Edan Cooper

• At GCS precast my day to day duties include: Setting out formwork for concrete panels and columns.
• De-moulding/stripping formwork.
• Operating overhead gantry crane to lift and store concrete panels. Load concrete panels onto transport trucks.
• Operating Forklift.
• Cutting, bending and tying reinforcement for concrete products.
• Quality assurance check pre and post concrete pour to ensure precast products are correct.
• Placing/pouring concrete, finishing concrete with hand and power trowel tools for a smooth finish.
• Other duties can include cleaning, taking deliveries, and assisting others to achieve targets.

With Freyssinet Australia, I got an opportunity to join one of Melbourne's biggest projects, West Gate Tunnel Project.

I was able to use my skills and learn new skills in multiple teams within the project such as:

• Assisting the Post Tensioning team to run and tension the tendons.
• Setting formwork and steel work for concrete.
• Grouting tendons, placing and finishing concrete.
• Dogging - Working with crane operators and directing loads.
• Removing formwork, cleaning areas and assisting with other tasks.

• At Coen Precast my day to day duties would include the following:
• De-moulding/stripping formwork.
• Operate overhead gantry crane to lift and store concrete panels and columns. Load concrete products on transportation trucks.
• Assisting formwork carpenters setting formwork, cutting and measuring formwork.
• Cutting, bending and tying steel reinforcement to build cages for columns and panels.
• Quality assurance check pre and post concrete pour to ensure precast products are correct.
• Ordering, placing and finishing concrete, using power and hand trowels.
• Other duties may include forklift operation, cleaning and assisting other coworkers.

• During this time I was relocating long distance, taking on jobs such as:
• Assisting concrete businesses with setting residential house slabs, driveways and pathways.
• Duties include: Screeding concrete, finishing concrete to a smooth finish for house slabs, swirl finish for pathways and driveways.
• Assisting with formwork and steel work to prepare for concrete.

NVC Precast is a prestressed/pretensioned precast yard, making large products such as Super T Beam bridge beams, L Beams - Level crossing removal beams, and smaller bridge beams. Beams of up to 120 TON in weight.

I first started at NVC precast with some experience in residential concreting. Over a short period of time I learnt many skills by assisting task leaders and coworkers. I was offered a position as a task leader, which I did for 3 years.

My duties would include the following:

• Communicating with project managers, supervisors to organize concrete and steel deliveries, other trades needed and so on to meet project deadlines.
• Delegate and supervise jobs to team of 12 members, working together to complete works.
• Setting and preparing concrete moulds, shuttering and formwork using various tooling depending size of the job.
• Setting steelwork, running steel cable for pre-tension stressing. Tensioning the cable with hydraulic tooling. Setting the formwork and shuttering ready for concrete pour using overhead gantry cranes.
• Communicating with concrete deliveries and coworkers to place and finish concrete.
• De-moulding, lifting concrete beams using overhead gantry cranes, moving to storage and loading transport trucks.
• Operating Excavators, Skid Steers, Forklifts.
• Use of grinders, Arc and Mig welding, Gas Cutting - Oxygen + Acetylene
• Other duties such as: Dogging - Directing mobile crane movements with many materials, steel and concrete products. Assisting other task leaders as needed. Patching and repairing concrete.