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Re: A quick explaination of my solar system

PostPosted: Wed Aug 22, 2012 3:47 pm
by solar_dave
Doug you are where I will be in a few more years (multiple months) I love the machine shop creative and am getting to the point that is is as good as it needs to be. Of course it never is finished, its a machine shop. I worked hard all my life and miss the smell of cutting oil and chips flying. I made automotive progressive stamping dies before my move to Denver and work at Rocky Flats (if you have an inkling as to what they made) as a tool maker, tooling inspector for 15 years. The computer bit pays better but none of the creative, point to it kind of stuff. AS a buddy of mine once said, a Toolmaker needs to know as much and have the skills of a Brain Surgeon and gets paid less than a UPS driver. Rocky Flats enlightened me to ultra precision tooling, 50 millionths all the time.

Re: A quick explaination of my solar system

PostPosted: Wed Aug 22, 2012 3:58 pm
by chrismb
solar_dave wrote:AS a buddy of mine once said, a Toolmaker needs to know as much and have the skills of a Brain Surgeon and gets paid less than a UPS driver. Rocky Flats enlightened me to ultra precision tooling, 50 millionths all the time.
Sad, but true for many engineers. Western society has never really got to grips with understanding where wealth is really 'made', thus has never really rewarded the wealth creators (miners, farmers & manufacturing engineers).

As least you've made it to retirement. I am in my 40's and have been stung by a recession at the very start of my 'career age' in the early 90's, then have now been hit by the financial-market shenanigans of the last few years that has meant the whole pension pot of our company has now been frozen (as it became under-funded a few years back and was forced to close by the regulators). I've a minimal pension to look forward to and will no doubt suffer a further 20 years of under-inflation-rate salary rises. If it's ever been a bad time to be an underpaid mid-career engineer, it's a really torrid time of it right now in the UK. Maybe anywhere.. I hear it is pretty rough in the US too at the moment.

Enjoy your retirement, and don't look back! It's a good plan to get yourselves as self-sufficient as poss, asap. Glad to see you could get the solar energy thing done!

Re: A quick explaination of my solar system

PostPosted: Wed Aug 22, 2012 4:28 pm
by Doug Coulter
Dave, you might want to check out some of Jerry's posts here - he MAKES CNC machines...his CNC laser cutter (UV laser) is just the latest.

Re: A quick explaination of my solar system

PostPosted: Wed Aug 22, 2012 4:30 pm
by solar_dave
Doug Coulter wrote:Dave, you might want to check out some of Jerry's posts here - he MAKES CNC machines...his CNC laser cutter (UV laser) is just the latest.


Actually I have a plan for a granite based milling machine, super stable and well damped.