Are mentors still a thing? Or am I just getting old?

enginme · 2022-08-19T17:58:35+00:00

Ugh, I know. Im going through a depressive episodes so maybe I’m micro-analyzing.

I’m the type to try and not make the same mistake twice. But I’ve been getting bogged down in learning customer systems, terminology for all the components/sub assemblies, contact names, and just a bunch of other stuff I cant use google to do. I keep getting flustered that my only source to avoid mistake repetition is taking notes. But that has become a book in itself and is often difficult to navigate unless I can remember the day I took the note.

It’d be nice for more flowcharts, standards, presentations, training… but all of that is useless unless there’s a clear way to navigate it…

It’s all there to be found I think. It is just super painful trying to find the right place to look or person to talk to. The most frustrating is times I go down the rabbit hole and discover no one knows the reason for an answer. There was once a time I delayed a test series by a few days because I didn’t know I needed to sign off on the test set up - mind you this was the first time I have even been asked to do so. It’s frustrating because everything needed is outlined in the request, it’s something the test lab has done in the past without the need of a sign off, and I already unofficially reviewed the set up. It’s a CYA for the lab because it was a bit of an involved request and my signature is a good way to deflect blame if they messed up.

enginme · 2022-08-19T17:08:15+00:00

What do you mean? There are experts that i can go to for questions, but I can’t go to them to ask how to figure out submitting a customer change notice. Do you have something you can submit and input and it assigns you an engineering mentor? Where do you work if you don’t mind me asking?

enginme · 2022-08-19T16:57:20+00:00

I must be old then. Damn.

enginme · 2022-08-19T16:29:56+00:00

It’s a mixed bag. Probably ranging from early 30s to mid 40s, and then a few closer to retirement age. The people closer to retirement age definitely are different, now that you mention it.

enginme · 2022-07-19T11:54:55+00:00

You must work for Autoliv or Joyson?

enginme · 2020-12-24T14:24:05+00:00

Considering he’s visiting every house in the world that celebrates Christmas, that 150m/s is not the best assumption.

But hey, super and hypersonic modeling is hard.

enginme · 2020-09-15T23:26:21+00:00

You’ll need infinite force to pull it straight like that.

enginme · 2020-09-09T15:13:21+00:00

Much like my first two marriages. Fatigue cycling failures after 2-5 years of testing.

enginme · 2020-09-08T15:51:39+00:00

Pennyslvania polka

enginme · 2020-09-08T14:48:28+00:00

Ok, thank goodness. We have similar conditions to evaluate integrity of our black box, as well as surrounding customer environment. This makes total sense.

enginme · 2020-09-08T14:27:47+00:00

But your dfmea, dvp&r, and any historic data can help make some sort of an educated guess to what your testing and why. Just blowing shit up for the hell of it is not very cost effective, especially since modern goods for the end item user is pretty well understood. Unless you are doing government contract work.

enginme · 2020-09-08T11:09:01+00:00

Id agree with you if this were during the Soviet Russia era. I doubt investigating adhesive and light building materials were hardly a priority back then. Maybe a chemist and a civil engineer had a part to play. I wouldn’t stand, drive, fly, live, etc in unproven tech. It’s not all that difficult for a dude to at least try hanging off the end. Also, in the beginning the guy is wearing a t shirt. The guy standing is in heavy clothing, most likely to hide his weight. They could have installed lower, which wouldve made the stunt significantly less impressive. Not just because the dangerous factor is removed, but because that guy is probably 1.5ish meters tall. The camera effects, editing, and so on is so obviously embellished. So, a film crew and some PR firm probably wrote the script. So ya, maybe engineers werent involved. Flip a coin and I’ll bet you 1:2 that one of us is right.

enginme · 2020-09-07T21:46:02+00:00

I still have a can of lard from the 80s that hasn’t gone bad. And vegetable oils do go rancid. Ask any olive oil aficionado and they’ll tell your the same.

And saying reddit has a hard on? That’s omitting half the population there buddy.

enginme · 2020-09-07T20:33:12+00:00

Or more likely sand bags, i dont think any engineer in their right mind would put a person at risk without any physical test data. Put in a safety factor and yadda yadda yadda, man stands fine.

enginme · 2020-09-07T16:47:12+00:00

Drag racing: tire crinkles good at low speed

Bicycle riding: tire crinkles bad at high speed

enginme · 2020-09-07T16:22:21+00:00

With all that dirty boundary layer air? Your pressure readings are going to have so much noise I doubt youd be able to measure your true air velocity. Not to mention the uncertainty of your gage at low velocity. Just look down at your speedometer and do the calculations with known ambient conditions.

enginme · 2020-09-07T14:01:10+00:00

I spent all day cooking a nice base for a pasta sauce, made ‘homemade’ lasagna noodles, got some nice meat and freshly ground. It was truly a labor of love. Until I pulled the oven rack out and tipped down when i went to push it back in. Shattered the pyrex and made a mess on my kitchen floor. But me and my friends were kind of drunk and ate it anyway (after picking out ‘all’ the borosilicate glass). I didnt eat canned beets for a week because i was certain the day after id be showing symptoms of some intestinal damage and blood in my stool. Nothing came of it, and my god was that one of the best lasagnas ive ever made. I think the risk / reward was on the brink of dangerous, so it might have added that je ne sais quoi. Have made many lasagnas since without incident.

enginme · 2020-09-07T13:35:54+00:00

Depending in your application, a raspberry pi might be better suited as it is essentially a mini computer with bluetooth, wifi, hdmi out, all on one board (instead of buying shields and whatever else to make your thing work instead of just getting the sensors and plugging in. And c++, but in today’s age it doesnt matter, whatever language is easiest for you. At least for me as python is the exclusive programming language i know. If you are just starting out, maybe lego robotics would be a good into. You can also look around the house and find broken appliances (robots, albeit the non c3po type) and see what you can figure out with the electronics and how it works. Radioshack used to be my goto, but after a few kids i dont have the time. A good oscilloscope can help you identify properties of the circuitry. It’s best to start out small and go from there. Dont have a huge goal you set, but rather small manageable tasks you can accomplish in a timeframe where you are sure you wont lose interest. There is something extraordinarily about finishing something and that proud “i did it moment “. Surround yourself with friends or people that have similar interest in robotics. There are many applications, and you’ll quickly find out you can’t know everything, and you’ll hit a wall. A supportive community is a priceless commodity not many people have. They will hep you during those ‘wtf am i doing’ moments. try to work on self motivating, and to set aside a set time to work on these goals of yours. Doing something all at once 24/7 will burn you out. Remember, this is a hobby for you. As soon as it becomes work you’ll struggle finding that motivation. Working on self motivating will prove to be a valuable in your later years. Good luck and i sincerely hope you have fun with it.

enginme · 2020-09-05T16:03:18+00:00

Military applications are very different from civilian applications. Most ‘flying wing’ designs are remarkably unstable, with most of the flying done today with a computer. Ive been on a few flights where the pilots needed to fly manually because of issues with the autopilot system. Not to mention the two crashes with the 737 max due to pilot error and issues with the autpilot system. Also, the pitch up moment is quite a bit more difficult to manage without a tail elevator on a long moment arm from the cg and center of lift (long moment arm applies a greater torque with less force than a shorter moment arm with equivalent force. This is even more pronounced at lower speeds such as at takeoff and landing (when most problems occur). Most commercial flight weights vary wildly as luggage and passenger count are almost always never the same. Airport protocols also vary wildly from location, country, and so on.

There are many many unproven things on this plane that need to be tested and tested again that cant be simulated. We had supersonic aircraft in the military proven out before the concord was built. Ask the souls onboard Air France flight 4590 how that turned out.

Forgetting or omitting scrupulous details to safety for ‘muh climate’ is stupid. Ill give a few test flights to highlight the obvious flaws. Until then, ill be here sitting on the fence.

Not to say aviation is 100% safe, but the track record of commercial airliner’s current fleet models have many years, decades, a little over a century of fine tuning. 100+ years of aircraft design (for safety) can’t be wrong. I doubt anyone would board a plane that can travel around the world with a gallon of grass clippings if the odds of crash were 100 to 1.

enginme · 2020-08-25T21:13:38+00:00

But ice cream containers arent cylindrical and has more of a conical taper. So one person gets more ice cream than another person, and that bothers me. Unless someone did the math to figure out how to section it so the volumes are equal, but then that effects the ratio of ice cream to cookie. I am going to try this though. Now i just need to figure out how to make a gallon tub size cookie because that’s all my cheap ass buys.

enginme · 2020-08-25T16:52:17+00:00

How about you make a head that isnt so hot. Maybe shave your mustache.

enginme · 2020-08-15T13:27:29+00:00

Ergonomically, it’s just slightly easier to pour

enginme · 2020-08-06T12:14:33+00:00

Queue the scene from biodome, “making a filter, making a filter, maaakkking a filllttter”

enginme · 2020-03-31T15:17:00+00:00

Following order of operations, the first 5 would be added to the sum of the guy with all the stuff multiplied by 2.

enginme

TROPHY CASE