I'd be incredibly surprised if any "fully employed" person in an engineering company was asked to provide their own PPE.... perhaps going in as self-employed or as a "contract" employee then yes...

I'm generally office-based now but have worked in various engineering roles for 20 years (oil&gas/M&E/site based/office based/QS/project management/site maintenance engineer), and i've never had to provide my own PPE (unless i've done so out of choice).

If you're a full employee of a company and they can't even be bothered to provide you the correct PPE then i'd suggest they might not necessarily be the be the greatest company to work for.