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Odette posted:I'm in my second year of EE, and at the end of this year I have to pick a specialization. My options are pretty much the following: RF, DSP, Control Systems, Power. (RF/DSP have more embedded systems papers) What kind of classes are in each specialization? I ask because in each of those topics are really where you get into specialization. Like, you can go into RF but do packaging heavy work, or into Power and really end up in a control heavy area. Two people can work in 'RF' and not really understand each other when they get into technical details because they could be worlds apart is what I'm saying. On the surface none of those seem especially bad to me, but it really depends on what curriculum your school offers behind each of those doors. Like if none of the RF profs work with embedded stuff really, then its going to be reflected in what is offered.
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Jul 7, 2013 19:46
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You'd just better really, really like/be good at math if you do controls. You can kind of "get away" with not being super-strong in DiffEQ/etc in different areas of EE, where practical knowledge trumps being able to throw around transforms like no one's business. I still need to lean heavily on MATLAB/Simulink to solve some relatively simple controls stuff, but I know signal integrity/fields/etc off the top of my head. I don't think I could do controls all the time personally, so much math 
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Jul 7, 2013 19:52
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movax posted:You'd just better really, really like/be good at math if you do controls. You can kind of "get away" with not being super-strong in DiffEQ/etc in different areas of EE, where practical knowledge trumps being able to throw around transforms like no one's business. I still need to lean heavily on MATLAB/Simulink to solve some relatively simple controls stuff, but I know signal integrity/fields/etc off the top of my head. I don't think I could do controls all the time personally, so much math Yeah control is so mathematical intensive to the point that if you can't handle complicated math then better stay away from it. It's quite similar to specialization in semiconductor devices, which you have to master overwhelming amount of solid state physics.
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Jul 7, 2013 21:56
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In my opinion if he has made it to the end of his second year without posting "Help my GPA is just a frowny face in red marker" in the engineering thread he is probably plenty well versed in the necessary maths.
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Jul 7, 2013 23:13
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Booties posted:I'm totally in it for the money and I'm not ashamed to admit it. gently caress your $29,000 lab tech position. From what I gather from talking to a few people this is really common these days.Even people with good gpa's, god help you if you have a sub 3.0 gpa. O yea I have a sub 3.0 gpa. These are stories from chemical engineers though.
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Jul 7, 2013 23:25
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Uncle Jam posted:What kind of classes are in each specialization? I ask because in each of those topics are really where you get into specialization. Like, you can go into RF but do packaging heavy work, or into Power and really end up in a control heavy area. Two people can work in 'RF' and not really understand each other when they get into technical details because they could be worlds apart is what I'm saying. From looking briefly at the 4th year papers, this is whats offered with each: RF
DSP
Power
Control
Note: The 3rd year papers seem to split into two separate categories, with RF + DSP having more embedded papers & Power + Control having more power/control papers.
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Jul 8, 2013 00:47
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Controls and RF are kind of the same math anyway...
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Jul 9, 2013 15:57
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boxorocks posted:This is pretty long winded and I ramble a bit, and I'm probably a bit bitter about the whole thing, so take it with a pinch of salt: BTW, box, I finished my first startup with my controls position. It was pretty cool, and all the up front work really paid off when we got on site. You should try to get a job with a industrial controls firm. We're in the same position as you, except we never get blamed when X construction firm screws up installing X giant bazillion dollar component. Well, not never, we were on the same page as this customer. They had our back. SCADA work could easily translate to working with ABB, Rockwell, Seimens, Emerson, Honeywell, etc. You have to learn their way of doing it anyways, so basic knowledge of SCADA/DCS is all you need.
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Jul 9, 2013 19:18
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KetTarma posted:Are you me? I bought a Raspberry PI, haven't had a chance to play around with it much yet though. What have you done with it? If anyone else in the thread is looking to practice C, I've found HackerRank.com to be helpful. They have exercises that go through all sorts of programming challenges like different types of searches, sorts, decision making and other stuff you can do in C, C++, Python, Java or a bunch of other languages.
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Jul 10, 2013 02:44
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OctaviusBeaver posted:I bought a Raspberry PI, haven't had a chance to play around with it much yet though. What have you done with it? I have one acting as an HTPC and one that acted as a webserver. I took the webserver down after deciding that not being super awesome at security configurations and having server applications open to the internet might not be a great idea..!
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Jul 10, 2013 03:55
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I'll be starting a bachelor in electrical engineering in august. I couldn't decide between electrical or machine engineering before it was too late so electrical it is! It's two years since I last studied so how horrible will going back to school be?
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Jul 10, 2013 17:27
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grtzsgdre
hehehewwwwwww fucked around with this message at 06:36 on Dec 18, 2019 |
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Jul 10, 2013 17:30
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Dominic R. posted:I hope this is the right thread to ask this in Field application engineer / application engineer is the job title you want. My good buddy spends his time crawling around automotive test cells, not much time in a cube. Picking something like petroleum as an industry will also have a much higher chance of getting you out in the field, usually with a pay boost due to working where nobody wants to be.
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Jul 10, 2013 17:33
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thanks
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As an application engineer, let me just tell you that depending on the actual job, you won't necessarily be getting out and about very much (besides other offices...) just because of the title. If you're looking at what engineering major to choose, well, pretty much all of them can get you there if you want...
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Jul 10, 2013 21:15
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If you want to do hands-on, don't bother with engineering, become a tradesman or technician. Honestly, hands-on gets old really quick; there's a lot to be said for a cushy desk job in an air conditioned office you can retreat to after the field work that you'll appreciate soon enough.Selklubber posted:I'll be starting a bachelor in electrical engineering in august. I couldn't decide between electrical or machine engineering before it was too late so electrical it is! It's two years since I last studied so how horrible will going back to school be? grover fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Jul 10, 2013 |
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Jul 10, 2013 21:25
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Oh and also, a lot of other fields have more hands-on stuff. For example, my buddy is a geology major and spends his working days down in a mine. He seems to like it, though I consider it a lesser version of hell.
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Jul 10, 2013 21:59
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Apply to construction companies if you want a good balance of hands on and field work. I currently work on a project as a field engineer, graduated with a BS in ME, and spend half my time in the office, the other time on the job site. It pays well too compared to other ME fields. The only downsize is being relocated every 1-3 years at the whim of the company.
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Jul 11, 2013 01:14
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Dominic R. posted:I hope this is the right thread to ask this in Become a civil engineer. If you want as much field time as possible then concentrate on construction management. My wife is a cm and did two years on site, now she is in the office for the last 2 years. Really though it depends a lot on what job you get though. My last job I did the same thing as this one. I spend as much time in the field as I want now though. E: if you want to work electrical maybe not the best field. Although I am in and out of substations and work on EHV power lines all day. spwrozek fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 01:58
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Dominic R. posted:I hope this is the right thread to ask this in I will point out that it doesn't necessarily require an engineering degree (or a degree at all, for that matter). A lot of the guys in my office, for example, were maintenance techs in the Navy. I have noticed, though, that the people with engineering degrees do tend to be a bit sharper in general and better at creative problem-solving. And at least at my office, degreed employees are given a lot more opportunity for growth and advancement. And I feel I should point out that the pay can be very lucrative. There's a pretty good chance that I'll be sniffing six figures next year, which was but a far off dream in my former life as a design engineer. In the interest of fairness I should point out that it's not all roses. There can be a lot of travel involved and long and unpredictable hours, so it's somewhat difficult to have a normal social life. Hell, I'd say at least half of the guys in my office have been through at least one divorce. And while I love getting dirty and sweaty and the actual physical feeling at the end of the day of having done something, the occasional days spent outside in 90+ weather sitting on top of a GSU transformer or staring at a DC hi-pot for hours are... not pleasant. grover posted:If you want to do hands-on, don't bother with engineering, become a tradesman or technician. Honestly, hands-on gets old really quick; there's a lot to be said for a cushy desk job in an air conditioned office you can retreat to after the field work that you'll appreciate soon enough.
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Jul 11, 2013 02:22
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Dominic R. posted:I hope this is the right thread to ask this in Petroleum Engineers that work for service companies tend to get stuck in the field early in their careers and can make more money than office workers if they work 80 hour weeks and are catching jobs every day. You might have a hard time finding a job with a major service company because they tend to value safety.
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Jul 11, 2013 03:43
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I'm job hunting at the moment; did my bachelors in aero and then went to grad school to get a PhD in mech but decided it just wasn't for me and dropped out with a masters. It was a hard choice cause all my life I wanted to be a scientist and was dead-set on it but that's life and things change. Now I'm looking for jobs and I'd like to limit myself to major cities on the West Coast and NYC. I guess this leaves Seattle, Portland, and the San Francisco Bay Area (and NYC), and on the bottom of the list would be the LA and SD metro areas (would like to avoid southern CA, for no reason other than I find SF much nicer). Since the only time I ever went job hunting and went to career fairs was during my undergrad, I'm unfortunately only familiar with the major aerospace and defense companies (LMS, Boeing, etc). I don't know anything about "normal" companies that need mechanical engineers and I don't have the resources/connections to go to job fairs and such anymore. Is it kosher to ask here for names of companies that fit this bill? Not asking for people to do my homework for me but whatever companies that immediately come to mind would be nice. At this moment my main concern is to just relocate to one of those metro areas with a job in hand and start working to get some experience so I can be more hirable as an engineer. I can pick and choose my jobs later when I the last job I held isn't "research assistant."
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Jul 11, 2013 10:34
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I would say don't pick and choose where in the country you want to work right away. I have friends doing that and they are unemployed. For finding companies just do some simple Google searches. So many different industries hire engineers. Search for "engineering companies in ___" or type in "(industry name) jobs in ___" if you're looking in a specific area.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:43
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I'm pretty burned out on writing cover letters. Can anyone read this one that I'm working on? I feel like the quality of these dips after writing so many. I want to make sure I'm still on track.
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Jul 11, 2013 22:14
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Jump on LinkedIn and connect with everyone that you did undergrad with. There is a very good chance that many of them work as engineers and know something about a job opening somewhere.
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Jul 11, 2013 22:32
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KetTarma posted:Jump on LinkedIn and connect with everyone that you did undergrad with. My only experience with LinkedIn is getting spammed from them from people I had like a single class with freshman year in like one of those 100+ people lectures, so much spam that I just blocked everything from LinkedIn as spam just so I never see those god drat emails anymore. I never even signed up for it so I couldn't figure out how to turn off the spam any other way. e: I have a probably irrational hate of LinkedIn from this. Boris Galerkin fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Jul 11, 2013 |
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Jul 11, 2013 22:47
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Accept every connection. Figure out who can help you. More connections mean that you show up higher in search results. If you decide against networking.. I will warn you that you will probably not get a job from applying on a website. There can be thousands of applicants for a single job with only 10% of them actually qualified for it. Hiring managers will pick the first 50 and base interviews off of those.
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Jul 11, 2013 23:20
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djroomba posted:I would say don't pick and choose where in the country you want to work right away. I have friends doing that and they are unemployed. One of the reasons I didn't want to continue my career path to academia is because I'm starting to have an insistent desire to root down somewhere like right now and that's just not possible with academia (I'd have to constantly move around every couple years to do a new postdoc somewhere totally different). I can't explain it but I've done the whole traveling thing thing, studied abroad, seen a hell of a lot of the world, and always lived in a 'temporary' place and now I'm tired of it all and want something permanent.
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Jul 12, 2013 11:33
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Boris Galerkin posted:One of the reasons I didn't want to continue my career path to academia is because I'm starting to have an insistent desire to root down somewhere like right now and that's just not possible with academia (I'd have to constantly move around every couple years to do a new postdoc somewhere totally different). I can't explain it but I've done the whole traveling thing thing, studied abroad, seen a hell of a lot of the world, and always lived in a 'temporary' place and now I'm tired of it all and want something permanent. First, you can get a PhD and then go into industry, especially with something like mech. I only know one person who is doing the post-doc circuit and I have a feeling that's because she spends 80% of her time on vacation and her family is super wealthy. Second, I've made Senior Scientist at my company with 'only' a master, so don't exclude research automatically. Yeah you won't be a tenured prof with his own lab or whatever but its pretty nice. Don't devalue yourself, it'll show through on interviews. Finally, applying to companies broadly is ok, but really try to uncover and target specific jobs. Does it matter to you if the company you work for employs hundreds of mech engs or just a few? In a company with a few, it might be easier to stand out, and they get a lot less applicants. When my company founds a new specialist department, they usually shoot out a press release to local papers, its a good time to apply to see if they need people in the new department. I'm in RF and some of the companies I interviewed for were a Carbon Capture company and a glass making company (embedding antennas into the glass).
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Jul 12, 2013 15:12
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Boris Galerkin posted:I'm job hunting at the moment; did my bachelors in aero and then went to grad school to get a PhD in mech but decided it just wasn't for me and dropped out with a masters. It was a hard choice cause all my life I wanted to be a scientist and was dead-set on it but that's life and things change. Now I'm looking for jobs and I'd like to limit myself to major cities on the West Coast and NYC. I guess this leaves Seattle, Portland, and the San Francisco Bay Area (and NYC), and on the bottom of the list would be the LA and SD metro areas (would like to avoid southern CA, for no reason other than I find SF much nicer). It's not exactly what you are looking for, but take a look at LifePort in Woodland, WA. Subsidiary of United Technologies
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Jul 12, 2013 15:37
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Boris Galerkin posted:Since the only time I ever went job hunting and went to career fairs was during my undergrad, I'm unfortunately only familiar with the major aerospace and defense companies (LMS, Boeing, etc). I don't know anything about "normal" companies that need mechanical engineers and I don't have the resources/connections to go to job fairs and such anymore. Is it kosher to ask here for names of companies that fit this bill? Not asking for people to do my homework for me but whatever companies that immediately come to mind would be nice. Try Crane Aerospace & Electronics, FLIR Systems, SunPower Corp.
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Jul 12, 2013 17:46
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What kind of ME are you? ME is insanely broad.
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Jul 13, 2013 21:00
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I was wondering if anyone has any advice for a recent ChemE graduate. I'm having a real hard time finding a job after graduating in May. I know I stunted my original search by primarily looking in my immediate area (Akron/Cleveland Ohio) but with no prospects I'm willing to apply just about anywhere. I've had two interviews that have gone very well; both from my p.o.v. and from the responses I got back from the companies, however, I've gotten beaten out by candidates with far more experience. One of the companies is looking for positions in other offices for me, however, I do not want to bank on that prospect in case nothing turns up. I graduated with a degree in ChemE with a specialization in polymers and I did an 11 month co-op at a contract manufacturing plant doing a mix of project/process/mechanical integrity as well as a 3 month co-op doing competitor research and patent searches. I feel my sub-3.0 gpa (2.83) may be holding me back from getting some opportunities, especially considering the amount of co-op experience I attained compared to other students. My networking has helped get the few interviews I have done and I keep reaching out to others but I feel I just haven't had that right stroke of luck yet. Does anyone have any other tips to offer? My plan right now is to just canvass simplyhired, monster, etc. and send my resume out to as many entry level jobs all over the US as possible and hope something sticks.
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Jul 15, 2013 19:09
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mullzor posted:I was wondering if anyone has any advice for a recent ChemE graduate. I'm having a real hard time finding a job after graduating in May. I know I stunted my original search by primarily looking in my immediate area (Akron/Cleveland Ohio) but with no prospects I'm willing to apply just about anywhere. I would think networking is your best option, since a lot of places may robo-filter you out for having a sub-3.0 college GPA.
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Jul 15, 2013 19:51
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evensevenone posted:What kind of ME are you? ME is insanely broad. I guess you would say I specialize in CFD, HPC, and regular fluid mechanics. I've got some CAD experience but it's not that great. Honestly I don't really see too many jobs for people in my field out there so I'm trying to sell myself as a ME that can learn new things really fast.
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Jul 15, 2013 20:30
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Boris Galerkin posted:I guess you would say I specialize in CFD, HPC, and regular fluid mechanics. I've got some CAD experience but it's not that great. Honestly I don't really see too many jobs for people in my field out there so I'm trying to sell myself as a ME that can learn new things really fast. Do you have a good story to go along with the learns real fast claim? I wouldn't be so quick to push that claim. I'd say showing how well you worked on your previous projects and the completeness of your work, even in a different area, would be time better spent. Getting a perfect fit for a posted job never really happens in my experience, unless the posting was designed with a specific person in mind. Then you were hosed from the start anyway, just a victim of corporate policy.
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Jul 16, 2013 02:31
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If your GPA in the final year(s) were significantly better than the earlier ones, you can turn it into a I've matured a lot now blah blah blah deal. This can be a great response to one of those typical HR questions like "what's your weakness" (inability to prioritize or some other spin on "immaturity").
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Jul 16, 2013 03:11
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One position I applied for asked me if I could submit a portfolio of my past projects. What in the world is a portfolio in the engineering sense? Are there any good examples out there? I've never actually designed and built anything but the position I applied for isn't a designing and building position either.
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Jul 16, 2013 19:11
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Boris Galerkin posted:One position I applied for asked me if I could submit a portfolio of my past projects. What in the world is a portfolio in the engineering sense? Are there any good examples out there? I've never actually designed and built anything but the position I applied for isn't a designing and building position either. Maybe they want some reports on design projects you've done the last few years?
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Jul 17, 2013 00:50
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Boris Galerkin posted:One position I applied for asked me if I could submit a portfolio of my past projects. What in the world is a portfolio in the engineering sense? Are there any good examples out there? I've never actually designed and built anything but the position I applied for isn't a designing and building position either. Typically some slides or slide-like things that describe a project. You'll want a project introduction, like the motivation behind the project (and I don't mean, cause a class required it, even class projects have some sort of real life application), then the steps that you took, and finally results/reflections. Don't just delve straight into the technical details because everyone will become confused. The purpose is not only to show what you can do technically, but also how well you present and tell a story. I'd put the information on a USB stick and also print them out in color in a binder. Prepare any project you think is worthwhile to include, and just choose the most appropriate ones for the interview. This is also a good reason to get whatever you work on in your first job published to the public, whether it be patent/paper/website press release/light magazine article/whatever, so you can put it in your portfolio and not break confidentiality when interviewing for your second job. One guy I interviewed had only printed out the source for his MATLAB code, and nothing about the problem it was supposed to solve or the actual output of the code. Don't be that guy. Edit: Also for the love of god don't follow the default bullet point hellscape template in powerpoint, annotated pictures/diagrams with one or two main points written out per slide. Uncle Jam fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Jul 17, 2013 |
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Jul 17, 2013 03:05
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mullzor posted:I was wondering if anyone has any advice for a recent ChemE graduate. I'm having a real hard time finding a job after graduating in May. I know I stunted my original search by primarily looking in my immediate area (Akron/Cleveland Ohio) but with no prospects I'm willing to apply just about anywhere. I was in a very similar situation minus the co-op experience over in the Bay Area, CA. I was searching for six months to no avail before finding a crappy production tech position at a chemicals company in the semiconductors industry through a staffing agency. I know, it's a really lovely position to have for a ChemE grad, but it's all about building experience and networking at that point. I was able to find a new job at a proper company through a friend in college after a bit over a year of working that production job. Basically I would say just take any job you can find that's even tangentially related to your field (even if you consider it "below" your level) while applying for "proper" positions. If that ends up not panning out, in about a year all your college buddies will be settled in nicely at their jobs and might know of some openings that can help you out. In terms of locale, you can always try Houston/the rest of the Gulf Coast for the oil/energy industry or Austin/SF Bay Area for semiconductors and biotech. I think P&G is located around where you are, no? Keep your head up, as long as you keep putting an honest effort towards job hunting you will eventually find something that sticks 
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