W hen one door closes, there is always the hope that another will soon open. But a more positive approach, especially in a work-related situation, is to go out and look for another on which to knock.

That was the attitude of Chris James, who lives in Grove, when he was made redundant at the age of 55 from Siemens Magnet Technology at Eynsham. He looked for new opportunities and found one that opened the door to a new career as a mobile caravan engineer, in business as CFJ Caravan Care.

“I was offered another job but I had been employed by other people all my working life, from the age of 16 and I felt that now I would like to work for myself,” he said.

A friend mentioned the Mobile Caravan Engineers’ Association to him and through this he found just the kind of business that, as somebody with an engineering background, he had been looking for.

The MCEA is a group of independent, self-employed engineers, who each generate their own work but are able to help one another.

They have the support of their organisation, which provides business start-up advice on topics such as finance and administration and runs courses, one of which Mr James attended.

“It was for a week and totally intensive and hands-on,” he said.

“It covered every aspect of maintenance — taps, pipes, gas fires and everything else inside a caravan.”

He does not deal with the bodywork of the caravan and although he works on motorhomes, deals only with the living accommodation, not the engine.

Mr James’ first job on leaving school had also been transport-related — but in a very different way. He spent five years working with sailing and rowing boats, many being those used by the eights of Oxford colleges.

“That was very interesting but after I got married I needed a job with a better income,” he said.

He moved on, into various areas of engineering and to logistics and was also able to draw on childhood experiences with his plumber father who had been keen on car maintenance.

“That’s how I got my mechanical skills and learned how to use tools,” he said.

Caravanning has always been a family hobby for Mr James and his wife Jane, most recently enjoyed on a late autumn break in North Wales.

So he knows all about the kind of problems that can arise and how to deal with them.

“I enjoy it and I keep quite busy. I have a good customer base and clients who come back to me each year. Establishing customers and building up work is all-important.”

Now in his fifth year in his new business, Mr James has also secured a contract with Powrtouch which specialises in ‘movers’ — devices that enable a caravan to be moved a short distance without the need to be towed by a car.

Movers are two electric motors linked together with a framework, which run off the leisure battery of the caravan.

They save the effort of pushing and are particularly useful for manoeuvring in tight spaces, or moving a caravan along a driveway. They are fitted to the chassis by the wheels.

Mr James does the fitting on Powrtouch’s behalf and also any servicing required, covering for it an area similar to his own, across Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Buckinghamshire and other neighbouring counties.

This is the time of year the work is focused on close-season servicing.

Fortunately for Mr James and his fellow MCEA members, caravan owners are of two schools of thought: those who choose to have this carried out before putting their caravan ‘to sleep’ for the winter and those who prefer to wait until just before it is due to go out on the road again for another year’s travels.

So the workload is conveniently evenly-spaced, without too much pressure at either time.

All servicing is carried out to a specification prepared by the MCEA, all its members working to the same service programme.

Mr James has clients who own caravans that are up to 30 years old.

The very newest are likely to be still under their manufacturers’ warranty and serviced under their own schemes. The later spring months and the summer are the time when there are call-outs to deal with problems that have beset owners while out and about.

Often calls take Mr James to the park where the owners are based or making an overnight stay, which may well be during the evenings “I try to deal with the problem there and then,” he said.

“But if they are due to move on next day and a part may be needed to fix the trouble, I can contact a fellow MCEA member in the area of their next port of call and arrange for him to complete the job there.”

Similarly, if a prospective client lives too far away for travel to his location to be economic, he can be referred to somebody based nearer to him. “There is now a network of about 100 nationwide and we all work together,” said Mr James.

Courses are now held at the MCEA’s base in Wiltshire.

www.mobilecaravanengineers.co.uk