Thoughts on engineers.. let's hear yours

I am a machinist and have bumped heads on more than one occasion with engineers. There have been days I would like to have sent them all to the bottom of the ocean in a cement box. Then again I have worked with some really good engineers who could design stuff real well and even some who could run the machines I was running.

One other thought is that sometimes when you see a really dumb mechanism being used keep in mind it may not have been the engineer who wanted it released that way. There are accountants (remember Detroit shoving the donut spare tires down our throats which saved like $14,00 per vehicle or something like that)? Some times it's the CEOS of the company in a big rush to make the $$$$ for himself. (Can anyone using Vista on PCs relate)?

You have good ones and bad ones in every field. Just like teachers, doctors, scientists, laborers, even lawyers -only I can find no real evidence that there are "good" lawyers so, that may just be a rumor.

Engineers helped bring all of these things to the average person like myself. My daughter is alive today because a doctor engineered a solution for her issue, when he could have just said sorry, I cant do anything for you.

All humans want a better life and are at some level engineers who are trying to make their life or if they are very generous, someones elses life better.

The issue here is with egos and personalities.

It is correct that most engineers are good in the books and not real life, I see it everyday!

But I aslo see the tech only guys have a complex about engineers and trying to pit themselves against the engineer. There are very good and intelligent tech's that would have made VERY excellent engineers if they had the balls to go through the schooling required, but now they just sit back and mouth off at the engineer.... who's right, who's better... IMO they both are, each have their stengths and need to work together.

"At that time [1909] the chief engineer was almost always the chief test pilot as well. That had the fortunate result of eliminating poor engineering early in aviation." �Igor Sikorsky

IE.. take this design, and un-engineer it so that it saves 4 cents and becomes just barely adequate so that we can pinch the end user for replacement parts or total unit replacement every 'X' years...

I've worked in places like that... it's frustrating..

soundguy

I'm an engineer that ironically.. gets to do mostly 'technician' level work... I actually prefer hands on work vs driving a desk..

soundguy

soundguy

One of my best friends is a civil engineer, and I couldn't resist running that past him. He wasn't overwhelmed by the humor of it.

1st, in a situation like that, if you have retained the use of a design professional for a fee, you can't release that person to complete a full design of something without first reviewing the situation and identify what things need to be determined to make it work. Hoisting and live load ratings of the floor is all you needed to determine that.

Field people, trades and similar have a good wealth of knowledge on means and methods in most cases, a designer may not in most instances, but it depends on the background and experience of the person involved, we all come from different walks of life and backgrounds and some who you may think just because they are a designer don't have suitable field experience, might just be a hands on type, not often found but there are some that do have a well rounded background.

A situation like this is a combined effort, field people and the engineer. Instruct the engineer to analyze the floor, provide a design to reinforce it with temporary shores or whatever needs to be done to the floor to accomodate the new equipment, maybe it's load rating had to be increased, only in the area where the equipment, compressor is to be installed, the rest could have been shored temporarily or maybe there was some structural retrofit needed overall and that would also work and was in the budget. Either or, once you have those determinations on the table, you can cost load them; temp shores = x, structural modifications = Y compare and decide what works best there. Now you can achieve the ratings you need, and what the engineer did for you here is very valuable because using my example you have 2 scenarios to compare.

Being a field person you knew the telescopic material handler would probably make the pick, it is an easier thing to determine, then you just needed to make sure the floor could handle the loads once the unit is placed onto it and is to be moved to it's location to complete the excercise.

The engineers idea or plan for a "one of" system to do the same job of hoisting and the rest, was probably unecessary, how could someone release the engineer to commence a design of something that could easily be ruled out in conceptual stage up front ? That is a waste of design time and fees, shows no one did any value engineering nor had any capability to do so up front. It also shows that no qualified person took the lead here, you need that to happen, someone has to take the lead that knows what they are doing and what important answers they need to make it happen, and what things do not apply.

Hoist, yep get me a Lull 844D ( I've used those, they are a great piece of equipment ), ok what does the floor hold, can we shore it, or are we going to permanently beef it up..... done.

There are times when you do need that engineer to do an all out design of something that could be a "one of" 1 time use etc., but that is usually the case on much larger complex projects, like in industrial plants and or similar. I have had a few designed when there was no other choice, that happens too, and from the designers view, it works, can be done but may not provide the best value to an owner or can be value engineered to reduce costs by utilizing more cost effective means.

A little value engineering, collaboration between field people and design people goes a long way to create solutions to complex problems and to keep costs from becoming excessive. Team effort, forget titles, credentials etc., work together and get it done, even if you have to look at multiple scenarios first.

Maybe some designers, consultants do like to fluff up billing hours, I've know a few that seemed to have a reputation for that, but I can tell you one thing, in a situation like yours, someone needed to direct the engineer, not let that person take lead. He billed for hours that rendered a useless and non-applicable design, that also canned the project.

I had one engineer that was the structual engineer of record for a building I was a project manager on, and he would not make 1 lousy site visit to review a very delicate situation that could have collapsed an adjacent building that he designed the underpinning for. The existing building's stone foundation encroached into the new buildings foundation. This is like 2 cars trying to park in one spot, something has to give, and this was holding up my project. Nope, he refused,( in shear arrogance) to look at in the field. I had to make the changes myself and demanded that he take these changes and provide me with a design based on what I told him needs to be done. It cost the owner an additional $55,000, I could not risk collapsing the existing building, so I had to put a slight jog in the foundation, coordinate the masonry shell, eliminate precast concrete plank in that section on that floor and change it to reinforced concrete, my design, he had to calc it and provide the actual details with a revised stamped detail amending the drawings. If I did not take the lead here, this would have screwed up the critical path of the job and caused a sizable delay.

Excellent example for discussion, can't tell you how many situations similar I've dealt with, back and forth with an engineer or other designer, sometimes it's not easy to find solution that can be built and will not break the budget. I find that once you have developed a working relationship with a designer, working as a team, is most effective.

I had an erector on a job site who encountered field conditions on structural connections that made what was called for on the stamped drawings, impossible. The design was defective from the start, we ended up re-engineering the entire system. This was a job that we took over after another contractor was defaulted and the bonding company took over, it was a sorted mess, shop drawings and other documents were missing etc.

This erector took the liberty to make field modifications of these connections that needed to be checked by an engineer, he also used materials found laying around on the site. The controlled inspection firm had a full time inspector on site and would inspect every one of these connections, there were hundreds of them. I realized that the erector was technically challenged and fired the company, put my own iroworkers on the job, supervised same, spent weeks on the phone and the fax on site, doing field sketches, solving these connection problems, and installing connections per a set of stamped details and calculations that were heavily amended to reflect all the odd conditions we discovered on site. The new building we were attaching our connections to when being constructed was not properly coordinated, dimensions blown, tolerances not maintained, it was a real disaster job, if that erector was left to do what he was doing, we would have had every connection rejected, the job would have been a huge loss, and if one of those connections failed, someone could have been killed.

I had 2-4 ironworkers up on articulated boom lifts for months welding, they were required to have city of new york dept of building welding certifications, usually achieved in apprentice school, and the specifications made reference to AWS criteria, that the inspector enforced, my erector wanted to fight him on that, some people just don't have what it takes to recognize what really needs to be done, the job made 15% profit, and in 1 month I got more acceptable work in place than this erector completed in 3 months, a very good call to get him off the site.

There is just no substitute for being on the floor or in the field. When you"ve been sent into a tank that held ink and wasn"t cleaned out, know what happens to turkey guts at the rendering plant, know that pillowblock bearing won"t slide past a step on a shaft .250" larger than the bearing diameter and have installed fittings and hardware in a biomedical research facility you have tremendous advantage that you don"t get from school.

That being said, the degree goes a long way toward helping out the paycheck. It gives a measure of credibility and marketability to potential customers that will help get you in the door. Those guys that run finite element analysis on parts to show why you can use thinner sections end up saving weight, materials and ultimately cost. I wouldn"t trade my Jetta TDI in on the "78 Malibu Wagon we had growing up. I"m glad bridges aren"t built based using gut feelings.

There will always be overeducated idiots and lazy whiners. The good thing is that most of us fall somewhere in the middle and it is pretty amazing what we can accomplish. As for me, it was well worth getting up at 4:30 this morning to haul calves to the stockyard because I know I"d be stuck behind a desk and computer the rest of the day. When I get home there is a JD 2755 that needs the water pump put back on it.

Larry

I have one of those cars with filler on the right side. It's a 1981 Mercury Cougar. The better place would be in the center of the gas tank. I've had cars with that setup and you can fill from either side. I worked along side of an engineer for years from PR and he spoke perfect English and Spanish, but when he was trying to remove the driveshaft from his Mustang he called me over and ask for help since he had rounded off the heads of the bolts when trying to remove them. I told he needed another tool and he asked what that was and I pointed to the torch we had. I rolled the torch over and heated those bolts one at time and then used vice grips to loosen them. I told to take my truck and go get new bolts. We may have kidded one another, but we got the job done. He just retired last year.
Hal

Bottom Line: I think the problem you're addressing is more the personality of the individual, not the profession. I know some "know-it-all" mechanics / plumbers / bankers / teachers / etc It's just something we all have to deal with on occation.

Good discussion point...we all can inprove.

I have never seen an engineer given the opportunity to re-design something just for the sake of re-design, as you seem to think happens. Nobody would stay in business if they did that. As someone else pointed out, designers work within a whole bunch of constraints. Fortunately for me, I'm one of the systems guys who creates the requirements and constraints for the designers, but I've also done design.

I get just as upset as anyone when I have to work on a something that you can't get to or that requires special tools. Unfortunately, in our society, maintainability is NOT a market driver, and in a lot of instances, neither is reliability. Given the choice between a design that's cheap to produce and one that's easy to maintain, cheap to produce will win EVERY time, regardless of what the engineer may want.

The commercial design world is driven by market pressure, NOT by some engineer. Engineers are tasked to respond to the market by producing products that sell, not necessarily products that are high quality, easy to maintain, etc.

We can all find examples of someone doing something dumb...in fact, I've made my share of decisions that turned out wrong. I'm certain I can find plenty of examples of people in your profession making dumb mistakes, being arrogant, etc., just like you say about mine.

Hope this doesn't come across as being too defensive, but before you make generalizations about some other group of people you ought to make sure you have the whole story. Engineering is a challenging and creative profession. We take technologies that someone has dreamed up, and make them into useful products.

Keith

A typical engineer struggles through college frequently paying his or her own way and at the same time learns several different disciplines. Once they graduate they are usually paid less than a low skilled unionized auto worker who never graduated high school. They do not have job protection, guaranteed annual increases, and frequently don't have the same health care services of a unionized laborer. They struggle to pay back the enormous debt that they incurred while attending college.

When they start their career they are expected to hit the ground running and must design for life, for safety, for ergonomics, for manufacturing capability, for assembly and disassembly, to meet a cost objective while using the cheapest materials possible and at minimal manufacturing cost and within a very closely monitored time constraint. The product must meet or exceed the competition in price, performance, and durability.

An engineer is provided with a cost objective and must meet that cost or come back for a redesign which will accomplish the cost target. If they slip up on one design feature and that results in a product defect and warranty return, or high litigation cost they probably are going to be looking for a new job since they don't have the job protections afforded the unionized labor.

Then why on earth would anyone want to be an engineer? It is what they want to do. These people want to be able to design a product that others can use and enjoy even if the purchaser doesn't know or understand who designed and agonized over the balance between cost and serviceability of that product. It is done for self satisfaction.

Now, much of what you're complaining about falls in the realm of design. Design is not a precise science and cannot be expressed in mathematical terms. A good designer combines experience, rules of thumb and imagination to develop an elegant solution to a problem. Many compromises are made when designing any product; it's not always obvious which tradeoffs are acceptable and which are not. I've known great engineers who were poor designers and great designers who were poor engineers. The best engineers have imagination and vision balanced by technical know-how.

Im here to help my fellow man in this great hobby we all love n share n repay all those who helped me over the years n Im NOT here to fight or criticize others or their chosen livelihoods or professions, only to share n help others

Sooooo o God Bless yall regardless of your chosen professions n lets all try n get along n help our fellow tractor collectors

John T Retired Engineer and Country Lawyer and darn proud of it

Let me share some of my 34+ years of aircraft engineering experience with you. (I believe it to be similar to what those at other transportatation equipment manufacturers would experience.)

It may surprise you to know that engineers take direction from company project management who receive input from marketing, sales, and customer service, regulatory agencies, etc as well as the customers themselves. Design organization are provided with design requirements, cost targets, and schedules. To the extent that all the "real requirements" are captured by the design requiremnts depends on how accurately all this imput is communicated to the design community. Notice I used the words "design community". No one engineer designs a complete product. The job is broken into pieces and design teams design the sub parts and work together to integrate the parts into the whole. We used to say that "an airplane is a million parts flying in formation".

Only relatively recently was "manintainability" a big issue. I don"t believe that it should have been that way but the big wigs from the customer who buy the product and the big wigs from the manufacturer who design and manufacture the product set the major requirements and, in the past, these guys didn"t give a darn about things like maintainability because it was such a samll part of the cost and profit picture that they didn"t care. Then along came deregulation of the airline industry and it went from a "cost +" industry to an out and out free enterprise competeitive business like the automotive industry or McDonald"s etc, and every cost issue became important. It took about 10 years for the impact of airline deregulation to finally get to the impact of design on things like maintainnability. Then it got put into the design requirements and suddenly engineering was designing for it. The company I worked for spent billions on software and brought airline mechanics in from all over the world to participate in the design process to make sure it happened. And every new airplane is better from the last one in this regard. So that"s an simplistic synopsis of the aircraft product development. I will say this, having worked with airline mechanics and airline service personnel. They can"t agree on everthing, so compromises abound and the guy that doesn"t get his way cries in his beer that "those damm engineers didn"t listen to ME!" That"s life.

The same things are true in the automotive business, farm equipment, etc. The maintainability in the modern automobile leaves a lot to be desired from my viewpoint because I like to fix things myself. But you know what? Me and my kind are in a very, very, small minority. Most people just want to turn the key and drive off. So the manufacturers are concentrating on reliability not ease of maintenance. (And they"ve done a darn good job of it, in my opinion. I remember when it was something to get 100,000 miles on a car. I have a "91 Toyota p/u on our ranch that"s at 240,000 miles and still going. It"s a B**** to work on though i don"t have to work on it too often!)Also dealer"s service bays have become a real profit center so the manufacturer wants to help encourage their use.

It has nothing to do with the age, experience, or talent of the design and product development engineers and what they CAN do. It"s what the design requirements dictate they MUST do or they can go flip burgers at McDonald"s.

I know there are those they say this explanantion is just an excuse to blame somebody else. You can think that way if you want but the reality is that it"s the voice of the consumer and their wants and needs that the manufacturer"s care about. When a significant number of buyers who are "do it yourselfer"s" say that maintainability is important and buy a car for that reason, they will change their design requirements. I wouldn"t hold my breath waiting for that to happen, though.

From an engineer whose been there!

My point was that "ease of maintance" is a factor for maybe less than one in a thousand buyers of automobiles. If that"s true, why would the design requiremnts make "ease of maintenance" high on the "must do" list??

I'll agree some things get over engineered, or at least the management of an engineering project lets things get out of hand. I was reading in SAE a couple of years ago they were putting computer modules into taillights in cars. Nice tech challenge, many problems with concept.

We get a bad name interfering with trades and techs but it can be amazing the types of mistakes made when you don't have a science background. Just as amazing as engineer mistakes with no hands-on background. So I'd say both sides of the puzzle are needed and great things can be achieved when both sides work well together!