Do engineers have a sense of humor?

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I remember having lunch at the faculty table with the head of the math dept one time. I think the war started when I told him that as I remember calc II was mental masterbation.
 
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I had a professor in college tell us all to learn from experienced treatment plant operators when designing treatment plants. He pined what a great mistake it is not to seek advise from these people. I’ve sought the advice of intelligent Contractors, some of which are extremely intelligent. It takes experience, maturity, and wisdom to successfully apply an engineering education to solve real life problems. I’ve always been eager to learn as much as I can from the great Contractors, Operators, and Vendors I’ve had the pleasure meeting. I strive to stay humble and prove myself by being clever, logical, rational, and generally right. I’m open to those much smarter than me, more experienced as well as less experienced and less smart, so long as they are logical and rational. Cheers Bill
Sounds like you’re doing it right. There are a lot more doing it right than given credit for. And a lot of engineers I meet have a good self-deprecating humor about their profession. I’m technically an Engineer by job series and title, but never went to school for it and don’t claim it. Technically I’m a Remedial PM/Engineer. But remedial design in most instances is hardly engineering IMO. So I guess I can’t talk too much sh!+

Prost!
 

WCB

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I know they don't change oil in their vehicles....except for whoever placed the filter and plug for the new Chevy Equinox...that guy was on his game.
 

cusecat04

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Mar 28, 2016
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Syracuse, NY
A classic is when passing someone in the hall and saying hi. Typical engineer says hi to the dust bunnies near the wall as they never raise their eyes or completely ignores you.

I've met many varieties over the past 20 years.
Some of us have twisted senses of humor as we get called in to fix the issues of the CAD jockey that never leaves his/her desk.
Hands on work/wrenching on farm equipment/vehicles growing up has benefitted me greatly in my career.
 
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A priest, a lawyer, and an engineer are sentenced to death by guillotine. The priest puts his head on the block, the rope is pulled but nothing happens. He claims he has been saved by divine intervention and is released.

The lawyer puts his head on the block, but again, nothing happens, he claims he can't be executed twice for the same crime and is set free.

The engineer places his head under the guillotine. He looks up at the release mechanism and says: 'Wait a minute, I see your problem...'
 

Steve O

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You ever try changing the plugs in a mid '80s Jag XJS?
Air cleaner box off.
Disconnect throttle linkages (which de-synchronises the carbs)
Carbs off.
Rocker covers off.
Inlet manifold off
HT lead separator tray off
THEN you can get to the 12 sparkplugs.....

Reassemble in reverse order, obviously replacing all gaskets as you go, then re-synch the carbs.

We used to book 6 hours for what should be a 20 minute job. AND that's assuming you got the damn leads on right the first time.....
If you were fortunate enough to have a 1984 Buick Skylark (little J body) you could have pulled the engine to get to ONE of the 6 plugs. I didn’t think my great aunt had that many miles left in here so went with 5 new ones and rolled the dice 😊
 

Steve O

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Calc II was the devil.
Differential Equations was my problem child, but that was mostly professor driven. This thread is giving me some PTS type flashbacks. Tonight I will probably dream I’m one class short of graduating…
 
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Every time I fill up my washer fluid from completely empty, this is whats left. Drives me bonkers. Im convinced the engineer is still laughing until this day... Any of you engineers pulled some funny business intentionally?
the rest of it goes in the blinker fluid reservoir
 
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Have you ever dropped a piece of buttered bread? Notice it (almost) always lands on the buttered side?

An engineer will tell you it’s because you buttered the wrong side.




P
 

Billinsd

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Aug 25, 2015
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ALL engineers are neurotic, at least to some degree to almost debilitating in severity and generally cope in many ways, often amusing to sometimes shocking to non engineers and struggle with relationships, especially women. This is what I’ve read on the internet. :D
 

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mt terry d

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What you guys are seeing as engineering mistakes are intentional. Everything today is designed with service in mind. Not the service you can do yourself but the service you have to pay for down the road. Many of those things are frustrating to me in a sales engineer role because they make my job harder.
Plastic blender door in my son's F-150.
$30 part, $1500 labor.

Seat, console, dash all out.

We did it over two days. Took several beers and my full 4-letter vocabulary.

There are thousands if not millions of cars whose engines, trannies, running gear are all
in fine working order but are junked because of electronic part failures Cost of thousands of $$ to
have them repaired exceed the value of the vehicle. But, hey, we're saving the planet!
 

Fowl Play

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Oct 1, 2016
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My F-350 is the same with the washer fluid — little thing that grinds my gears as well.

Probably the best story I have that fulfills your question, is I had a colleague who named his part the “fun-tunnel” and labelled it as such in a training presentation. I was the unfortunate sole who just happened to be presenting that to a room full of high ranking NASA officials and I had not caught his stupid joke. Room was predominantly women. Someone caught on and asked me what the “fun-tunnel” was, why is it called the “fun-tunnel”, doesn’t that sound a bit wrong? Why would anyone name that hole that a bunch of men have to pass through the “fun-tunnel”. Things got out of hand.

I still have not properly gotten him back for this. I did make it so that every fluids panel in his new building had valve reference designators on the facility schematic and machined into the panels as “FU-1” , “FU-2” etc. but this is not enough….
 

Smallie

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Illinois
Process engineer in manufacturing here so I can’t design anything and I’m bad at math. So I get to tell people how I think is the best way to do their job. If I didn’t have a good sense of humor I think I would get beat up in the parking lot everyday walking back to my truck
 

rharbaugh

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Apr 26, 2021
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E. Iowa
Plastic blender door in my son's F-150.
$30 part, $1500 labor.

Seat, console, dash all out.

We did it over two days. Took several beers and my full 4-letter vocabulary.

There are thousands if not millions of cars whose engines, trannies, running gear are all
in fine working order but are junked because of electronic part failures Cost of thousands of $$ to
have them repaired exceed the value of the vehicle. But, hey, we're saving the planet!

My brother in law has the same blender door issue, but he’s freshly out of college and doesn’t have enough money to fix his the right way. He’s going to “red neck engineer” it with a saws all on some plastic parts to gain access to the door. Here’s the video he sent me


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

mt terry d

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Shoot2HuntU
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We considered that but it was winter and we had time. It was a b**ch of a job though.
I'm certain when the dash is put in at the factory the windshield is still out.
I'm sure it would have killed FORD to have put a higher quality blender door in in the first place. God knows no one would pay the additional $25 bucks on a new vehicle for that.

Oh, add the oil filter located directly above the starter on a 2000 Taurus.
Sheer genius.
 
Joined
Feb 23, 2021
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Montana
Same with the DEF tank on my dodge. Even if I run that thing to E I can’t get two jugs of fluid in. Always some left. Every time I fill it up a little part of my soul dies.
 

jmez

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Jun 12, 2012
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Piedmont, SD
My brother in law has the same blender door issue, but he’s freshly out of college and doesn’t have enough money to fix his the right way. He’s going to “red neck engineer” it with a saws all on some plastic parts to gain access to the door. Here’s the video he sent me


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Depending on what kind of vents he has you can go through an air vent if you have small hands. It's on you tube.

Sent from my moto g power 5G - 2023 using Tapatalk
 
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