Thoughts about others

[Henro]

I spent most of my working career as an engineer in heavy industry, steel to be specific.

Funny thing is that being part of the electrical group, I think we had a feeling of superiority, when we compared ourselves to the mechanical side of the organization. Our plants were set up with three divisions, electrical, mechanical, and operations.

I think this was essentially because in electrical, you often have to analyze things without obvious hints, like smoke or heat (talking control systems, not burning up motors that smoke). Whereas often mechanical issues showed up as physical vibration or heat.

Anyway, after being retired for a while, and interested in mechanical things more than electrical now, I realize now that both mechanical and electrical personnel were essential equal in what they were dealing with, and neither were better than the other!

Of course, the operators were inferior, LOL! Just joking of course. Each had their own purpose...AND the operators were really superior as they dictated what the electrical and mechanical sides would end up doing, in the end, right or wrong, if serious issues developed.

Just feel like it is time for a confession I guess.

 

[Biker1mike]

That's okay. Those of us in the chemistry field looked down on ALL OF YOU anyways !!!

Let the war begin, again.

Have a great one

 

[ctfjr]

Hmmm the Chem engineers were the only ones we thought of a equals (okay, almost equals). Civil engineering was referred to as easy engineering.
Then we all grew up

 

[Tughill Tom]

" Mechanics, because even Engineers need hero's".......... Just sayin!

 

[Outnumbered]

I come from the industrial electrical controls side of things. I have been blessed and have had a great career and have made a good living but do think it takes a bit more when you get to the heavy troubleshooting which I have really enjoyed over the years. I often refer to it as dumb luck when I have found problems that some have worked on for months and years. Truly, I have found it is more of an overall awareness of everything and being thoughtful before replacing parts or components. Once you start that you can introduce a lot more issues that make the situation far worse than when you began.

 

[GreensvilleJay]

Everyone has their strong points but my aunt would NOT hire any that came before her wearing ' 'the ring'.

 

[Old_Paint]

I've worked both sides of the fence, mechanical and electrical and put my muck boots on more than once to look into the chemical end. It was just simply expected of me. I learned a very healthy respect for mechanical, civil, and chemical engineers because I've had to do some part of all those jobs many times. My job was anything but specialized. I've had to work with any engineering discipline you can think of, and always made a point of trying to be at least 10% smarter than what I was working on, or who I was working with.

 

[RCW]

Due to the circumstances of my job 20+ years ago, I often played a doctor, lawyer and engineer.

Sometimes all in one day.

I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express on occasion....

Typical scenarios were:

"Was I exposed to Rabies from that raccoon/bat/fox/skunk /opossum /cow/llama/donkey?!?!?!"

"My kid took a dead bat to his elementary school yesterday; what should we do?"

"My neighbor's drain pipe is flooding my driveway!!"

"Our South 200,000 gallon water tank split open...we can barely keep up. What do we do?!?!"

"The fuel tanks are leaking at the gas station 400 yards from the village wells...."

My C+ Diploma, stuffed under my bed, said I had a BS as a Forester and Biologist.

My college education helped greatly in contending with these issues.

However, I learned more about how to deal with these problems by being raised a farm-boy, then restaurant cook.

The lessons I learned in that real-world were common sense and public interaction......

Someone once said I should have a PhD in Common Sense....

 

[DaveFromMi]

Mechanical Engineers design weapons.
Civil Engineers design targets.

 

[Biker1mike]

Mechanical Engineers design weapons.
Civil Engineers design targets.

Chemist (Industrial Environmental) clean up the mess a generation later.

 

[skeets]

THE RING? What you trying to say Jay

 

[Biker1mike]

When in the field , ALWAYS talk to the back hoe operator. Always a wealth of information on what to expect at what depth.

 

[Henro]

THE RING? What you trying to say Jay

I was wondering the same thing. Was the aunt single. Maybe the ring was a wedding ring.

OR a nose ring? Maybe that would set me back too...

Curious...

Edit: Or an ear ring? Can't stop thinking of the possibilities!

 

[chim]

At work, we had electricians, plumbers, fitters, carpenters, welders, masons and sheet metal tradesmen. We occasionally discussed projects that we were doing at home. There was a difference in the variety, complexity and success that was related to the guy's field. Carpenters made the best-looking stuff. Masons, plumbers/fitters and sheet metal guys were a little timid about working outside their trades. Electricians would try almost anything.

When looking at someone else's field, it's very easy to underestimate what it takes to be successful in it. An example I sometimes use is my in-law's chicken farm. They had laying chickens, and I couldn't imagine there was anything complicated there - put feed and water in one end of the bird, get eggs and poop out of the other. At one point Wifey pretty much ran the business for a few years and it was an eye-opener. when she told me about some of what was really invo0lved.

 

[xrocketengineer]

Well, I am mechanical engineer. I started in 1977 working for NASA at the Kennedy Space Center as a fresh out of school on the Space Shuttle mechanical systems. A few weeks into the job, the boss gave me an electrical schematic for the orbiter landing gear and told me to come and explain it to him in two weeks. Good thing I was interested in electrics but it still took me a lot longer than the two weeks since the drawing symbols were not conventional and on top of that my college electrical courses were about power or analog stuff and not digital controls. I learned a lot in the process and eventually somehow, I was the office expert. It turned out that the "Apollo mechanical " old timers in the office would not touch anything electrical with a ten foot pole. They only worked "nuts and bolts". Eventually, I ended up working not only the landing gear but in addition, all the other mechanisms that had electric motors and controls; participating in test requirement development, test procedures writing and checkout software development for said mechanisms plus the infamous trouble shooting when things often went wrong. Several times I heard from the old timers "we did not use to do it that way during Apollo". But the new scheme of things was that when you worked a system, you worked it from the command source all the way to the last piece moved by the mechanism. Apollo did not have all the complexities of the shuttle.
It was remarkable that when I was hired I was told that I might have job for a few years only, since the plan was for the privatization of the Space Shuttle. So, except for a couple lateral career moves and another couple of upward moves it became my 31 year plus career. Many times exciting and some others, heart breaking.

 

[random]

Mechanical Engineers design weapons.
Civil Engineers design targets.

And software engineers design the programs used to totally screw up both...

 

[twomany]

And,...I got suckered into working with "light" and it's interaction with matter...

I still actually enjoy changing summer and winter tires each seasons change. And keep a pretty complete work shop (metal and wood (not combined;-)

But it's these wicked tractors that get the most attention ;-)

 

[skeets]

Most know I spent most of my adult life underground, working for the man. And my training is electrical, and electronics, all of which is stone age stuff now. It was always tons of fun teaching young engineers, that the things they learned in books dont always apply in real life. Things that made them scratch their little heads saying that cant work like that, or why is that working like that when it shouldn't. And ya sit back and smile while they try to figure out that some contaminant has created a high resistant junction where there shouldn't be one, or some little critter got between a contact not letting make up. And then they tell the boss they fixed it or found the issue, and never once did one say thank you.

 

[GreensvilleJay]

ring.-->. engineers ring
her job was in the US guv, could hire/fire,