What does this say about us?

[Genghis the Engineer]

I've been running a series of design/build projects with a big university engineering department. To do this, I've been working with both teachers and students in mechanical engineering, aeronautical engineering, building services engineering (air conditioning and stuff apparently) and automotive engineering - with subtle flavours in all of those.

Anyhow, stage 1, get the various academics to come up with projects - without fail, the quickest and most complete projects all came from the aeronautical engineers.

Stage 2 - get the students to do presentations to the lecturers about what project they should be doing. By and large, the most prompt and complete presentations came from the aeronautical engineering students.

Stage 3 - where I'm at right now. The lecturers have to decide which students they want to run projects with, and the students have to state their own preferences. Lo and behold, it's the aeronautical engineers (both students and lecturers) who are well ahead of the game.


Right now, treating them all equally from my end, the aeronautical engineers are the only people I'm actually enjoying working with. Everybody else is just being an absolute pain in the neck.

What I wonder, is why? Is there some innate enthusiasm that goes with aircraft work? Are we in some strange way more professional and organised (even when students) than people who deal with cars, water filtration units and air conditioning systems?

I really have no idea, but the difference is really quite marked.

G

[keel beam]

What I wonder, is why? Is there some innate enthusiasm that goes with aircraft work? Are we in some strange way more professional and organisedG

Too many years ago when I applied for an apprenticeship with BOAC, I had to do a day of tests with 200 other hopefuls. Some of the tests I suppose were what you would call intelligence tests, then there were Maths and Physics tests and also a general knowledge test about aeroplanes! (I guess that those who scored reasonably well in this test would probably have position offered to them than someone who did not have a clue if the results of the other tests were close)
If you enjoy the work you do then there is a good chance (from the company point of view) that you will perform well (and probably put up with a bit more cr@p from the company then somebody who could not careless about aircraft)


Todays trainees may not have the enthusiasm of yesteryear and some may not have general knowledge of aircraft.

As an aside, in the early eighties BA engineering apprentices were told there would be no employment for them after their apprenticeship finished. A number of them applied and succeded in being offered cabin crew positions, an alleged comment from a cabin crew trainer was suprise that these engineers were quite bright!
Some of them were very bright, they loved the job so much that they stayed on as CC (they were treated alot better than in engineering)

Sorry I have digressed a bit, but I think it might give part of an answer to your thread.

[Flatface]

I have spent 30 plus years in aviation. My experience is that most of us had an early interest. Mine started at age 12 when I decided to become a pilot. I succeeded at age 18 but never progressed beyond private pilot training because I could only get a class III medical. I still own an aircraft today. I have spent the last 28 years in maintenance at an airline in Canada.

I am surrounded by long service employees, one fellow retired recently at age 65 with 46 years of service. My point here is that the airline business puts you through so much BS that all the wanna bes bail out very quickly.

The standards for aviation work is very high but we all take it for granted after many years of service. I noticed that all the aviation people I know maintain very high standards in their private lives. Their garages are usually very well equiped and very well organized. Whether they are building a fence or working on the plumbing at home, usually this work is done well above the standard expected from business. I receive many comments from non aviation people who ask why go through all the trouble to maintain these standards off the job, this surprised me as I didn't even think there was any other standard. Ihave found that this method of working has even rubbed off on people around you when they witness it at your home or off the job.

All I can say that it is a nice way of doing things and it pays back every day when you compare it to the way non aviation people and businesses operate.

[vapilot2004]

The disparity surely cannot be due to intelligence differences. :eek:
Your aeronautical engineering students definitely appear to have a greater cohesive drive and enthusiasm for their work than the others.

I believe that any good aeronautical engineering team (and aviation in general) demands individual excellence and outstanding teamwork of a level analogous to a top military squad - where personalities, individual aspirations and abilities may vary, but the group's ultimate success is always the shared goal.

Perhaps it is the very nature of flight - where the sum of all parts becomes almost magically greater than the individual contributions that provides the enthusiasm which in turn helps generate the drive for these students to excel. (....and therein lies the love and devotion to the cause)

[Golden Rivet]

The aero students were top of the class as someone had promised them a trap if they finished first.

Some things never change ;)

[whiskeyflyer]

Yep.. you got to like aircraft to stay in this game:ok:
Is that why I am looking at Pprune during a break after already doing a 10 hour day with more paperwork to do ahead.
Anybody else would be looking at the sports web, so break in work is looking at aviation forum.
Could be worse, could be a pilot always looking for another job...................
Aviation is a vocation

[keel beam]

The disparity surely cannot be due to intelligence differences. :eek:
Your aeronautical engineering students definitely appear to have a greater cohesive drive and enthusiasm for their work than the others.
)

Perhaps not only due to intelligence differences, how about adding attitude. It was certainly drummed in to us during the apprenticeship, also the knowledge that we have hundreds of lives at stake if we faulter in maintenance. (It is , I believe, that lack of responsibilty for lives might harbour different attitudes to work?)

[Trash Hauler]

One word for the difference PASSION.

It is very easy to see aircraft 'defy' gravity every day and despite our understanding of the physics there is still some 'mystery' that surrounds it which I believe is what drives our passion for the business we are in.

TH

[Bodjit]

Sorry Genghis but I have to put up with these students at my place on OJT during the final phase of their licence training and on the whole I have to disagree...

With the exception of one all the remainder of these so called students couldn't give a fat rats a :mad: se about anything in particular let alone learning anything from us...

The one by the way was as you stated, enthusiastic, intelligent, and a thoroughly nice lad. Yep he passed his licenses and with a bit of help from us and a few words out in the 'engineering' world he got a good job without any problems, and I reckon he'll go far...

The rest though, my heart sinks that one day I might be on a plane that their spanners may have touched.:( :(

The worst thing, the CAA are powerless to filter them out:=

Bodjit
An engineer

[Blacksheep]

I think Trash Hauler has hit the button. Aero engineers of all persuasions tend to be passionate about aeroplanes. If we weren't, we would never put up with the working conditions. :)

I know of some passionate engineers in other fields - my brother is a civil engineer who eats, sleeps and dreams power stations - but I suppose its harder to get passionate about water filtration and air conditioning, than about something that whizzes through the sky at several hundred miles an hour.

[GullWing]

Blacksheep / Trash hauler I concur!

I wanted to do Aero Eng but didnt get the grades and ended up on mech eng. I'd say that 75%+ of the people on my course had no intention of becoming an engineer. On graduating, my friends became teachers, joined the army, or started other courses in very different areas. Passion for mech eng was lacking somewhat - especially as we had to learn topics as diverse as business law and computer programming?! WTF?

Anyways I'd have loved to have studied aircraft, their systems, and the physics that sees them fly etc etc, and would have undoubtedly tried much harder! :)
Gullwing (a mechanical design engineer doing a ppl on the side haha)