🎛️ Building Controls · IBEW / NECA
Building Controls & BAS Code Practice for Apprentices
Practice building automation and controls — 4–20 mA signal scaling, control-valve sizing, and BAS logic — in real controls puzzles. Free for IBEW/NECA apprentices.
What you'll practice
- ✓Signal scaling (4–20 mA / 0–10 V ↔ engineering units)
- ✓Control-valve Cv and authority
- ✓Sensor wiring and wire-break (NE43) detection
- ✓Sequences of operation and interlocks
Code standards covered
The signal path, end to end
Controls work starts with a question most electricians were never taught to answer: what does this milliamp reading actually mean? CraftIQ drills signal scaling until it is reflex — converting between 4–20 mA loops, 0–10 V inputs, and the engineering units the BAS displays, in both directions. Wire-break puzzles teach why the trade standardized on a live zero: a current loop reading below its range is telling you something a dead voltage signal never can, and the NAMUR NE43 conventions formalize how transmitters signal a fault. These are the fundamentals that make a controls tech trustworthy with a meter, and CraftIQ turns them into fast, repeatable puzzles instead of a page of formulas you saw once in class.
Valves, sequences, and the standards behind the BAS
Past the wiring, controls is a systems trade. CraftIQ's puzzles cover control-valve sizing and authority — why an oversized valve hunts and an undersized one starves the coil — plus the sequences of operation and interlocks that make equipment behave. Race-style puzzles build intuition for dynamics: which motor reaches setpoint first, what a VFD actually changes about how a system runs. The standards layer is real, not decorative: BACnet interoperability under ASHRAE 135, industrial control-panel practice under UL 508A, and instrumentation conventions from ISA. Interlock puzzles reward the tech who asks what should happen when this fails — the question that defines good controls work. Every puzzle cites its source, so each standard stops being an acronym on a spec sheet and becomes something you have actually used.
For electricians crossing into controls
Most controls techs come from the electrical trade, and CraftIQ is built for that path — IBEW and NECA apprentices who can bend pipe and pull wire but want the instrumentation and logic side that commands controls wages. It is free for individual apprentices, bilingual English/Spanish, and runs on a phone between tasks. Contractors and JATCs can license it for a group and see who is ready for controls work and where the class needs another pass at signal fundamentals. Every controls puzzle has been code-audited against the standard it cites, and the sequences you drill are the generic patterns behind every proprietary platform — economizer logic, staging, safeties, resets.
Start practicing freeCodes & standards for this trade
- ASHRAE StandardsEvery section CraftIQ tests, explained in plain language →
- National Electrical Code (NFPA 70)Every section CraftIQ tests, explained in plain language →
- Other Standards & ReferencesEvery section CraftIQ tests, explained in plain language →
Prepping for a license? Try the timed exam-prep mode.
Frequently asked questions
Does CraftIQ cover BACnet?
Yes, at the working-tech level — what BACnet is, why ASHRAE 135 matters for interoperability, and how BAS points relate to the field devices you wire. It teaches the concepts a tech needs on commissioning day, not the protocol internals a systems integrator programs against.
What is 4–20 mA signal scaling and does CraftIQ teach it?
It is the conversion between a transmitter’s current signal and the real-world value it represents — the single most-used calculation in controls. CraftIQ drills it in both directions, plus 0–10 V signals, until reading a loop with a meter and knowing what it implies is automatic.
Will CraftIQ help me move from electrician to controls tech?
That is the exact path it targets. The puzzles assume electrical fundamentals and add what controls work demands: signal math, valve behavior, sequences of operation, and fault detection. It will not replace vendor training on a specific BAS platform, but it builds the trade knowledge every platform assumes.
Does CraftIQ cover control valve sizing?
Yes — flow-coefficient reasoning and valve authority, framed as the practical question: will this valve actually control the coil, or hunt around setpoint? Puzzles build the intuition for why sizing matters before you ever open a manufacturer sizing tool.