Any Engineers on Here

[hobbes]

That's not true at all. We design for specified loads, environments, and life cycles. The problem with the crumbling infrastructure is by en large two parts. Part 1 the infrastructure in the majority of these cases are working beyond what it was designed for. The reason we don't have cars that last forever is not because it's not possible, it's because it would be to d**m expensive. Part 2 future environments are not always foreseeable. It's one of the many reasons we design in margin.

So we don't have any aging infrastructure? No bridges that are well past an age that anyone ever anticipated? Maybe in your region, but a wood structure built on wood piling in the 1940s in Montana has exceeded it's life, plain and simple. And no joke we design to anticipated use and sometimes don't have a crystal ball. I never once implied that your two reasons weren't valid, but don't even try to tell me that we don't have aging infrastructure in many cases.

I've no idea what your cars that last forever comment has to do with aging infrastructure.

 

[ThorM465]

Yes and no. I think 2 different thoughts on it. I'll use automotive.

Body on frame vs uniframe vehicle. The uniframe as a whole is stronger and more efficient use id guesstimate, but the body on frame is of better construction, if I'm saying that right?


Pffft. Gimme ICF with engineered joists (not I joists or nominal) and foam insulation (attic), air exchanger etc etc. Any day over what is being built conventionally.

You specified that we weren't talking conventional (read spec homes).

"That's the comp though, the master (oldschool) vs the master (new school) to the exact same scope. "

 

[BDWMT]

I’m a mechanical and do practically no engineering like most engineers I went to school with. The degree opens doors and combined with leadership abilities and practical experience will likely put you in a manager position. I would strongly recommend it if you are truly motivated to follow through. I’ve had several employees pursue and complete an engineering degree mid career while also working a FT. Not easy but possible with some temporary sacrifices.

 

[Trackerbacker]

So we don't have any aging infrastructure? No bridges that are well past an age that anyone ever anticipated? Maybe in your region, but a wood structure built on wood piling in the 1940s in Montana has exceeded it's life, plain and simple. And no joke we design to anticipated use and sometimes don't have a crystal ball. I never once implied that your two reasons weren't valid, but don't even try to tell me that we don't have aging infrastructure in many cases.

I've no idea what your cars that last forever comment has to do with aging infrastructure.

I'd wager the car comment would be much closer to consumerism and planned obsolescence rather than engineering.

 

[ThorM465]

So we don't have any aging infrastructure? No bridges that are well past an age that anyone ever anticipated? Maybe in your region, but a wood structure built on wood piling in the 1940s in Montana has exceeded it's life, plain and simple. And no joke we design to anticipated use and sometimes don't have a crystal ball. I never once implied that your two reasons weren't valid, but don't even try to tell me that we don't have aging infrastructure in many cases.

I've no idea what your cars that last forever comment has to do with aging infrastructure.

I'm not sure what your point is here. It seems we're talking past one another.

As far as the cars comment it was an analogy (or other big word I can't think of right now). The point was that we could have built infrastructure that lasts forever, the problem is that's it's cost prohibitive. It's cheaper to periodically repair and rebuild.

Let's try this. The reason the Space Shuttle Program was canceled is that it was to expensive to fund the army it required to maintain the Shuttle. It's cheaper to fire a 1x use rocket and drop it in the ocean. We could have continued the Shuttle Program and it would still be flying today.

 

[TheGDog]

I'm an EE, better be good in math.

Honestly, way more opportunities with BS computer science....if you like programming

We can't hire enough

Software Engineer since '92. I'm gonna tell you this... just understand that your "homework" will never be done.

New tech comes out all the time. And what happens is.. you get a job, you're working on a product, developing a system/app. And it's being sold, you develop a userbase that you have to keep up and running.

So... what *can* happen is... especially if you're in a smaller company setting, is that you'll be soo busy with maintaining that app for your current userbase... (adding new features and functionality and integration with other companies products which are popular) that you'll be "soo done" with fussing with computers to do stuff for others after hours, that when it's your time off the clock you'll find it hard to want to do the studying and sample coding you may simply HAVE to do in order to truly learn that "new thing". So understand that unfortunately sometimes you're gonna have to skip hunting some weekends.

What is the danger in that, is that while you're "in the trenches" out programming in the real-world... now locked into continuing to advance this money-making product for the company... what you always gotta keep in your mind is that a buncha young ones are in school with ALL the freaking time in the world to be consuming and learning about cutting-edge/bleeding-edge new tech. SOoo... you "can't be caught slippin'".

Meaning you need to kinda be good about once in awhile getting a feeling for where the industry is heading in terms of popular tools or languages or programming suites people are starting to embrace. That's referred to as "Tech Debt". Never let your Tech Debt get too far behind. I'm gonna say that again...

NEVER LET YOUR TECH-DEBT GET TOO FAR BEHIND!

That is... unless you get hooked up with a larger entity. Some of them, now, if they're lead right... encourage you to continue your training. Providing you with online training classes such as on PluralSight, etc.

Your "Google-Fu" will need to be VERY strong for this career. And StackedOverflow.com *can* be a savior at times. Cause an example of one something that happens is... you've got a system, and let's say you work on it to offer integration with something like Exchange/Outlook. You'll finally get it working and everything is good. THEN... often without a good method for letting people sign-up to be WARNED PROPERLY way ahead of time, about new upcoming software releases from Microsoft... (Again I'm sure sometimes such a push-technology list exists, but you're soo busy working on other stuff, you don't have the time to read the incoming blurb) they'll maybe release an update, that causes something in your existing App to seemingly fail for a large client.

Your Support staff will try their best, but ultimately such a problem isn't anything they can fix. So not only do you have to be extremely good at being a methodical problem solver. You'll also get these problems dumped on your lap re: this BigFish client with a much more exotic setup than the types you're familiar with in-house. So sometime they'll have more piece-parts to the equation of fixing the problem due to all these various other things they have setup in their environment. Such as load-balancer devices and such.

And DEFINITELY familiarize yourself with all the various kinds of concepts related to cloud-computing. Which is essentially you design a browser-based app that YOU host and maintain and do the database backups for etc. And they charge a subscription to the software, instead of the client having to buy it and fuss with setting up all the servers in-house. No more them having to deal with installing new updates of your stuff, etc.

Learn about all the little piece parts of Microsoft Azure, and AWS (Amazon Web Services). And coding using something like React or Angular. And boom, 6 figures easily. (So to speak)

 

[CJohnson]

I'm surprised that no EE's have brought it up, but if you're going into the Power side of things vs. coding/programming, you can usually find a decent job at a utility. And, I'm pretty sure utilities are everywhere. Around here they pay better than almost any private employer and offer benefits like "paternity leave".

The calculus part of EE is easy, it's the linear algebra that was hard for me. I basically tried to memorize everything for the tests and took my C with a sigh of relief.

Whoever said electrical was all theory has probably never pissed on an electric fence. Theory comes at you real fast sometimes.

 

[hobbes]

I'm not sure what your point is here. It seems we're talking past one another.

As far as the cars comment it was an analogy (or other big word I can't think of right now). The point was that we could have built infrastructure that lasts forever, the problem is that's it's cost prohibitive. It's cheaper to periodically repair and rebuild.

Let's try this. The reason the Space Shuttle Program was canceled is that it was to expensive to fund the army it required to maintain the Shuttle. It's cheaper to fire a 1x use rocket and drop it in the ocean. We could have continued the Shuttle Program and it would still be flying today.

Yes, I think we are likely on the same page or at least part way. And...I missed the analogy, sorry. No argument here that we could design things to last longer, but we often don't for various reasons, typically cost. There has to be a balance between available funding to complete projects and a reasonable life span. Regardless of why we've elected to build things a specific way in the past and for a specific lifespan, there's a lot of it out there that has exceeded it's lifespan and we have to prioritize when and how to replace it based off the available funding. As you stated, some of it has more to do with exceeding the anticipated use and not necessarily the time.

Damn, the op probably didn't know what he was getting himself into. He'll never go through with engineering now.

 

[KurtR]

Okay now it's personal. I was no d**n soldier. I was a Marine. HAHA

Is it hard not to eat the crayons while drawing plans? Haha couldn’t pass it up.

 

[UtahJimmy]

First of all, if they're wearing suits, then they're putting on a show or working for somebody else.

Gotta start somewhere and being 35 before going to school for finance means you'll be a slave for a few years after graduation. I wouldn't wish that on anyone in their 40's.

Second, cash is not king and is not a measure of wealth. Cash is subject to losing value quicker than assets. The hyper inflation event in Germany in the 19-teens demonstrates that.

I didn't say it was king, but it definitely is used to measure wealth. Having cash also gives you opportunity.

If you think a boat you have a loan on that's not making you money is an asset, you don't know what an asset is and likely a poor investor.

By definition; an asset is something that has value. A boat is an asset.

And guess what, engineers learn about risk and turning paychecks into assets from the economics and finance guys. Where do you think ROR/ROI, IRR, and NPV comes from when evaluating projects?

It comes from doing math.

 

[ThorM465]

Yes, I think we are likely on the same page or at least part way. And...I missed the analogy, sorry. No argument here that we could design things to last longer, but we often don't for various reasons, typically cost. There has to be a balance between available funding to complete projects and a reasonable life span. Regardless of why we've elected to build things a specific way in the past and for a specific lifespan, there's a lot of it out there that has exceeded it's lifespan and we have to prioritize when and how to replace it based off the available funding. As you stated, some of it has more to do with exceeding the anticipated use and not necessarily the time.

Damn, the op probably didn't know what he was getting himself into. He'll never go through with engineering now.

There's one more thing to consider I didn't think of earlier.

I was talking to a CE friend in college about why bridges last longer than roads. He said something close to this, but my numbers are probably off, roads are built to withstand the 10 year storm and the bridges are built to withstand the 100 year storm.

Those concrete bridges do last a long time, but the roads are a hell of lot more comfortable to drive on. And that's the other thing to consider. Which gives us a better quality of ride? How much comfort do we want to sacrifice?

It may not make a huge difference for sedans, but I can tell you that if the tires and shocks on my F350 aren't in good shape I'll bounce all the way across a concrete bridge.

 

[ThorM465]

Is it hard not to eat the crayons while drawing plans? Haha couldn’t pass it up.

I don't understand. Crayons are for eating and pencils are for drawing.

 

[hobbes]

There's one more thing to consider I didn't think of earlier.

I was talking to a CE friend in college about why bridges last longer than roads. He said something close to this, but my numbers are probably off, roads are built to withstand the 10 year storm and the bridges are built to withstand the 100 year storm.

Those concrete bridges do last a long time, but the roads are a hell of lot more comfortable to drive on. And that's the other thing to consider. Which gives us a better quality of ride? How much comfort do we want to sacrifice?

It may not make a huge difference for sedans, but I can tell you that if the tires and shocks on my F350 aren't in good shape I'll bounce all the way across a concrete bridge.

For the most part, it's the bridge ends that are a problem. The bridge is on a deep foundation of some sort that rarely moves/settles while the approach is likely a significant amount of fill/embankment that does settle.

There can be several things going on with the embankment. We have in situ soils in some places that we know over the life of the roadway may settle multiple feet. We remove those if it's shallow,if they are deep we'll attempt preconsolidation (several ways) and those are not always 100% effective. Add in the difficult of compaction of embankment and pavement against the back wall and it's not uncommon to have settlement in the roadway. You can also get water behind the backwall that causes a problem and there are ways to deal with that. We have a specific detail and spec for the material placed at bridge ends to try and improve that.

Many states install an approach slab that sits on the backwall and extends out some distance to a sleeper slab in an attempt to spread "the bump at the end of the bridge" over some distance so that it's not as abrupt. Approach slabs create their own set of problems so we've moved away from them.

The deck itself can sometimes not be as smooth but it's normally a result of the contract doing a poor job with bidwell setup. If it's a long enough bridge to require expansion joints, those can create some bumps as well. I think we could pour everything on the deck a touch high then micro grind the entire deck for a smoother deck but there are costs associated with that.

That's all fairly simplified and there are constant attempts to improve a problem at the end of a bridge that will likely never go away completely.

 

[Backstrap]

You're going to have to really, really, really want it to pursue a ME or especially a EE degree (I'm a Civil Engineer but my curriculum still made me take differential equations and the Laplace transforms & Fourier Series still wake me up in a cold sweat) AND work full time, especially if you don't have the math background going in.

I didn't myself and I remember starting out adding apples and oranges in my first college math class. With your work experience Manufacturing or Industrial Engineering may be the way to go. Employers and especially project teams appreciate someone with hands on experience in addition to the theoretical knowledge.

Where are you at in the Yoop? If you're within an hour's drive or so (in the snow) of Michigan Tech, that would be your best bet for education locally. Excellent school with a great reputation. Check with them to see if they have flexible class scheduling that accommodates working adults. Best of luck with whichever path you choose.

 

[Cedarsavage]

I'm surprised that no EE's have brought it up, but if you're going into the Power side of things vs. coding/programming, you can usually find a decent job at a utility. And, I'm pretty sure utilities are everywhere. Around here they pay better than almost any private employer and offer benefits like "paternity leave".

The calculus part of EE is easy, it's the linear algebra that was hard for me. I basically tried to memorize everything for the tests and took my C with a sigh of relief.

Whoever said electrical was all theory has probably never pissed on an electric fence. Theory comes at you real fast sometimes.

That's definitely something to consider

 

[Cedarsavage]

You're going to have to really, really, really want it to pursue a ME or especially a EE degree (I'm a Civil Engineer but my curriculum still made me take differential equations and the Laplace transforms & Fourier Series still wake me up in a cold sweat) AND work full time, especially if you don't have the math background going in.

I didn't myself and I remember starting out adding apples and oranges in my first college math class. With your work experience Manufacturing or Industrial Engineering may be the way to go. Employers and especially project teams appreciate someone with hands on experience in addition to the theoretical knowledge.

Where are you at in the Yoop? If you're within an hour's drive or so (in the snow) of Michigan Tech, that would be your best bet for education locally. Excellent school with a great reputation. Check with them to see if they have flexible class scheduling that accommodates working adults. Best of luck with whichever path you choose.

I'd like to go there but it's a little too far and doesn't fall under my "free education" umbrella

 

[rtkbowhunter]

Didn't read all the responses, but my recommendation would be in controls or automation engineering. One of our local colleges offers a BS in "Automation & Intelligent Robotics Engineering Technology". High demand field, great pay, and you get to work with some really cool sh!t.

 

[ThorM465]

Didn't read all the responses, but my recommendation would be in controls or automation engineering. One of our local colleges offers a BS in "Automation & Intelligent Robotics Engineering Technology". High demand field, great pay, and you get to work with some really cool sh!t.

With all due respect, that's a technology degree and not an engineering degree. If you want to go this route you're better off with an EE BS. You'll be qualified for any job requiring this degree. However, vice versa, you won't be considered for every job requiring an EE degree. If you really want to specialize in this field you'll be better off with an EE BS and a Masters in this field.

 

[JohnIrish]

I am an EE (now retired) that went into the Power option. I worked for an electrical utility. Lots of jobs in rural areas if you are in the Power area. Just look up the area you are interested in ... then find the electrical power companies near by. You may be able to get your "foot in the door" by working now for that company while going to school. Many companies will even pay for part of your schooling. Dont be afraid of the math! Yes.. you do need to learn it but everything is simplifed in the real world when you get out of school. There are also many consulting engineering firms that are scattered around.

 

[Seth1913]

Mechatronics engineer here currently working in a heavy industrial manufacturing facility. Sounds like you’re mechanically inclined so an ME would be up your alley. Personally I wouldn’t worry to much about a PE. One thing is engineering will help you move up from your current position but I know a lot of tradesman that have started their own business and will do better than I ever will. You have to want to be an engineer though not just for the money, if you do it for the money EVERYTHING is harder. Another thing to consider is engineering at the “plant” level (ie, manufacturing facilities, power generation facilities, construction sites) can be very demanding with little to no compensation for over time.