Lost or Miss-represented skills

Machinist.

A dying breed. Used to be we would use a multi plate indexing head for gear cutting. Had to calc all our own cutting speeds and feed rates. Don't get me started about thread cutting. Specialty tool grinding. Sharpening our own twists, web splitting and grinding rake and relief. I could make adjustments based on chip shape and color. Sound was the fifth dimension of an operation.

Machinist. Smell the cutting oil?

cr3

Nice one CR3

...but does Rene Descarte draw out 30 or 40quid? (pounds dollars whatever?...oh so many threads..oh so little time!)

I have two grades of Diamond stones that I use to sharpen things that need it around here. Also I have a very good quality Arkansas stone that puts the grandest polish / razor edge on the new sharp that you have ever seen.

I generally feel that I can sharpen anything that I have handled before.

there's nothing so sweet as filing every tooth on a chain saw chain exactly the same so that your cut is as straight and perfect as a new machine cut chain. that's ecstacy.

Yeh... I once made some cogs by hand for a scale model seige engine...just a hacksaw and files. Amazing what you can do with those two tools and sufficient patience, practice, skill.

I bet you needed a beer after doing a whole chain.

45 years ago I had to make my own hammer from a piece of iron only with saw and files... I do have it :-)

35 years ago we repaired computers by measuring out the single erroneous component and replaced it. Programmed the CPU from panel, in hex... Now it's a black box, go-no_go-maybe_microsoft...

In my home workshop (I'm lucky because I have a fairly good place in the basement) in the "mechanical section" I have a small lathe, a boring machine, a grinder, and, of course, a good vise and files. In the "electronical section" an o'scope, generators, an old VTVM, etc...

I do the maintenance tasks on my car. Not because I like it but I know I do it for myself so it will be right.

I enjoy when someone discard something "can't be repaired" and can I fix it. Maybe my wage ( I don't do it for money) would not be enough for earninig my live but I enjoy it and I can learn how those gadgets work.

"can't be repaired"

Yeh...I know what you mean... It's a challenge!

If something breaks down in my house I take it as a personal insult and feel obliged to fix it!

Yes, you are right.

Ditto.

Usually its not worth fixing. Once in a while, I'll sharpen a planer blade, drill bits as needed, and of course, chain saws are made to be sharpened. Unless they are too badly worn to bother. But you sort of HAVE to do that when you are already 2 or 3 hours away from a service shop. I regard sharpening drill bits as being part of regular mainenance, like dressing chisels, wedging hammers, and picking rivets out of the pile of shavings. There is something calming and zen like about putting a mirror finish on the faces of my blacksmith hammers.

I schedule one afternoon a week to "maintenance", and often skimp on that. Most shops I have worked in devote the last half hour of the day to clean up and putting tools away. Because of deadline constraints, I don't do that in MY shop, and at least once a month I get ashamed of myself and do a nice clean up.

Fixing computers...not a lot that can be done, though bent pins, squashed leads, and dirt will be with us always. But by the time a 'puter needs to be overhauled, it is usually being moved along to some other department because it is obsolete. (Though some of the engineers in the CAD shop seem to be working with 10 year old macs, to me it shows that the company is too cheap to supply their workers with the latest stuff. It distresses me a little that the CEO has a new laptop, and the guy on the floor has a 10 year old steam powered 486 running win 98. )

Cars seem to be designed to last a long time and then suddenly fall apart. The story of the "Wonderful One Horse Shay" seems to be required reading at Ford Motor Company! When I say a long time, I am a little surprised at myself that I mean it! All my cars lately have been dying at about 300,000 km. Back in the '60s and '70s, it made the news to get past 100,000 km. It is not unusual to find original spark plugs on vans with 200,000 kms on them still passing their emmissions tests. But, there comes a time when you have to drag them off to the re-cycling yard.

Maintenance versus replacement. A shop I worked in once would never allow me to sharpen any drill bit smaller than 3/16s because the money they would pay me to do this job was more than a new bit from the catalogue. I guess that is the eternal problem of management in a nutshell!

working with 10 year old macs, to me it shows that the company is too cheap to supply their workers with the latest stuff

Latest is not always the best. I work with mainframes and 8-10 year-old devices are very common. The most expensive service is what you pay for but you don't use it. In mainframe area it's very usual to skip some versions because it's less expensive and and more efficient and safe then a permanent upgrade.

On the other hand: in my home workshop I can collect deeper knowledge with fixing gadgets because it's not enough to know how it should work, you have to know why that way it works. In addition I can use my experience in my job too. And, of course, I enjoy it, because, as the Cat has meowed, it's a challenge...

@ one time, my boss told me: "You can't resharpen .125 (inch) diameter, 4 flute endmills!!" HE WAS WRONG! Though, in all fairness, it was not cost effective. Only did it once, just for the (satisfaction) proof that i could!

"Maintenance versus replacement. A shop I worked in once would never allow me to sharpen any drill bit smaller than 3/16s because the money they would pay me to do this job was more than a new bit from the catalogue. I guess that is the eternal problem of management in a nutshell!

__________________
If it was easy anybody could do it. "

"You can't resharpen .125 (inch) diameter, 4 flute endmills!!"

That's exactly how to make a good engineer do something! Just tell him it can't be done...

The Gravermeister Air Operated Engraving system will permit an accomplished engraver to do a job in a fraction of the time it would take to do by hand. In the hands of a beginner or novice it will make scrap of an expensive work piece in record time. Just a matter of skill.

I have an ancient 10 key wide "Comptometer" type adding machine which worked very smoothly some 20 or so years ago when I picked it up at an indoor flea market for a few UD$. Now it is gummed up, washed out, key stems removed. The problem now is to determine how to continue to disassemble and carefully clean each and every part prior to reassembly. Gradually laying out a procedure/plan before taking it apart and put it back together.

As a child everything mechanical in sight was likely to be subjected to screwdrivers, pliers, and other hand tools to take it apart. Sometimes it was reassembled and worked again and just as often ended up on the junk heap. Often it takes head skills as well as manual skills to get the job done right.

Sometimes the analysis and planning skills acquired from many projects and a few failures are as important as the manual ones.

As a child everything mechanical in sight was likely to be subjected to screwdrivers, pliers, and other hand tools to take it apart. Sometimes it was reassembled and worked again and just as often ended up on the junk heap. Often it takes head skills as well as manual skills to get the job done right.

HAA! As a child, and as an ADULT! My garage, oh my poor garage. It is a shameful sight indeed!

Lost and dying art forms: A few examples

Proper file methods: How many people out there can still take a series of files and file a solid metal spere into a equal sided cube? There is nothing more beautiful than a octagon barrel on an old rifle that was hand filed by an artisan from a piece of round or square stock.

Wood joinery: When was the last time you saw dovetails cut by hand so perfectly that it was difficult to see the seams and very little if Any glue was needed to hold the joint together?

Tool sharpening: Very few really know how to sharpen anything anymore with any precision. Probably why Ghinsu knives sold by the car loads. Nothing feels better (well almost nothing) than a keenly honed hand chisel taking paper thin wisps from a piece of hard wood, Against the grain.

I love power tools and use a lot of them. Only because Speed now takes precedence over real artisanship and to me that is a crying shame.

When was the last time you saw dovetails cut by hand so perfectly that it was difficult to see the seams and very little if Any glue was needed to hold the joint together?

Yeh that reminds me of another ... Inlay.

What passed for inlay these days is a big hole with a bit of plastic floating on a sea of epoxy !

I've done some ivory inlay on a crossbow... 'can't see the join' as Eric Morecambe used to say.

<Does anyone make joints without a router? Do you still sharpen your own chisels? Drills?>

Oh yes. Drills, chisels, planes, everything. That 'O'-level in woodwork has saved a fortune, and was a basey fundamold for greater things. A favourite joint? Without question the 'hidden dovetail' (a.k.a. 'mitred full-blind dovetail' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dovetail_joint); if one makes a minor mistake one can hide it and still assemble the piece!

Here's another one. How about: splicing ¹/₄in audio magnetic tape with a jig and a razor blade? One-track and two-track is relatively easy; doing it with four-track successfully takes a little practice. Doing it with ¹/₈in cassette tape is an art-form, provided one can keep blood off the tape surface. Fortunately the tape doesn't pick up the sound of cussing unless the machine is in 'record'......

Splitting and sizing roofing slates?

Or how about: making a coal fire go? How many youngsters have even seen an open coal fire these days?

Great post!

Have you ever tried to cut an old 1/2 in computer tape to two 1/4 in with a half razor-blade in a mould, in order to use it on your tape recorder? (we were short on money...)

That's progress, when the cost in time as far as wage is concerned to sharpen a consumable tool is concerned. Someone figures out a way to make the cost go away. Why would any one spend more time on a drill bit then it cost. These are business practices that some take home with us. At home for some of us it's the pleasure of working with our hands to create some thing. To see a job well done. To be able to put an edge on a cutting tool that we know a machine can't do. To use this tool and take pleasure in what you have accomplished.

Del the skills you have just mentioned take heart they will not go away. One small population of American society will not let it. They are called the Amish.

At work with wood chisels I use a bench grinder to take the damage production does to them off. Would take hours by hand on a stone. Some of them look like they were used to brake rocks. They are then finished on a stone. I have had to design rotary cutters for special applications that all the final grinding and honing was done by hand. So all is not lost here.

A skill which takes more of your time than to do a replacement is called a "hobby". It takes skill to use a slide rule, but mine has sat in the bottom drawer for 25 years now. I didn't throw it away because I liked the idea of a non-battery operated backup and it doesn't take up much room. I got rid of all my "Grey code" books because I never work on anything that uses it any more. I admit I am guilty of picking up a gorgeous 75 year old router-edger plane, and carefully cleaning up the rust and re-trued the fences. Then it sat for 5 years collecting dust because it can't really compete with my one-third horsepower shaper. I put it in the garage sale and got 30 bucks for it...half a dollar for every hour I worked on it to bring it into shape.

Having these skills are okay I guess, they are useful if I have to get something done without having the right tools. Most times when I use these skills, they remind me of the early days of scrambling for business, making do with insufficient equipment, bad skill sets, dangerous work conditions, bad bosses, and even worse employees. Even the rosiest of rose coloured glassess don't make these times fun. These were wood working shops, mechanics garages, and machine shops that ALWAYS had insufficient tools and overwhelming deadlines. Now I am a hobby blacksmith responsible ony to myself and my clients, and the arthritics in my shoulders are telling me to get a power hammer. NOW!

There is no doubt that anybody that does this job has to like the "process" rather than the "finished" showing off the finished product since often I spend 20 or thirty hours on a job, and then it is packed for shipment. Often there is no time to even get a picture of the finished product. I might see the finished item for a quarter hour, then, for all intents, I discard it. So in that respect, I think my present "job" is a "hobby". Mostly. Unless I am hustling to make some money for a new transmission for the Aerostar, or to pay for a new dual core. In which case, it is a means to an end. Then it is more important that I become a salesman instead of a craftsman.

Speaking of getting to work, Its time I DID just that!

TTFN

Nice post...

I'm not averse to machinery or modern innovation as long as they actually do the job/save time/money etc... It's when they produce a poor imitation of the real thing that I have a problem!

My inlay example is a good one.

Ages ago I had a portable blacksmiths forge (I think they were used a lot in WWI )...moved house and it stayed behind....

Ever made any bodkin arrow heads on your forge?

Cheers

Del

Lost skill:

Manual drafting and drafting boards. There was a time when all dwgs were done by hand and complex shapes such as car body panels and airplane wings were created using ONLY 2D hand drawings. The engineer/designer creating these dwgs had to THINK in 3D. You also learnt how to visualize fits and tolerances and you had to know how things went together and had to design them for manufacturability and ease of assembly. As a young designer, I worked for a forklift company that made me go down in the assembly and fabricating areas and actually put forklifts together. This taught me the problems that the assemblers had to deal with and the machinists had to do deal with making the parts I designed. Let me tell you I certainly took into consideration these problems in my new designs. With CAD and computers it seems that applying this type of common sense to design has also been completely lost.

I have had to oversee new designers that don't know how to dimension properly, don't know standard dowel fits and tolerance, or even what UNC or UNF mean, etc. It's horrendous. These CAD jockeys I call them are great at making lines and circles really fast and creating models if you lead them by the nose, but give them an actual problem to solve and come up with a viable design. You will be hard pressed to find a hand full that can do it competently.

Computers are great, but give me someone that understands how to design first. We can teach him how to use CAD easily later.

<...CAD jockeys ..... give them an actual problem to solve and come up with a viable design>

If they're there to be CAD jockeys, then the viable design is the responsibility of the individual who signs the 'Approved' box in the corner of the drawing, and that ain't gonna be the CAD jockey!!

Drafting indeed.

I recently saw a special on one of the channels where a man was demonstrating the art and skill of flint (chert) knapping.

Very, very cool.

These people have been hired AS designers (as I said above in my original post). I am calling them CAD jockeys because of the design skill level they possess.

Del,

I hazard to guess that the majority of posters here initially learned trades at the benches of fathers & grandfathers. That influence shaped their response to future learning experiences and is precedent to who they (we) have become. If you agree with the premise, I would be interested to hear your thoughts and how are our children's skill sets now being developed and where it all leads.

Pepper

Very true...

I despair at the dearth of decent male role models for many of todays kids.

My daughter has been under a car changing a clutch, dropping a crankshaft and replacing driveshafts. Both kids learned guitar from their Mum, they've always had books and pencils and paper and construction type toys...still got the Lego.

I don't suppose they learn wood work, metal work or any decent chemistry at school these days, too worried about health and safety.

Historically primary schools teachers tend to be female, who for historical (or maybe nature/nurture)... reasons tend to be less biased toward the practical. Sometimes I feel education knocks the curiosity and enthusiasm out of kids rather than encouraging it.

Some of 'em don't even play outside beacuse of dangerous roads and an unrealistic fear of paedophiles...(statistically kids are more likely to be abused by people known to them rather than strangers)

I can only hope that kids natural resilience will help them to do ok despite their parents and eduction...!

Oh dear I've depressed myself now..

Del'

The mention of woodwork brought back memories of wood shop in High School. If you learned nothing else you learned to clean up at the end of a "shift". I'm suspect there are no wood shops in public school now. Not to fear though. Our boys are home schooled and they indeed have shop class as well as clean up.

darn you, you 'ol horsetraders. Now I'm reminiscin' into a pitiful fit.

Del,

I'm often in awe of manual skills which I don't possess. This weeks is plastering. Made a danged awful mess of the kitchen wall on Sunday. Potentially a miniscule leap forward on my previous attempts perhaps. Another one is panel beating. Beats me how guys learned how to do it. Surely it takes more than one mortal existances worth to perfect? One thing I've just about worked out how to do is sharpen my plane. I will look out for those darned panel pins where some blithering idiot nailed hardboard onto the door to make it 'modern' 40 years ago!

Can't stand the noise made by those motorised planes 'they' have these days!

Happy filing. Speaking of which what about 'scraping' flatness, an expression of the conjunction of art and engineering (www.bugatti-trust.co.uk) - where does that feature?

Yeh..scrapers.. I bought one a while back just 'cos it was a cool shape... sort of curved like a big comma .( havn't used it )

I once worked with an old guy who had worked on bugatti engines..they used to lap the valves in, then fill the port with gas and leave it overnight...if it was still full in the morning then the seat was deemed ok.

Must admit I bought a cheap power plane which I've been using on an oak sculpture I'm doing, but I've also used spokeshave, chisels, files, axe, disc sander, table saw, plane. so I think I've covered all bases! The antlers are being made of Yew which I scavenged from timber which I knew was lying on the floor following some woodland management a few years back... it looked rotten, but that heart wood is beautiful once you chop off the rotten sap wood.

If it wasn't for hand tools I wouldn't get even a tiny bit of excercise!

Well, apart from walking the *** occasionally!