Course Description
This course is designed to assist those who are planning on writing the API 510 6-year recertification quiz, and to provide a portion of the required Continuing Professional Development hours needed to recertify at both 3-year and 6-year intervals for certified API 510 inspectors.
IMPORTANT NOTE: This course is NOT designed for those who are writing the initial API 510 Pressure Vessel Inspector examination to become certified as an API 510 Inspector. If you are writing the API 510 examination to achieve initial certification as an API 510 Pressure Vessel Inspector, we offer three options to assist with that, please go back to the Courses page and review our Webinar, Combination and Self-study options for the initial API 510 certification exam preparation.
Intent and Purpose of this Course
There are two main goals that this course material intends to meet. They are:
1. To educate, inform, and instruct those who are planning on taking the 6-year recertification quiz required by the American Petroleum Institute.
2. To provide a portion of the Continuing Professional Development (CPD) hours needed for the 3-year and 6-year recertification requirements as stated by the American Petroleum Institute. (This course will award a maximum of 16 synchronous hours to be used for API recertification. An additional 24 asynchronous hours can be awarded to those recertifying with CWB, AWS, or jurisdictional recertifications, for a total of 40 hours.)
Goal 1: 6-year Recertification Quiz
To meet the first goal, preparing candidates for the 6-year recertification quiz, this course uses the Body of Knowledge published by API as the source material. API states that recertification candidates should be familiar with the latest editions, changes, and updates to specific API documents. The current Body of Knowledge published by API requires knowledge of the following documents:
- API 510 Pressure Vessel Inspection Code (10th edition, May 2014, with Addendum 1, May 2017, and Addendum 2, March 2018)
- API RP 571 Damage Mechanisms Affecting Fixed Equipment in the Refining Industry (3rd Edition)
- API RP 572 Inspection of Pressure Vessels (4th edition, December 2016)
- API RP 576 Inspection of Pressure-Relieving Devices (4th edition, April 2017)
- API RP 577 Welding Inspection and Metallurgy (3rd edition, October 2020)
- API RP 578 Guidelines for a Material Verification Program (3rd edition, February 2018)
To meet the goal of preparing exam candidates for the 6-year recertification quiz, each of these documents will be discussed in detail in the course material by means of explanatory lessons, Practice Questions, Quizzes, and a Final Exam.
The lessons will focus on navigation, key words and concepts that will teach the exam candidate to recognize the document being discussed by the subjects in the exam questions.
Course participants need to provide their own copies of the above listed documents for study purposes.
Goal 2: Achieving Professional Development Hours for Recertification
To provide Continuing Professional Development (CPD) hours to course participants, this course meets the seven stated requirements in the API Recertification Requirement Guideline. These requirements, and how this course meets them are stated below:
1) Training is to be provided by a recognized party. – Kinetic Inspection & Testing has been successfully instructing exam preparation and training courses in the oil and gas industry for years and is recognized by major companies as the go-to training source for exam preparation.
2) The subject is directly relevant to the petrochemical industry and the course participants ICP certification. – This course covers the subjects specifically identified by API as relevant for the API 510 Pressure Vessel Inspector ICP certification.
3) The training is to have a clear and relevant learning objective. – The learning objective is to become familiar with the source documents, and any changes in them since the course participants original certification date. There will be a final examination demonstrating the course participants mastery of the subject matter.
4) For multi-day courses there should be no more than 10 contact hours in a 24-hour period. – This course will involve two days of live instruction, each of which will be 8 hours.
5) CEU equivalent hours will should not exceed the time needed to complete the subject materials. – The two-day live instruction will include an introduction, then each document will be discussed for approximately 2 hours, the final exam will be timed for 2 hours, and then there will be a review of the exam for the final 2 hours = 16 hours total contact instruction hours.
6) Must evaluate the participant’s knowledge through some assessment mechanism. – There will be a timed, open-book exam during the second day of the course. Achieving a passing mark of at least 80% is required to receive certification hours.
7) Must provide documentation showing completion / mastery of the course. – Each participant who achieves a passing grade in the final examination, and has completed 100% of the online materials, and has attended 100% of the 2-day live instruction will receive a letter and certificate showing their success, completion, and hours earned.
Course Components
This course has the following components, or sections:
- Online training materials consisting of explanatory lessons, navigation guidance, over 550 Practice Questions, and 3 quizzes. These materials cover all 5 required documents. Candidates are required to provide their own copies of the API documents to study from. Access to these online lessons is available up to 100 days prior to the class dates. (This portion of the course will award up to a maximum of 24 asynchronous CPD hours usable for CWB, AWS, or jurisdictional recertification requirements.)
- Two days of live instruction (via Zoom) where the lessons and concepts learned in the online portion will be discussed. (This portion of the course will award up to a maximum of 16 synchronous CPD hours usable for API, CWB, AWS or jurisdictional recertification requirements.)
- A final examination which will be a 25 question, open-book, online examination. Achieving a passing grade of 80% (20 out of 25 correct) is required.
Completion of all components of the course, attendance in the full two day class, and achieving a passing grade on the final exam are all required to achieve credit for the training hours in the course.
As stated above, course participants and recertification quiz candidates are responsible for supplying their own copies of the required codes and recommended practices.
Completion of this course does not remove the requirement to complete the API recertification quiz on the API website for candidates recertifying in their 6th year. This course is intended to assist in preparation for the recertification quiz.
Useful links:
API Individual Certifications - 510 Information
API 510 Recertification Information