Another one bites the dust!

[Archie]

Sounds like we're on the same wavelength! The maths book is heading for a ritual burning when I leave but I suppose it wouldn't hurt to take the 12 bore to it first!!!

I'm in the third year now so fortunately there's no more maths in the pure sense but there's plenty left in multi-phase flow and Christ knows what else. TBH, like your cousin, I loathe the course but at this stage I shall stick it out.

I think you're absolutely right about geting experience in another company before, potentially, looking to make my own way. I have been running a small sideline making plant supports which I sell to mad old bats with big gardens. Business wise it's small scale but I've learnt quite a bit from it. It has yet to be seen how things will go next year with the financial climate as it is..... I chose Engineering with a view to getting exactly the 'way of thinking' you are talking about out of it. If I had even the slightest temptation to be an engineer when I started it has now been expunged!

Thank you for the compliment, BTW!

 

[Drains]

Hi Mr Fluffy,

The fact that the Chinese own a significant portion of US debt means that the Chinese have money, doesn’t it?

They also have a large labour force, educated people, factories and a lot of people that want a fridge, tv, moped or whatever. I mean, why do they need to send that stuff over here, where we already have enough of those goods. My take (and that of many leading economists) is that the resources are better spent satisfying the needs of the Chinese people.
.

You're right Dutchman that the Chinese will do well to develop their domestic markets, as the US did in the 19th Century.
There was far more to US wealth than the domestic market though. Trade with Europe and the far East were absolutely vital to US economic growth. At the time, the UK owned much that America produced (investments in US Railroads, steel companies etc). World War One reversed the bias of ownership, as the UK had to buy millions of pounds-worth of munitions in a one-way trade situation (they made them, we blew them up)
But the truth is, it doesn't really matter who owns the money or who owes it, as long as it flows - it's true that "money makes the world go round" - although in fact, it's money going round the world, which is useful, and for that to happen, we have to have TRADE. Historically, trade has always brought wealth. When trade stops, wealth decreases. Right now, because money has stopped flowing, so has trade. So we're ********.

 

[MrFluffy]

Hi Mr Fluffy,

The fact that the Chinese own a significant portion of US debt means that the Chinese have money, doesn’t it?

No, they now own so much of it, for them to call it in would cause the US economy to implode if they cashed it in and render the debt worthless before they got it. Guns and tanks might be involved in the aftermath too...
So, they can either continue to shore it up by owning some of their debt and use it to leverage trading conditions with the spectre, or they can destroy the US economy and have nothing to show for it.
Meanwhile the chinese gov is rather more interested in maintaining status quo there and staying in office and keeping its populace under control by drip feeding that prosperity to its new middle class in a controlled way by forcing the us to feel obliged to continue to trade without blocks than using its new found world wealth to improve the lot of its citizens.
This is the view of quite a lot of economists Ive read recently.
Strange bedfellows indeed. What wicked ways people weave...

Malc, its not savings, its just we're paid in pounds by a client but the company is based here. We've been trying to pick a date to bring over the recent turnover expecting it to rise, only to see it hit parity this week...
Ive heard of a lot of expats repatriating because of the weakness of the pound of late for the reason your parents are having a time of it. That and the healthcare changes...

 

[malcolm]

If I had even the slightest temptation to be an engineer when I started it has now been expunged!

Don't let uni put you off engineering. It really can be fun. Though you'll never be able to buy your own house of course. If you wanted to have fun doing engineering and earn some cash another language would be a good skill to have. Best thing about it for me in my field (automotive development) is the variety - I could spend a morning with the brain doing clever things in an office, then I could try them out in the afternoon by making stuff.

Only real danger of self employment for me is the motivation. I'm very poor at that so a week or two working for other people every now and again is great for getting me back into a rhythm. The risk it would go tits up is less for me as my living expenses are low.

Sorry Si - very good point. Should be interested to follow that as me and Archie have probably got as far as would be useful to anyone.

 

[marknotgeorge]

Well, I've picked a fine time to change careers. To be fair, the career I left was the motor industry (I was a line rat at Toymota). I'm hoping that the career I'm moving into, accounts, won't be as hit as other areas, as companies will still need good people to keep a tight hold on the purse strings. And accounts is something I seem to be good at.

On another note, what do people think about governments propping up the big three? I feel it's as necessary as propping up the banks, as long as there are reforms. There'll have to be wage cuts and pension reforms in the US, and I think the US design teams should be trimmed in favour of the European arms, as at least the Europeans know how to design efficient vehicles.

 

[Drains]

Archie, have you graduated? If so (or if not), what in? And are you left handed?

It's a proven fact that left handed graduate engineers get jobs in the company i'm working for. I'm neither, but then again, I'm just a lowly contractor.

 

[Archie]

I should be graduating in Mech. Eng in either '09 or '10. Probably 2010 unless I get the boot at the end of this year which is always a possibility. Major sticking point though; I'm not cack-handed!

 

[snowcat]

Archie, I left school pretty much smack bang in the las major crash late eighties early nineties, I really wanted one of the old style ford 3-5 year training apprenticeships they were excellent, but with around 150 places per year there was over 2000 applicants, so I stood Little chance at 16, after spending a year working for a large farm and deciding thats not what I wanted to do, I went into writtle to do there Eng diploma, this was much the same as yours and Malcolm's experience, loads of Maths and little (tho some) practical work, including a nasty 3 hour Maths lesson every Wednesday at Essex University, that still sticks in my mind, much of the course has little relevance what I do today, but I made sure I got every bolt on Writtle offered (at charge) including a C&G in welding, basic chainsaws, Materials handling cert and forklifts, and PA1&2 most of these are out of date now but are still handy to have...

after graduating I spent a few years of partly working on the family farm (something I'm still mugged into helping on) and doing this that and the other, including groundworks, Welding for London Underground, Demolition, Fencing, Air conditioning......and didn't get into what I do now till the end of the 90s, the brake I needed actualy came off the back of F&MD, you never know what around the next corner. ultimately I do believe flexibility is the key, and whilst working for people brings experience, only working for yourself will give you a can do attitude...... Its good not to be in too much of a rush, and theres no need to worry about having a carrier set in stone straight away, as long as your doing something.....

 

[madkayaker]

I teach apprentices at a FE college and we have a few older lads who didn't stick in at school or the first time round at college and they wised they did.

 

[dutchman]

Si, Fluffy,
I am by no means a protectionist and agree that money should be flowing around, in MULTIPLE directions. It has not done so in a balanced and sustainable way, hence the difficulties.

About studying, I did it a bit differently. Was fed up with school and started working at 17, after getting my diploma. Started an import/export business at the age of 18 and moved to Germany.
Seeing many friends having a lot of free time and fun while studying engineering, I decided to go to uni and studied Business-economics. Having worked for a couple of years was a huge benefit in understanding what was being taught. Sometimes I regret not doing engineering, but my old man talked me out of it. (He was trained as a constructional engineer ).

 

[mishka]

I think things would have to get really, really bad for me to consider doing a Phd!

Heh - PhDs can be good fun! At least - I had fun

 

[bill_gj]

There is, in my opinion, a real problem with the teaching of "engineering" in the UK.

I left school (a Boy's Secondary Modern) in 1967. As I have an August birthday, I was not yet 16.
In the Sec Mods, the nation's factory fodder were prepared for a life of clerical, shop and factory work.

For boys, this meant that in addition to 'normal' studies, woodwork was taught from 11 to 15 or 16 and metalwork from 12 or 13 to 15 or 16, depending on the school and what else you were doing.
This gave a lot of lads some basic skill and interest in making things.
In my school, I can't remember anyone leaving without decent literacy and numeracy skills - that is, I don't think anyone couldn't read and they all knew whether a pay-packet was right.
At the higher levels, there was an 'O' Level (NOT GCSE) stream and the maths teaching extended to calculus, as required to 'O' Level Maths.

Many lads went into decent engineering apprenticeships, because it was a time when the UK still had a broad and vigorous engineering industry.
I wasted my time and went to the local college to do an Ordinary National Diploma in engineering. However, the discovery of beer and being an a#sehole meant I didn't quite make it and I ended up being taken on by Plessey (anyone remember them) as a technician apprentice instead.

Where's this drivel going? Well - in all the time between then and now, I've learned that one of the greatest things missing from an engineering education is an APPROPRIATE understanding of maths and how it is part of everything that happens around us. That brings me onto the teaching of maths.
Maths teachers are the worst people to teach it. Most of them have the gift of being able to understand the more esoteric sums and usually can't understand why you don't understand. Give me a maths teacher that had their own struggle to understand, any day. They have a chance of actually teaching and not just telling you about it.

Just like you professional welders need to have some understanding of metallurgy, materials and processes to be respected as 'professional', anyone that is involved in engineering needs their understanding of maths at an appropriate level - enough so that you can be cautious in what you do. It's the TEACHING of the subject that buggers people up, not the subject itself. It's this appropriateness where things fall down and engineering courses, whether C&G, BND or BSc are a turn-off owing to the drudge of more maths than is actually needed.

 

[runnach]

I got GRIM new today, an institution (Lothians) fab/weld company has gone into administration, I think around 100 paid off! I don't know all the details, but current climate will have had an affect on pay off's. Hopefully a buyer will be found???

GRIM

 

[Robotstar5]

More doom & gloom

The company I work for has made about 30% of workforce (shopfloor and staff) redundant, the rest of us are having an 8% pay cut for at least the first 6 months of next year. Could get worse if the automotive industry continues to decline.

 

[weldequip]

A pay cut is better than redundancy though eh? And I believe the wonderful Unions dismissed the idea of a pay cut in the car industry? Cut the ****** Unions...clean off...is my opinion! They have been soley responsible for Britain's manufacturing decline and the sooner we get rid the better
Worker's rights? Abundent, without lazy ****, resource sapping, pretend politician, professional bleating oafs!
weldequip

 

[bill_gj]

No, sorry weldequip, not 'solely' by any means.
Much of what we used to have as a manufacturing base was also hacked about by non-engineer bean counters and accountants who 'rationalised' some industries to the point of death. They took their profits, asset-stripped the business and then pronounced them 'not viable'.

Lets take a look at what was West Germany. After World War Two, Germany's industry was re-started mainly by UK organisers and US money.
The Works Council model was pursued in the bigger companies and it has never done the likes of VW or Siemens any harm at all,
Good management + bean counters under control + Works Council has seen them become the biggest economy in Europe, bar none, all based on what '80s British politicians discarded as an outmoded 'mixed economy'.

It certainly made me laugh a couple of weeks ago when Old Etonian Campbell pronounced that what Britain needed was a vibrant manufacturing industry - is was his political forbears that had a big hand in doing away with it.

The 'Unions' led by the likes of Red Robbo in Longbridge and his counterparts elsewhere, were certainly culprits. However, Trades Unions did a lot to correctly improve the lot of the working man in the years before 1950-ish and I don't believe that one should paint them all the same colour red.

 

[weldequip]

However, Trades Unions did a lot to correctly improve the lot of the working man in the years before 1950-ish and I don't believe that one should paint them all the same colour red

******! Around 1950 the British car industry was the best in the world, leading into the 1960's...and then the rot set in with Labour governments & Unions...'work to rule' etc.etc. We've never looked forward since!
weldequip

 

[bill_gj]

****** eh. Nice.

I can't agree. Sorry. Are you about the same age as me?
British cars of the 50s were diverse in style and design and many had absolutely exemplary performance, if not durability. Many Americans will have exactly your view about their own car industry, as will the French, the Germans, the Swedes........

Like a lot of people here, I've been interested in things engineering and technical from an early age. I've worked in the defence, aero and motor industries as apprentice, draftsman, planning, methods and work study engineer, laterly I've been in both light and heavy diesel engines, EFI systems, engine sensors and other stuff.

I've seen what goes on from shop floor and management viewpoints. As an industrial engineer I've been told to f##k off by machinists that viewed any attempt to improve the manufacturing process as a means to rob them of earnings; as a technical lead on fuel delivery design for certain big-cat cars I saw how asinine so-called managmenet can be when it's controlled by accountants.

What knackered British industry? Everything did.
Red Robbo
Accountants
Asset strippers
Governments of both colours
Poorly educated managers
Refusals to accept that any aspiring industrialised nation can do as well, if not better than you by not repeating your mistakes.

 

[Drains]

******! Around 1950 the British car industry was the best in the world, leading into the 1960's...and then the rot set in with Labour governments & Unions...'work to rule' etc.etc. We've never looked forward since!
weldequip

Easy Steve. The British car industry was like the motorbike industry - past it's best and on the downward run. As for blaming labour governments and unions - there was very little difference until '79 between Labour and Tory - consensus politics was all the rage. No matter how much the unions were to blame, the corporations and capitalists failed wholeheartedly to look to the future and invest appropriately.

If you want to look at what really makes success -look at Germany and Japan. Their manufacturing bases were destroyed. With the help of the Marshall plan etc, they rebuild largely from scratch, pulled together in adversity and did well. They also have very different mutually supportive structures which we don't. You can't blame a "them and us" culture on only one side.

In the UK, at least until the 80s, many UK manufacturing plants were still based in substantially 1930s buildings. Plants like Longbridge were built piecemeal over 50-odd years. Their inefficiency wasn't just down to the lazy-good-for-nothing workers (probably your words, not mine), but also down to inefficient, short sighted, and complacent management (and everybody else who were convinced the sun would always shine on the British Empire - unions included).

It doesn't matter how much you don't want to admit it, but Thatcher destroyed Britains manufacturing base. Why? Cos she didn't like the unions either. Don't blame the unions, it was people like you who supported her! That puts the blame at the door of Thatcherites (and that may mean you Steve, no matter how hard you work, and no matter how much you, individually, are trying to redress the poor situation of Britains manufacturing- and i'm SURE you are!)

 

[snowcat]

isn't that a tad socialist Simon, are you saying the Unions are blameless then? when I worked for London Underground (only very much as a private contractor) I couldn't believe the clout of the RMT, subbies like myself were regarded with contempt, and despised, they were overstaffed by a good 20% simply because so many people would go off "sick", the management had to back down over a dismissal on one guy who was caught 6 months still off work on full pay apparently who was two sick to work, but could play squash every morning ( a née injury by the way), then the RMT put the whole lot on strike, and forced the management to reinstate em, A bloody great computer should replace all that lot with there 40K pay and militant work shy attitude........christ knows what it was like in the 70s

Your comparing Britain to japan, now is this the Japan who's workers in there last economic crash, worked for more hrs for less money, even no money in some cases, I couldn't see BL workers doing that in the 70s or even now, its a completely different mind set.......I shouldn't think 3 day week and demarcation are words that even translate.....