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Jim Wilkins[_2_] Jim Wilkins[_2_] is offline
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Default My First Punch and Die - Makers & Builders

"John B." wrote in message
...
On Thu, 25 Apr 2019 15:57:09 -0700, Bob La Londe
wrote:


On 4/25/2019 1:42 PM, Jim Wilkins wrote:
"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
...What about a machinist... No. Just ask any old manual
machinist.
I'm just a hack, button pushing, shade tree, wannabe by the very
fact that I never serviced apprenticeship for 3 lifetimes in a
steam
powered line shop. LOL.


Hmmm, at age 18 I did operate machine tools in a factory with
overhead
line shafts and leather belts. Can I call myself a machinist?




Only if it was steam (water wheel is ok) powered and the old guys in
the
shop always sneered down their noses at you and said you weren't a
real
machinist if you didn't serve an apprenticeship beating metal over
an
anvil first.

Actually I'm old enough that when I served my apprenticeship there
were still a few of those old guys around. My "apprentice master"
was
well into his 60's and had "gone in the shop" when he was 14 years
old. I never heard them talk about beating metal over an anvil.
About
the only ones left that did that when I was a boy were
Farriers, who shoed the few working horses left and they worked to
tolerances of, "well about that much" :-)

--
cheers,

John B.


My apprenticeship was at a small company that built custom production
test equipment for the auto industry. I had to learn manual and
machine metalworking and industrial electrician practices but already
knew drafting from school and quite a bit of analog and digital
electronics from the Army.

I've never seen a good title for the skills necessary to specify,
design, construct and test custom electrical + mechanical equipment.
"Engineer" tends to imply a designer with clean fingernails who passes
the hands-on work to technicians. Maybe that multitasking is only for
small companies like Segway where titles and job descriptions don't
matter, the shop was open for anyone to experimentally machine or
modify the parts they'd designed. Sometimes I had to wait until
midnight for CNC machine time.