Engineering Sayings and Catchphrases

If you find youself in a hole, stop digging!

Presumably that's not from the mining industry?
Quit while you're behind has a similar feel.
Del

I like that one, but here are a couple others: "right tighty, lefty loosy" and "oops".

"Oops."

A definite classic.

But what about, "a stitch in-time…"

1. Yes Dear (oh wait, that isn't a catch phrase, that's a phrase when I get caught)
2. You can pick your friends and you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friend's nose.
3. Measure twice, cut once.
4. Why do I need to comment my code? It was difficult to write, it should be difficult to read.

<splarf snort flump thud>
Del

When I was a youngster my father cut my hair once each month and he'd say that every single time. And he thought it was funny every time.

Me, not so much.

How about measure once, and buy more material.

Maintenance Quote:

"Shit Happens"

And Maintenance Management quotes:

"No job is finished till the paper work is done!!!"

As much as I hated that term, I always loved it.

And I'll tell you why as an anology,

When I see a loose football, and no one wants to pick it up and say......"Thats not My Job", I pick it up and run with it.

Served me well early in my carreer.

But....We've always done it that way.

Houston, we have a problem.

"we will fix this machine if it takes every dime you've got."

Even if it's been "Mended beyond repair" (one of my fave's)
Del

"It's a rule of thumb"

"Work smarter, not harder"

"Think outside the box"

"You let the smoke out of it"

"Risk is not a four letter word"

"Let's not re-invent the wheel"

And my all-time personal favorite, which is always said by some Director who never spent a day in engineering to the engineers working on a project, is: "Let's do it right the first time."

We can have that up and running in no time.

"Words can not express..."

Of course they can, that's what they were designed for.

When I nod my head, you hit that sucker.

If we can't fix it, we'll fix it so it can't be fixed.

I don't know. It worked fine until we fixed it.

As Roger Ramjet stumbles out of the wreckage of his crashed jet, a bewildered bystander asks, Roger what happened? Roger replies I don't know, I just got here.

One maintenance person to another. How did they get the part into that small space?

Reply: I think they planted a seed and it grew in there.

If it was easy to fix, you wouldn't have called me.

Let me get my crystal ball and some pixy dust and we'll have this fixed in a jiffy.

There's a right way, a wrong way and there's the army way, we do it the army way!

Or "That's supposed to happen ...." (if you can get away with it).

Tough sell when the room is filling with smoke.

Indeed - just got to make a feature of it!

"This is the automatic shutdown/alarm system test function - _{([stage whisper] Jim, I told you we weren't going to demonstrate that today!)}".

Although the product has produced record-breaking sales figures and has a solid, loyal customer base, by taking the "lean" approach, we have decided to redesign.

"Good enough for the girls we go with."

If NASA can train monkeys to fly the space shuttle I just might be able to teach this guy to work here. (Tcmtech working with the new guy the first day.)

Space monkeys would have been the better choice. (Tcmtech after working with the same guy for two weeks.)

If a prototype works fine from the first time it must have a hidden flaw

That's operator error.

"User error" I really hate that one. Or how about this one: we changed the link, but we won't tell anyone, that way we can find out how many people are really using it.

It's only temporary!

Go ahead everyone else does.

Project Engineer to the Electrical Foreman after watching two apprentice electricians struggling to field bend a 10' length of 6" rigid steel conduit into a 90 (with a hydraulic bender no less):

Engineer: Did you see your two apprentices out there wrestling with that conduit?

Foreman: No, what happened?

Engineer: "They looked like a couple of monkeys trying to f**k a football"

www.monkeyf**ckingafootball.com

I was going to get t-shirts made for myself and the company's programmer with this logo, our company name above it, and "We struggle" below it.

Up 'til it shears then back half a turn.

Reality's on the blink again.

Who's idea was this?

From working on Pulp & Paper, and wastewater plants:

"Smells like money"!

We used to say the same thing working in beet sugar processing plants.

That's funny. My dad (Chas. T Main for 30 years, pulp & paper) when we drove and would smell the distinctive odor of a paper mill, would say, "I smell money."

Comment from Engineer in charge of millwrights squinting while I pointed my flashlight at the wobbling 10' diameter shaft coupling and the 6"x3' bolts laying in the oil catch pan: Your an electrician, How did you know this was broke?

Definition of a fitter, "an electrician with his brains removed"

It's weird but every problem starts out as an electrical fault, until the electrician finds the mechanical fault.

"Don't ya just hate when that happens..."

these two items have gotten me through most of my life so far

1) good thing for some people that breathing's automatic

2) you can't teach the ignorant

Stub

My favorite, when something goes right is "I planned it that way".

Either, "Well that must have been broken too", or,

"Well, first that broke, then it must have taken this with it"

omg... I'm surprised Bill didn't wet himself...

I seeeee... said the blind man as he picked up his hammer and saw..

...rectum? nearly kill 'em..

or...

... bent it? - Damn near broke it!

On the inception of a new project or new technology:

We've been doing it wrong for so long, why change now?

Bob

I've read the following somewhere here on CR4

Plumber's rule of thumb

Hot on the left, cold on the right and shit doesn't go upward

sh*t flows downhill and payday is on friday!

Engineer to colleague,

"Just tweek that pot (or valve or screw) a bit ...........STOP !!"

"We've done so much with so little for so long that it appears we can do anything with nothing in no time at all"

"If it doesn't work, we will always wish it had"

"We love it when it works"

"Back to the drawing boa.....um, I mean 'CAD system' "

"I wonder what this does . . ."

"Don't paint yourself into a corner"

"Good idea, glad I thought of it"

"Hey that's great, mind if I use it?"

Catchphrases from a former boss (a good engineer):

"Never underestimate the wiring" - all too easy to do.

"Ah, but it was cheap!" - usually referring to other's problematic equipment or projects which had been done on the cheap)

"Words fail me"

I think the first one is funnier if you include your comment into the quote, as it gives it a nice self contradicting oxymoron sort of feel.

"Never underestimate the wiring - it's easilly done".

Or am I getting into overthink?
Del

"Well, nobody thought it would do that"

K.I.S.S.

Keep It Simple, Stupid!

If it would be easy, everyone would want to do it.

Twice is nice! - My Panel builders after a design change

We can fix that in Software. or It's just software.

Change #2,375,678

Fire in the hole! - Upon turning power on for the first time.

Shawn

Kitchen, roast potato's.

"After brown comes black!"

In workshop.

"Loose, tight, tighter, very tight, over tight and then loose!"

Computer industry.

"Don't wory, be happy, don't marry!"

Office.

"He saves money no matter what it costs!" (Translated from old German saying....)

"Blessed are the pessimists, for they hath made backups."

"descubriste la cuadratura del círculo"

This will only take a minute.

Never argue with a fool. They will drag you down to their level, and then beat you with experience.

So many of them, and so few of us.

Hey! Watch this....

"If you're not sure ask."

"Sometimes you get the bear, sometimes the bear gets you."

On passing a problem to the incoming crew: "Well, all you gotta do is..."

Domestic manager (IE: wife), upon seeing you working on the car, surrounded by parts: "Are you done yet?"

There are worse times for that question to be asked.

"It was like that when I got here."

"That's close enough."

Why make it simple when it can be complicated?

There come a time in the life of every project when it is time to shoot the engineers and begin production.

Being politically correct about a problematic operator...

"It is clearly an induced ID10T error..."

..from the hollows of tech support..

"Well... ...that's the first time we've seen this problem?"

"That's why we call it Research!", as I explain to a client how it took so long to develop their product. "Eureka! we've just discovered one more way not to do it!" after a failed experiment. "You can't fix STUPID!"

Here's a new one I just made up:

1. If you've got time to read all of these, you are under-utilized.

Now a couple from the software side of the world:

2. You can do anything in software given enough time and money.

3. There is no such thing as a perfect program.

"Good enough for the girls I go with"

From Manager as you breathlessly put on your glasses to inspect the broken equipment, "How long will it take to fix it??"

Software

"That's not a bug, it's a design feature"

Drafting/Checking

OIE-Operator Interface Error

Tech support

PEBKAC Problem Exists between Keyboard an Computer

Video Production

"We'll fix it in Post"