OT (Sorry) - What's your job?

[CodeMonk]

Right now I'm unemployed.
Normally I'm an all around computer geek (programming, network admin, pc tech, etc.).
Right now there ain't s**t for that kind of work around here.
But I make about $100 a week giving guitar lessons.
I also do a bit of "consulting" for a local music store when they have busted pedals or other non-working electronic musical bits.

[returntable]

- if the banzai effects are discontinued, please convince your boss to make those enclosures you used available to us all... It are the coolest and best-looking enclosures ever...

Okay, now I asked our boss, where we got our enclosures from and I was right, they are custom made for us.
And he won't get them in bigger quantities for sale, because he thinks that not enough people are interested in them and because they would be too expensive, which leads to the 1st point again

[larryprune]

I fly around the country installing contact center software. 

[sickbend]

entrepreneur I own a small recording studio I make sample and loop cds build guitar pedals circuit bent instruments simple analog synths graphic design digital art and cd and dvd duplication as well as run an ebay store doing all of the above  

[The Iron Chef]

I am a journyman machinist by trade. I hold a US patent and  I have been working in a machine shop for over thirty years. I make parts most every day but I spend a lot of time programming the CNC machining centers that we have. Using Mastercam for most of the toolpathing and 2d design. Pro/E Wildfire 3 for 3d stuff.  Where I work may be more interesting to you all.  FOr the past 23 or so years I have worked  at the Sarnoff Corporation in Princeton  NJ. USA.  Sarnoff used to be the research arm of the RCA corporation. We had an AWESOME (1/4 watt resistors to 22meg)  stock room. most every type of component, organized, and free.  I wish I knew 20 years ago what I know now about building analog effects (heh, very little). Our stock room was dismanteled recently but I did get advance warning so I was able to scrounge and dumpster dive a  bunch of stuff.   Most electrical guys here buy components from digi- key.  I am pretty good with mechanical stuff and am glad I found this site as Im learning a little about electronics. Now I need to learn to play guitar I can make guitars, I just dont play them too well.. Anyway, Look at this, I built it for my sonhttp://home.comcast.net/~kgraydon15/Flying_Vee0002.html.
thanks for this site.

-Keith

[R.G.]

My current craziness makes me envious. I recently bought bench sized lathe and mill to pursue my long-time urge to be able to make some of the mechanical widgets I dream up. You have much better mechanical toys than I do. I regard the mechanical/machining parts of a project as the hardest.

[frank_p]

Using Mastercam for most of the toolpathing and 2d design. Pro/E Wildfire 3 for 3d stuff.

I was using Mastercam and Pro-e Wildfire (with TopSolid also) in mold making for castings.  I really wonder if that is the most common setup of softwares in CNC machining.  In schools I've been trained on Catia but only worked in one place where they used it.  It was for design of custom high speed cutting tools (HSS, carbide and diamond).

I regard the mechanical/machining parts of a project as the hardest.

For me it's definitely the opposite.

There is a series of book called MetalWorking, The Best of Projects in Metal.  It's a recollection of articles published in Projects in Metal magazine.  (Village Press Inc.)
Kind of cool book for the DIY machinist because there are projects to make your own equipments with less money that it would take to buy them.  Example (Book Three): building digital readouts for less than 125$ per axis, making sharpening fixtures, making an index plate, making a diamond dresser with standard grinder, etc. , etc.


 

[solderman]

Hi
I work as a project manager in the IT industry.

//Solderman

[R.G.]

There is a series of book called MetalWorking, The Best of Projects in Metal.  It's a recollection of articles published in Projects in Metal magazine.  (Village Press Inc.)
Kind of cool book for the DIY machinist because there are projects to make your own equipments with less money that it would take to buy them.  Example (Book Three): building digital readouts for less than 125$ per axis, making sharpening fixtures, making an index plate, making a diamond dresser with standard grinder, etc. , etc.

I did that the hard way too.     I found a guy who wanted to sell his entire collection of Home Shop Machinist, which is where those articles came from, I believe. I've spent about six months reading them all, plus Machinery's Handbook, Machine Shop Secrets, etc.  I have absorbed so much knowledge about machining that I am, without a doubt, a danger to myself and others. 

Fortunately, from my early mechanical experiments in childhood, I have an all-too-close experience with the sight of my own blood, and I can visualize how a machine might cut, bruise, crush, amputate, penetrate or grate my flesh all too easily, so I wind up being very slow. Combine that with clumsy and forgetful, and you can imagine how quickly work gets done. 

[tremendous]

interesting thread - a great way to get to know you all, as it were.

me? I work for a large mobile telecommunications company as a technical writer of help files for our customers.

[frank_p]

Fortunately, from my early mechanical experiments in childhood, I have an all-too-close experience with the sight of my own blood, and I can visualize how a machine might cut, bruise, crush, amputate, penetrate or grate my flesh all too easily, so I wind up being very slow. Combine that with clumsy and forgetful, and you can imagine how quickly work gets done. 

Yes, take great care with machining machines, in places where I've worked, it was almost always in the machining department that there were the most injuries.  And for guitarists it's a nightmare unless your name is Django Reinhardt.     In the last machine shop where I was working, my boss insisted on the fact that I had to go very slowly and focus my attention the most I could (slowly but surely).  I was not paid a lot, but was not stressed and got back home in one piece.  Happily (and unhappily also for him in our modern time)  he was from the old school.  Most of the time now, in machine shops, everybody are running everywhere and everything have to be done for yesterday.  When the place changed the owner (was bought by an other company), I had to go because I learned and had the habit to work slowly.  Perhaps better like that after all.

[sleepybrighteyez]

I've had a career change, so I suppose a new post is called for. I've been working in this company for a couple of months now and all is going very well, so I'd like to think I'm sticking with it for some time to come. I'm a lead technician for a company that designs wireless surveillance networks for local police departments and the FBI. We also do stuff for government installations and the military. Very, very fun. A perfect job for me that I thought wouldn't happen until after I finished school. Lots of travel, which is fun. The downsides being I have to spend a lot of time away from my family, I hate flying (not a fear mind you), and I work in some of the highest rated crime areas of the country. There are a lot of really, really smart engineers (both software and electrical) in this company that I can't wait to have a closer working relationship with. I feel really lucky to have been given the opportunity to work for this company, and really think of it as a career and not just another job. A big step for me.

[mojotron]

...
Fortunately, from my early mechanical experiments in childhood, I have an all-too-close experience with the sight of my own blood, and I can visualize how a machine might cut, bruise, crush, amputate, penetrate or grate my flesh all too easily, so I wind up being very slow. Combine that with clumsy and forgetful, and you can imagine how quickly work gets done. 

Ahh yes... as one who likes to drill on electrical box lids with a uni-bit (because I'm too cheap to buy regular enclosures) some close calls have given me conviction about safety - always wear eye protection, ear protection and a "cup" 

[tremendous]

I've had a career change, so I suppose a new post is called for. I've been working in this company for a couple of months now and all is going very well, so I'd like to think I'm sticking with it for some time to come. I'm a lead technician for a company that designs wireless surveillance networks for local police departments and the FBI.

narc!! 

[sleepybrighteyez]

narc!! 

Not even close my friend.

[Mark Hammer]

Fortunately, from my early mechanical experiments in childhood, I have an all-too-close experience with the sight of my own blood, and I can visualize how a machine might cut, bruise, crush, amputate, penetrate or grate my flesh all too easily, so I wind up being very slow. Combine that with clumsy and forgetful, and you can imagine how quickly work gets done. 

Yes, take great care with machining machines, in places where I've worked, it was almost always in the machining department that there were the most injuries.  And for guitarists it's a nightmare unless your name is Django Reinhardt.     In the last machine shop where I was working, my boss insisted on the fact that I had to go very slowly and focus my attention the most I could (slowly but surely).  I was not paid a lot, but was not stressed and got back home in one piece.  Happily (and unhappily also for him in our modern time)  he was from the old school.  Most of the time now, in machine shops, everybody are running everywhere and everything have to be done for yesterday.  When the place changed the owner (was bought by an other company), I had to go because I learned and had the habit to work slowly.  Perhaps better like that after all.

When I finished my undergraduate studies, I was briefly employed in a sheet metal shop that made cafeteria fixtures like those "hot closets" that food is kept in, conveyor belts, and display cases.  As the only guy with university, they gave me the task of cutting the 4 x 8 sheets of 12 gauge aluminum and steel with the bench sheers.  Stepping on the foot treadle to cut the metal was easy.  The hard part was figuring out how to get the most number of usable pieces with the grain running in the appropriate direction.  In any event, I would measure backwards from the cutting edge with my tape measure to where I needed to draw a reference line.  Given the tediousness of the job, and the early hour at which it started, on many an occasion I would absent-mindedly step on the treadle while my finger was holding the end of the tape measure in place.  Happily, it took longer than human reaction time......just....for the blade to descend.  I ended up with a lot of tape measures that started at 1" that summer....but I ended up with fingers that went all the way to the end.   Play safe kids.  And don't operate heavy of dangerous machinery  unless you've had a good night's sleep.

[Jim Jones]

I'm a curmudgeonly radio announcer.  Bands, stop releasing formulaic drivel - and get the hell off my lawn! 

Jim

[Skruffyhound]

Studied ergonomics at Loughborough Uni (briefly)
Travelled
Graduated Philosophy Leeds (slowly with much traveling/music along the way)
Travelled
Moved to Denmark and started a candle company and ran myself into the ground for 4 years
Began to do carpentry work again
Fell into doing freelance tech for theatres in Copenhagen (mostly building)
In August '09 started as Stage Manager of a theatre, a wider job spec. than it is in english, basically boss of all the techs (sound/light/builders/riggers) and responsible for infrastructure in the house. Lets see how this works out.

Parallel life as wannabe musician/multi-instrumentalist(ie. not very good at any one thing but can get a tune out of almost anything) and tinkerer (since I was old enough to hold a screwdriver.)

Now seriously sidetracked in pedal building, which sucks up any free time left over from being a father to young twins Niko and Ameli
who are 2 years and 4 months and frankly the best decision I've made to date. (becoming a father that is, pedal building is good but not that good!)

Impressive to see how many eclectic types this forum attracts.

[Cliff Schecht]

I do design work at PAiA. It rocks.

[aziltz]

i'm a grad student in physics at William & Mary.  I just passed my qualifier so it looks like I get to stay for the remaining 5 years.