Back To The Shop Floor

Being an engineer is a passion for me... I've always been interested in engineering since a young age (Due to my fathers influences), so naturally when it came to choosing a career path when I left school I traveled the oft neglected road of an engineer... now I've yet to meet a super wealthy engineer, as by the nature of the job we tend to do it for the love. But after the first few agonising years as an apprentice living on a pittance it can be such a relief to finally break through into the "big time" as it were, this I did several years ago, and although I'd always welcome more (Who wouldn't) I'd say I've got the balance right with a career that not only interests me, but also leaves me with a comfortable feeling in my wallet.

With my new job I hope I'm going to go far... today, for the first time in nearly 10 years I've been working on the shop floor and learning the processes involved in making the things I design. Now I'm not ignorant to how the various machines work, but it astonished me the advances that have been made in as little as 10 years, this combined with the fact that we use a lot of "fancy machinery" to achieve cuts in 6 axes at once left me looking like a slack jawed newbie (Most common or garden machinery only uses 3 axes). I'm hoping to learn a lot here, as I've always prided myself on the fact that as a designer I know what the machinist is having to do to make the finished item, therefor I can make his life easier :-)