offwidth
Level 10 Valued Member
I can't imagine...
Off-Topic This is what I do.
- Thread starter JeffC
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offwidth
Level 10 Valued Member
@Strong Rick nice looking shop.
I've worked in a variety of industries over the years. Including some very similar to yours. Believe it or not sometimes at even tighter tolerances than .0001". At the other end of the spectrum I worked with castings for the mining industry where we had +/- 3.0" tolerance on a radius.
I've worked in a variety of industries over the years. Including some very similar to yours. Believe it or not sometimes at even tighter tolerances than .0001". At the other end of the spectrum I worked with castings for the mining industry where we had +/- 3.0" tolerance on a radius.
elli
Level 10 Valued Member
What people do or what I do?I can't imagine...
offwidth
Level 10 Valued Member
Lol... What you think people do... hahaha
Strong Rick
Level 9 Valued Member
Darren Best
Level 6 Valued Member
@Strong Rick Nice looking shop, roomy, well lit, clean and organized.
Darren Best
Level 6 Valued Member
A couple of the projects that I have completed.
Darren Best
Level 6 Valued Member
Strong Rick
Level 9 Valued Member
this such a true statement its scary!
there is a sense of "entitlement" with the new generation coming out... it is just not right at all.
everyone thinks they can find all the answers from internet and you can long way like that but you still have to actually put some work in!
Tarzan
Level 6 Valued Member
@Darren Best - I must have made hundreds of screw jacks very similar to that one you posted when I was an apprentice. We didn't have CNC machines back then so it was all done manually on a regular lathe.
@Strong Rick - We call what you do Toolmaking over here in Oz, It's normally done as a post trade qualification and is a step up from a regular machinist, in pay grade & skill. I did a bit of that work myself for a few years. I spent a lot of my time making dies & electrodes for sinker EDM Machines.
I'm envious of that workshop you posted pictures of too, many of the places I worked at felt like going back 100 years in time when you walked through the door. Some places looked like a scene from a movie when they were building the Titanic.
@Strong Rick - We call what you do Toolmaking over here in Oz, It's normally done as a post trade qualification and is a step up from a regular machinist, in pay grade & skill. I did a bit of that work myself for a few years. I spent a lot of my time making dies & electrodes for sinker EDM Machines.
I'm envious of that workshop you posted pictures of too, many of the places I worked at felt like going back 100 years in time when you walked through the door. Some places looked like a scene from a movie when they were building the Titanic.
Darren Best
Level 6 Valued Member
JeffC
Level 7 Valued Member
I worked for Enerflex for over ten years in fabrication, and service and commissioning. It was a great place to work I learned a large variety of skills, and made great money. As a Journeyman Millwright I set, aligned, retrofitted, repaired, and maintained electric motors, engines, pumps, compressors, heat exchangers, valves, instrumentation, process systems, and utility systems. I am also a Journeyman Pipefitter.
Due to the downturn in the oil and gas industry I was forced to move on. Now I work in plant maintenance, much like the millwrights role at the New York Times. It uses a different skill set but is equally as rewarding. I am not defined by my job, but the trades are part of me.
Due to the downturn in the oil and gas industry I was forced to move on. Now I work in plant maintenance, much like the millwrights role at the New York Times. It uses a different skill set but is equally as rewarding. I am not defined by my job, but the trades are part of me.
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elli
Level 10 Valued Member
Okay, ffom reading your log, I should know what you do. But since this is not my first interest, I forgot about it and thought you' d rather sit on a desk, doing a lot of phlne calls, trying to sell sth. (you seem to be goodwith words and polite).You wanted to lose weight and you smoked- higher risk to develop bad habits when sitting in an office 50-60h/week?!
But I was wrong
Strong Rick
Level 9 Valued Member
thats pretty good!Okay, ffom reading your log, I should know what you do. But since this is not my first interest, I forgot about it and thought you' d rather sit on a desk, doing a lot of phlne calls, trying to sell sth. (you seem to be goodwith words and polite).You wanted to lose weight and you smoked- higher risk to develop bad habits when sitting in an office 50-60h/week?!
But I was wrong
I longer work on the machines ( I did for over 20 years) now Im the operations manager of the whole shop floor.
I still go out on the shop floor and "get in the mix" of the everyday decisions on the machines... it is in my blood, it is who I am, I cant shake it, I really do love it.
I do sit behind a desk now, and from time to time I have to talk to( smooth over) our customers but most of the time is spent in the shop on the shop floor.
Strong Rick
Level 9 Valued Member
@Strong Rick - We call what you do Toolmaking over here in Oz, It's normally done as a post trade qualification and is a step up from a regular machinist, in pay grade & skill. I did a bit of that work myself for a few years. I spent a lot of my time making dies & electrodes for sinker EDM Machines.
I'm envious of that workshop you posted pictures of too, many of the places I worked at felt like going back 100 years in time when you walked through the door. Some places looked like a scene from a movie when they were building the Titanic.[/QUOTE]
That is exactly what we call it also "toolmaking".
Thanks for the compliment on the shop... I have our guy work very hard to keep it clean!
I tell the guys "if we are going to spend this much time in the shop, I want it to be clean.... it sucks spending 50-60 hrs a week in a place that is dirty and smelly"
it is also hard to hold the tolerances we hold when it is dirty and unorganized.... I have a touch of OCD for organization
I'm envious of that workshop you posted pictures of too, many of the places I worked at felt like going back 100 years in time when you walked through the door. Some places looked like a scene from a movie when they were building the Titanic.[/QUOTE]
That is exactly what we call it also "toolmaking".
Thanks for the compliment on the shop... I have our guy work very hard to keep it clean!
I tell the guys "if we are going to spend this much time in the shop, I want it to be clean.... it sucks spending 50-60 hrs a week in a place that is dirty and smelly"
it is also hard to hold the tolerances we hold when it is dirty and unorganized.... I have a touch of OCD for organization
Riley O'Neill
Level 3 Valued Member
I think a lot of the younger generation are turning around about this line of work and the industrial trades. When I was in high school we were beat over the head that College is the 'only' way to really make a decent living and there was definitely a looking down on people who went a different path. Young people are seeing that a lot of college educated people have jobs they hate, or are working unskilled labor and that a lot of the tradespeople do really well and usually like what they do.
You have to work hard and pay your dues, but during that time you do get a paycheck. Its not like some internship where you work for free and do so for months where the 'best' intern may get a job at the company. Apprentices may not get paid anything close to the journeyman but after two weeks they do get a paycheck that is for considerably more than $0.
My grandfather was a master watercolor artist, I have taken over his business and make reproductions of his work. When he was alive and painting people would ask him how long it would take him to paint something and he would reply with something along the lines of "40 years and 3 hours". I see that in the industrial trades as well as the time measured to do it could be so many decades plus so many hours.
You have to work hard and pay your dues, but during that time you do get a paycheck. Its not like some internship where you work for free and do so for months where the 'best' intern may get a job at the company. Apprentices may not get paid anything close to the journeyman but after two weeks they do get a paycheck that is for considerably more than $0.
My grandfather was a master watercolor artist, I have taken over his business and make reproductions of his work. When he was alive and painting people would ask him how long it would take him to paint something and he would reply with something along the lines of "40 years and 3 hours". I see that in the industrial trades as well as the time measured to do it could be so many decades plus so many hours.
@Riley O'Neill, your grandfather's point reminds me that being a musician and being a machinist aren't so different. I did a presentation for a school the other day - a good thing, funded by a local college, put on in a preschool-through-8th-grade school in an area where the children have no instrumental music program because the school district has no budget for it. My co-presenter and I played things we'd never played together before, even demonstrating improvisation over simple things we both knew. It was our lifetimes of accumulated learning and experiences that brought us to that point, as it was with your grandfather.
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