• Ductwork, airflow, and condensate
• Refrigerant handling requirements
• Trade-specific safety

Optional Topics

• Introductory load calculation
• Low-voltage and control wiring
• Solar photovoltaic awareness
• Water heaters and tankless systems
• Indoor air quality and ventilation
• EPA 608 certification

Resources & Tools

• OSHA (osha.gov) — free construction standards, the Focus Four hazard materials, and the silica and heat guidance. OSHA 10 and 30 cards are inexpensive and frequently required for site entry.
• NCCER (nccer.org) — the standard craft training curriculum and credential registry in the construction industry; portable, employer-recognised, and worth asking your programme whether it is aligned to it.
• Florida DBPR — Construction Industry Licensing Board (myfloridalicense.com) — free; licence categories, scopes, requirements, and licence verification.
• Florida Building Code (floridabuilding.org) — free to view online; the code you will actually build to, including the high-velocity hurricane zone provisions.
• Your local building department — permitting requirements, inspection expectations, and local amendments; inspectors are generally willing to explain what they will look for.
• Registered apprenticeship programmes — through Florida's apprenticeship office and local trade associations; paid training with a documented experience record.
• Your instructors and site supervisors — the tool skills and the judgement come from watching people who have done it for years.
• Your own tools, gradually. Buy quality in the ones you use daily; a tradesperson's tools are a working investment.
• EPA Section 608 certification (epa.gov) — legally required to handle refrigerants; inexpensive, does not expire, and worth obtaining as early as possible.
• Florida Building Code — Plumbing, Mechanical, and Fuel Gas volumes, and the electrical provisions — free to view online.

Career Pathways

• Construction laborer — SOC 47-2061; the usual entry point and a genuine route upward.
• Carpenter — SOC 47-2031.
• Brickmason, blockmason, and stonemason — SOC 47-2021.
• Electrician — SOC 47-2111; licensed, well paid, and persistently in demand.
• Plumber, pipefitter, and steamfitter — SOC 47-2152; likewise licensed and in demand.
• HVAC mechanic and installer — SOC 49-9021; in Florida this is close to recession-proof work.
• Construction and building inspector — SOC 47-4011; a common later-career move for experienced tradespeople.
• Construction supervisor and superintendent — SOC 47-1011.
• Registered apprenticeship in a licensed trade — paid from day one, and the most reliable route to licensure.
• Self-employment as a licensed contractor — the long-term destination for many, and it requires the licence and documented experience described below.
• Florida's construction demand is driven by population growth and by storm recovery, and skilled trades have been in sustained shortage. ⚠ It is also cyclical — construction employment falls sharply in downturns, which is worth planning for.

Special Information

⚠⚠ Assume every conductor is energised until you have verified otherwise yourself

• Electrocution is one of the four leading causes of construction death, and the people killed are frequently experienced.
• ⚠⚠ Verify de-energisation with a tester you have just proved works. Test the tester on a known live source, test the circuit, test the tester again. A dead tester reads the same as a dead circuit, and that mistake has killed people.
• Lock out and tag out, and control the lock yourself. Someone else's assurance that a breaker is off is not verification, and breakers are switched back on by well-meaning people constantly.
• ⚠ Assume all overhead lines are energised and maintain clearance. Contact with overhead lines — by ladders, scaffolding, and equipment — is a leading cause of electrical fatality, and it is usually about something long being carried carelessly.
• Grounding and bonding are safety systems, not formalities. They exist to keep a fault from energising things people touch, and shortcuts in them produce hazards that stay hidden until someone is hurt.
• Do not defeat GFCI protection because it keeps tripping. A tripping GFCI is usually reporting a real fault.
• ⚠ Water and electricity are the Florida-specific combination. Humidity, outdoor work, and wet conditions all raise shock risk, and equipment left out in rain needs checking rather than plugging in.
• Arc flash is a burn hazard, not only a shock hazard, and it requires appropriate protection when working on or near energised equipment.
• ⚠ If you are not qualified for the task, do not do it. Working under supervision is lawful and sensible; working beyond your competence on electrical systems is how people die.

⚠⚠ EPA Section 608 — a whole-activity legal requirement, and get it early

• Federal law requires EPA Section 608 certification to purchase or handle regulated refrigerants, and to service, maintain, or dispose of equipment containing them.
• ⚠ This is not an employer preference — it is a legal gate on the activity itself. Working with refrigerant without it is unlawful regardless of skill or supervision, and it exposes the employer as well.
• There are separate types covering small appliances, high-pressure, and low-pressure equipment, with a universal certification covering all of them — take the universal.
• It does not expire, which makes it one of the best-value credentials in the trades.
• Venting refrigerant to the atmosphere is prohibited, and recovery equipment must be used. Penalties are substantial.
• ⚠ This matters especially in Florida, where air conditioning work is close to recession-proof and constant. Obtain the certification as early as you can — it costs little, and it makes you employable in a way the coursework alone does not.
• Refrigerant regulation is changing as the industry transitions to lower global-warming-potential refrigerants, some of which are mildly flammable and carry different handling requirements.
• ⚠ Rule 11 applies — refrigerant rules and approved substances are actively changing; verify current EPA requirements rather than relying on this guide.

⚠ Plumbing is governed by gravity and by cross-connection control

• Drainage constrains layout far more than supply does, because waste must fall at slope to an existing connection — and a great deal of Florida housing is slab-on-grade, so relocating drainage can mean cutting and repouring the slab.
• Slope must be correct in both directions. Too little and it will not carry solids; too much and the liquid outruns them and the line blocks.
• Venting is not optional plumbing. Without it traps siphon dry, and a dry trap admits sewer gas into the building — which is the actual reason vents exist.
• ⚠⚠ Backflow prevention protects the drinking water supply, and cross-connection control is a public health requirement rather than a code detail. A hose left in a container of anything is the classic cross-connection.
• Support piping properly. Unsupported runs sag, break joints, and produce failures inside finished walls.
• Test before concealing. A leak found at test is trivial; the same leak found after drywall is a substantial repair, and in Florida humidity it is also a mould problem.
• Use the right material for the application and the code — material substitution in plumbing is both a code and a performance issue.
• Solvent cements and torches carry their own hazards: ventilation for solvents, and hot work permits and fire watch for soldering.

⚠⚠ Construction is among the most dangerous work in the United States — the safety content is the most important part of this course

• Construction accounts for a disproportionate share of workplace fatalities, and the pattern of how people are killed is well established and largely preventable.
• ⚠⚠ Falls are the leading cause of death in construction. Fall protection is required above the applicable height, it must be used every time, and the fatal falls are overwhelmingly from routine heights during short tasks — the ladder for two minutes, the roof edge for one more measurement.
• Ladders kill people at low heights. Correct angle, three points of contact, no top-step standing, and secured at the top — and never carry a load that prevents you holding on.
• ⚠⚠ Struck-by, caught-in, and electrocution complete the pattern. Overhead loads, trench collapse, and contact with energised lines account for most of the rest, and trench collapse in particular kills quickly and buries people who thought a shallow trench was safe.
• ⚠⚠ Respirable crystalline silica is a serious and permanent hazard. Cutting, grinding, or drilling concrete, masonry, and tile releases dust that causes irreversible lung disease. Wet cutting, extraction, and respiratory protection are required controls, not optional care — and the damage is cumulative and silent for years.
• Assume older buildings contain asbestos and lead until tested. Renovation and demolition are where exposure happens, and both are regulated.
• ⚠⚠ Heat illness is a Florida-specific and lethal hazard. Construction work in Florida summer produces genuine heat stroke, which is a medical emergency and kills. Water, rest, shade, and acclimatisation for new workers are the controls, and the highest-risk worker is the new one in their first week.
• Hearing loss and hand-arm vibration are permanent and gradual, which is why they are neglected. Protection has to be habitual.
• ⚠ Lockout/tagout and electrical safety are non-negotiable, and assumptions about what is de-energised have killed experienced people.
• ⚠ You have the right to a safe workplace and to raise concerns without retaliation. OSHA protects that right. Refusing genuinely dangerous work is lawful, and speaking up is the single most valuable safety habit on any site.
• Get your OSHA 10 card, and OSHA 30 if you can. Many Florida sites require it for entry, and it costs little.

⚠⚠ This is a PSAV clock-hour course — it carries no college credit

• The leading zero in the course number identifies it as postsecondary adult vocational (PSAV) instruction, measured in clock hours rather than credit hours.
• ⚠⚠ Daytona State's catalog displays the clock-hour figure under a heading reading "Credit Hours". That is a rendering artefact of the catalog software, not a credit value. The number shown is hours of instruction; the college credit value of this course is zero.
• PSAV clock hours do not convert to college credit and do not transfer as credit to a degree programme. Do not plan a degree pathway on the assumption that they will.
• What they do produce is a workforce certificate and job-ready skill, which is the actual point — and in the construction trades that is a genuine and immediate route to employment.
• ⚠ Articulation agreements sometimes exist that let a completed PSAV certificate count toward a related A.S. degree. They are specific, they vary by programme and institution, and they must be confirmed in advance — ask an advisor rather than assuming.
• Financial aid for clock-hour programmes works differently from credit programmes, with its own eligibility and disbursement rules. Confirm with the financial aid office before enrolling.
• Clock-hour programmes have attendance requirements — hours must actually be completed, and absence directly delays completion in a way it does not in a credit course.

⚠⚠ Florida licenses construction contracting — know what you may and may not do

• Construction contracting in Florida is regulated under Chapter 489, Florida Statutes, through the Department of Business and Professional Regulation and the Construction Industry Licensing Board (Part I) and the Electrical Contractors' Licensing Board (Part II).
• ⚠⚠ Contracting without the required licence is an offence in Florida, and enforcement is real. It carries increased penalties during a declared state of emergency — which in Florida means after every hurricane, exactly when unlicensed work is most tempting and most harmful.
• Working as an employee of a licensed contractor is lawful; holding yourself out as a contractor is not unless you are licensed or exempt. That distinction is the one graduates most need to understand.
• Licences are held at state certified or state registered level, and there are separate categories — general, building, residential, roofing, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, and more — each with its own scope.
• Licensure typically requires documented experience as well as examination, which is why the sequence is normally: certificate, then work under a licensed contractor, then licensure.
• Local jurisdictions add their own requirements, including competency cards and registration in some categories.
• ⚠ Permits and inspections are legal requirements, not formalities. Unpermitted work creates liability, insurance problems, and obstacles when a property is sold.
• Registered apprenticeship is a strong route in the licensed trades — paid, structured, and it produces the documented experience licensure requires.
• ⚠ Rule 11 applies. Licensing categories, scopes, and requirements change — verify with DBPR and your local building department.

BCV0082L is PSAV clock-hour instruction: 150 clock hours and zero college credit, offered fall at Daytona State, with a $21.25 laboratory fee and BCV0081L as corequisite.

⚠ This course covers three separately licensed trades and produces none of the licences. Read the licensure note above, and get the EPA 608 certification early — it is cheap, permanent, and legally required for refrigerant work.