TWO young apprentices from a West Yorkshire engineering firm will be heading to London later this month in a bid for the student of the year title in the RAC Cooling Industry awards.

Jamie Acs and David Strong from Rawdon-based Airedale International Air Conditioning will go head-to-head in the competition held in association with the Institute of Refrigeration. The awards recognise the achievements of the best up-and-coming engineers and aim to inspire other ambitious engineers.

Jamie is the first Airedale apprentice to achieve a BSc honours degree in Refrigeration & Air Conditioning Engineering and the only student in his year to be awarded a first class classification.

He works as a service technical support engineer, as part of the company’s 55-strong service and spares division whose technical support staff and field service engineers provide round-the-clock coverage to data centres, industrial, retail and public sector customers across the UK .

His role requires him to hold advanced technical knowledge in order to support customers and site engineers.

Test engineer David Strong, recently qualified with a foundation degree in Refrigeration & Air Conditioning Engineering and holds a string of vocational NVQ and BTEC qualifications in mechanical and manufacturing engineering in addition to qualifications in practical skills such as brazing, electrics and refrigeration handling, the latter all gained at Airedale’s CITB Construction Skills approved training centre in Leeds.

David has already been involved in various ground-breaking projects, including testing the highest capacity chiller Airedale has ever produced as well as the new greener TurboChill chiller with low global warming potential.

He is also involved in end-of-line and witness testing final products at Airedale’s new research and development centre which is believed to be the largest test facility of its kind in the UK.

Both apprentices complete a 180-mile round trip every week to attend the Grimsby Institute of Further & Higher Education on a day release course .

They are among ten students nominated in RAC for this year’s awards. Winners will be announced on September 24. Airedale currently employs 12 apprentices.

eight in production and the Engineering Advanced Modern Apprentice award with Leeds City College in 2011.

Airedale Air Conditioning is currently operating from a temporary base in Leeds after a major blaze at its Rawdon base last September. The company, which has 320 employees, is planning to return to Rawdon in a new state-of-the-art factory by the middle of next year.