Makers and Model Engineers

[Another JohnSParticipant @anotherjohns]

[Another JohnSParticipant @anotherjohns]

Peter Morgan wrote, in the thread about MEX photos:

I find the whole "aging demographic" argument very interesting. I respectfully disagree. Younger model engineers call themselves makers. the maker movement is growing nicely and is actually exactly the same thing that many of you have been doing for many years! but Makers and model engineers are separated by the great divide! Its like watching a bad family drama where the 2 factions realise they are related but don't acknowledge each other!

I have created a new thread, because I think this topic is important.

Short story; 3 years ago I exhibited at a maker faire, and had, in reference to my CNC'd Unimat lathe, the following two types of comments:

1) A Unimat! I had one of those, but how is it moving by itself?

2) LinuxCNC, Gecko G540. But what the heck is that machine it's controlling?

You could determine the question by the age of the questioner. Grey hair, question 1, anything but grey, question 2.

So, directed to us grey haired people (or, those now with no hair!) how do we work with those who know the computers, but not the tools nor materials?

John.

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

I'm currently working with two guys in roughly the second boat.

One is mid 40's, very very skilled in CAD work but clueless in machine work although he knows what things are.

I'm trading mechanical skills for CAD skills in the hope that we both improve in the disciplines we are the worst at by osmosis.

Second lad, mid 20's knows his way around computers very well but that's all but he's keen.

He's starting to build a small CNC router with help but instead of freely giving help I make him research everything then tell me how to do it but correct any mistakes to save him time and money.

It's no good just giving this type of lad information as he's accept it not knowing why. He has to be made to think.

As regards CNC in general I have said for a long time the easiest way to get into it is to convert a rotary table or dividing head to a 4th axis. After all it's just one axis of a CNC, the others are identical.

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Join a Mens' Shed, we need to talk to each other. Mine is mostly gardening and woodwork. Makers stood at MEX for a couple of years, but are now big enough to hold their own events. As one who crosses the divide (Industry, amateur radio, computer user) I have an overview, but public understanding of technology is very poor.

Geoff

[MWParticipant @mw27036]

I would agree with Geoff, people just think it comes literally out of a conveyor belt and technowizardy happens in between, it's not called magic but it might as well be regarded as such.

Schools are pretty much left to fend for themselves when it comes to technology lessons, as nothing is provided by the government, so the result is a patchwork array of quality across the country. (UK) 

They might have not been as prestigious as universities, but the technical colleges of yesteryear were pretty good at preparing people for industry for what they were worth as they didn't need to focus on anything but.

Now in my local area, all of the colleges that individually taught machine skills were pooled into 1 of the colleges (privately funded) and the council college have stopped teaching it altogether. In years gone by the big industries put something back into the community by donating alot of the old equipment to them. 

They even setup a CVA auto-lathe school for the unemployed, so that they could learn to set the machine and get a job worth having. Now they just teach you CV writing. What goods a document with nothing to put on it? 

Michael W

Edited By Michael Walters on 23/09/2016 08:05:22

[stewart woodParticipant @stewartwood82335]

Public understanding , it seems to me that the main problem with a lot of new technology is, you can see it works , but if you want to understand how ! then that's what as become much more difficult. The piece of equipment I am using to make this post with is a perfect example, I know it works but how? I want to understand it but were would I start . Ok , so you might say your IPAD is so far up the manufacturing process ! it's a poor comparison. My point is trying to get people interested in the how it works ( not just this piece of technology ) is so much more difficult . Open the bonnet on any car to day and tell me what's reconiseable , first of all most of the engine will be covered with a lump of plastic covered foam , manufactures don't want us to be interested it's not in their interest. Then we have so many other reasons to stop us getting interested, everything is tamper proof fancy heads on screws, etc, etc, health and safety don't get me started . My grandson came home with something he had made , in what is very loosely called technology , it made me sad to see how any effort he had put in to completing the task must have meant little to those who were teaching him , I can say without doubt ! My school wouldn't have let me out of the classroom door with it . Stewart

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

When I built my first computer in the seventies everyone said how useless and why would anyone want one at home. Now you are an oddity if you can't surf the net and email text and tweet like crazy all day long. It is just a matter of time, usability and cost.

Thirty years from now few will understand Gcode and the maker machines will not allow much visibility of it anyway. Teenagers will be considered to be expert engineering designers if they can tell the computer to move the picture of some wheels onto the picture of a car body and say 'go'. There will some geeks trying to get a rusty old Tormach to work again in their sheds.

The St Albans modelling exhibition will still be held on the last weekend in September but will be attended by virtual reality access to the virtual hall where we have collected the 3D interactive images of the crumbling old plastic models printed in 2020.

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Well, yes, my experience of metalwork at school was limited to something cut from sheet metal and bent to hang a spade from. That was 60 years ago! As for what's under the bonnet, the first thing you see is designed to protect a pedestrian in a collision. It may be the air filter, or inlet manifold or w-h-y, but it has this secondary purpose too. Underneath, it works just the same as any other i/c engine. Fuel injection has replaced the carburettor, but even that was quite sophisticated by the 1970s. Tamperproofs are to stop the casual interference by the clueless and malign. The necessary fittings are easily available. The STEM programme is good, as are the encouragements for young women to take up engineering. If you want to understand the iPad, you have to start at the bottom, Ohms law, diodes, etc. You wouldn't try to understand a jet fighter without engineering basics either, it's not just electronics which has this characteristic. But, microtechnology is now so cheap that we can make it do complex things and still be affordable.

Geoff

[Colin BishopModerator @colinbishop34627]

Some interesting comments here but I think we should also consider the why as well as the how. I come from the scale model boating side where people are experimenting with CNC routing, 3D printers etc. with varying degrees of success. But to me my modelmaking is a leisure pastime and the prime driver is pleasure rather than advancing the spread of technology. I used to do quite a bit of computer programming before I retired so I’m sure I could dip into ‘maker’ techniques, 3D printing etc. if I set my mind to it but I have no real interest in doing so as to me it seems you have shifted the whole process upstream so that you design something and then a machine is programmed to make it for you. My satisfaction involves attacking a piece of wood with a craft knife and other associated activities which are literally hands on to the finished product.

Computer programming is a skill in itself and can be applied to all sorts of areas, the techniques used by makers to produce physical objects are perhaps not so very far removed from those used to write computer games and construct accounting or inventory systems. The big difference is that there is a physical rather than just a virtual end result but that only really applies to the output stage rather than to the processing that delivers it.

Naturally computerised techniques will appeal more to the younger generation as they are more comfortable with sitting in front of a screen designing rather than out in a shed getting oily amid pieces of metal and wood which is probably an entirely alien environment to them.

It’s horses for courses of course, or in my case ‘whatever floats your boat’. At the MEX I felt I was one of the younger ones – and I am 68!

Colin

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

Did years of programming stuff as a youngster and not remotely interested in it in old age

The level of focus and concentration required to do good code work can actually affect your brain, I finally stopped doing a chess program (decision making stuff which fascinated me) when I couldn't even remember to get a pint of milk on the way home. My ability to multi task was observably disappearing as I got more capable at coding.

So IMHO there is a genuine divide in this industry because in the majority of cases it's the young brains who can cope with it, especially with newer unwritten stuff, and in a majority of cases the older brains can't

Like all the best writers, composers etc tend to do their best work by about 35 years of age (in the majority of cases)

So the divide isn't so cultural IMO, it's also physical

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Colin, you are!

Geoff (70)

[Geoff TheasbyParticipant @geofftheasby]

Ady, yes. I've heard that said about mathematicians too. I'm not sure about the cognitive thing. I drive Debs mad when I don't remember even daily things, yet I still absorb and retain information like a sponge. Always have. I'm quite competent and compos mentis (within the meaning of the Act) and lived alone for 20 years up to the Millennium, but I'm more interested in the item of the moment rather than becoming an 'expert' on some narrow subject.

Geoff

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Ady1 on 23/09/2016 11:31:05:

Did years of programming stuff as a youngster and not remotely interested in it in old age

The level of focus and concentration required to do good code work can actually affect your brain

…

Anyone else remember "Shoestring Syndrome"? This euphemism for flipping out was quite common in computing in the seventies when burn-out was an occupational hazard in the industry. It still is.

As always the web scores high on Trivia. "Shoestring Syndrome" is a reference to the hero's back-story in the TV Series Shoestring According to Wikipedia, after the star (Trevor Eve) decided to move on, the format was moved from Bristol to Jersey and renamed Bergerac. I never knew that.

I only came in from my workshop to look up how deep to cut a metric thread. I got the answer ages ago and really ought to go back to work. But this armchair is so comfy…

In case you want to know something useful too, it's 0.614 times the pitch.

Cheers,

Dave

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

I have a theory, that in these days when most <30 year olds live at home, sizeable rented homes cost as much as a mortgage and starter homes have on the road parking and no garage, the majority of 'makers' simply don't have the space for a proper workshop. they need to have equipment that isn't very messy and is easily stowed away.

I have no doubt that as they grow older many will take an interest in metalworking and more advanced engineering, or that they will find completely different but just as interesting things to make models of.

Neil

[Matt Nolan 1Participant @mattnolan1]

I first learned of the "maker movement" when off on a project in the USA. Working in an open-plan creative co-working office / workshop space. Broadway costume and set designers next to a genetics lab next to sculptors working mainly with inflatables next to architects making bespoke interiors next to us – making robotic self-playing musical instruments from glass, metal and wood. Several MIT grads in there and also some "TED Fellows". While it was a fantastic environment for sharing ideas (the different individuals and small companies really did cross-pollinate quite a bit despite their different disciplines and official independence) I did feel that a lot of the stuff at the more virtual end of things was rather superficial and not entirely unlike a certain Emperor's clothes. Or maybe that's snobbishness on my part?

I'm in the middle, I guess. Early 40s, but perhaps not typical. I can tell you how that iPad works from the silicon level upwards, I have a fair handle on social media while also holding more than a mild disdain for it, but by far enjoy most getting my hands dirty with real physical, mechanical stuff.

I think the problem comes from the top down. We have so little engineering and manufacturing left in this country compared with in the past. What we have remaining is mostly at the high-tech or niche end of things, e.g. aerospace. There aren't the numbers of jobs there used to be and so there isn't the educational need for it. I use "need" there somewhat precariously. I do fear we have over-out-sourced our heavy industry to overseas and it is not something you can get back quickly. Also, I think that general "practical thinking" is very useful in everyday life!

What does seem to be growing is small scale hobby or entrepreneur / SME level hands-on activities. There seems to be a small trend of people who are bored witless with the virtual and / or service based world that fills most of the UK these days, or fed up of being a tiny cog in a huge machine where their own actions are so far removed from the results that they don't have a sense of reward from their work. Making things yourself is so much more rewarding. The loop between input and output is very short.

The trouble is, it is difficult to set this kind of thing up as tools and materials are less available due to there being little industrial need for them. Most of my own tools are old, second or third hand, or self-built. Many of my materials I buy directly from Germany or China, only some of them can I get from UK suppliers. There are many more things I would like to make but am prevented from doing due to availability of material forms or sizes, or simply material at all.

Maybe the niche nature of my own work exaggerates this effect. Does anyone else here see the same issues, or would you refute my argument or put a more optimistic spin on it?

Cheers,

Matt.

Edited By Matt Nolan 1 on 23/09/2016 15:24:55

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Ingenuity isn't dead, – health and safety is struggling a bit though…

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 23/09/2016 15:03:06:

I have a theory, that in these days when most <30 year olds live at home, sizeable rented homes cost as much as a mortgage and starter homes have on the road parking and no garage, the majority of 'makers' simply don't have the space for a proper workshop. they need to have equipment that isn't very messy and is easily stowed away.

I have no doubt that as they grow older many will take an interest in metalworking and more advanced engineering, or that they will find completely different but just as interesting things to make models of.

Neil

I think that's very true, but would add that people with family commitments, careers and mortgages etc are less likely to have the time, space and spare cash needed to get into metalworking. Instead, they will tend to go for a less demanding creative outlet such as computers, photography, 3D printing, art, sport, electronics, amateur dramatics or whatever else fits their lifestyle.

I'd been planning to have a workshop for over 40 years before I got one. It wasn't until I retired that I had the wherewithal to set one up. To me it's not at all surprising that what you might call the classical scholar end of the Maker phenomenon is mainly populated by the grey and bald!

I suggest that Model Engineering is actually as healthy as ever, but that it's nature has evolved somewhat. It has always been so and it always will be.

I would say it's cheaper and easier to get into Model Engineering these days than it's ever been. True it's harder if you want to use classic British kit or scrounge off industry, but new kit is just a few clicks away on the internet. Judging by the number of suppliers, web-sites and magazines devoted to Model Engineering and it's relatives, I would say the hobby is in good order.

As all them young chaps are ageing rapidly I don't think there will ever be a shortage of newcomers to the hobby. No normal man can resist a lathe once he's in his sixties.

Cheers,

Dave

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 16:58:30:

I would say it's cheaper and easier to get into Model Engineering these days than it's ever been.

I'm not 100% sure.

At MEX Mike Chrisp revealed that his first lathe was a Super Adept, bought out of his pocket money.

I think these days we expect more from equipment, it is supposed to work out of the box, first time. Fifty years ago or more people anything they could get and were happy to accept much simpler kit and work around its limitations.

Neil

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 23/09/2016 18:24:22:

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 16:58:30:

I would say it's cheaper and easier to get into Model Engineering these days than it's ever been.

I'm not 100% sure.

At MEX Mike Chrisp revealed that his first lathe was a Super Adept, bought out of his pocket money.

I think these days we expect more from equipment, it is supposed to work out of the box, first time. Fifty years ago or more people anything they could get and were happy to accept much simpler kit and work around its limitations.

Neil

Lies, damned lies and statistics time!

I have the 15th October 1964 Model Engineer in front of me. Unusually it has adverts for several lathes that include prices.

The magazine was 2/6d in 1964 and it is £3.80 today. So based on the cost of ME the value of a pound back then was 30.4 times higher than today. (Obviously this is a fair metric – Model Engineering magazine was just as good value in 1964 as it is today!)

Six lathes are advertised with prices. P&P is extra, but I haven't factored that in. (But as an example P&P for the Meteor was £22.80 in today's money and you had to return the crate.)

Meteor II (no chuck or motor) – £26.15.0 equivalent to £813 today

Gamages 3 5/8" x 16 1/2" (no chuck or motor) – £39.17.6 equivalent to £1212 today

ML7 (not clear if motor included) – £74.5.0 equivalent to £2257 today

Super 7 (not clear if motor included) – £107.10.0 equivalent to £3268 today

Unimat (with motor, 3, 4 jaw and drill chuck) – £39.16.11 equivalent to £1211 today

Super Adept 1 1/8" (with motor, 4 jaw and tailstock chuck ) – £24.13.6 equivalent to £750 today

If the ME Inflation benchmark and my dodgy maths can be trusted these figures suggest that we get rather better value for money today. I'm not sure how a Super Adept compares with a Mini-lathe in terms of quality, but at £750 the Adept would need to be hot stuff to compete.

Does that prove anything? I wouldn't bet money on it.

Cheers,

Dave

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 19:22:35:

…

If the ME Inflation benchmark and my dodgy maths can be trusted these figures suggest that we get rather better value for money today. I'm not sure how a Super Adept compares with a Mini-lathe in terms of quality, but at £750 the Adept would need to be hot stuff to compete.

Does that prove anything? I wouldn't bet money on it.

.

Perish the thought, but; it could prove that the magazine was better value in 1964

MichaelG.

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 19:22:35:

Does that prove anything? I wouldn't bet money on it.

Cheers,

Dave

I did once work all this out. I think the price of a C0 baby lathe ~= the price of an Super Adept in absolute terms.

Very crudely:

Average wage in 1930 was about £200, so the adept cost about half a day's work.

Average wage now, perhaps £28,000 so the C0 costs about three day's work…

Now that's an interesting comparison – was the average person RICHER in the 30s…? Houses cost about 1.5 years salary in 11930, and about 6-10 years now…

Neil

[Roderick JenkinsParticipant @roderickjenkins93242]

According to the average earnings index, the mulitplier since 1964 is about 36, so ME is actually BETTER value, it should cost £4.50

A mini lathe with chuck and motor costs in the region of £500 today so it would seem that it is twice as easy to buy a lathe today as it was back in the early sixties. However, you didn't have to spend your disposable income on iphones and tablets back then

Rod

Edited By Roderick Jenkins on 23/09/2016 20:54:14

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 23/09/2016 18:24:22:

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 16:58:30:

I would say it's cheaper and easier to get into Model Engineering these days than it's ever been.

I'm not 100% sure.

It depends on how you define model engineering I guess. Remember there are over 100 Makerspaces (or Hackspaces, FabLabs etc.) in the UK where machines of various sorts are available for use very cheaply. I'm not sure that they all have lathes and mills but isn't it still model engineering to build with plastic, wood, or other materials.

Even here in the back of beyond near the French/Spanish border there is a FabLab in an old warehouse on the outskirts of Perpignan. No metalwork lathes or mills at present but they have two cnc routers, a laser cutter five or six assorted 3D printers etc. All can be used at very reasonable prices, eg., €2 per half hour on a 3D printer.

Other equipment, computers, electronic equipment, hand and portable electric tools can all be used free of charge.

All of this encourages the younger generation to make and even to repair things rather than throwing them away.

Russell.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Posted by SillyOldDuffer on 23/09/2016 19:22:35:

Posted by Neil Wyatt on 23/09/2016 18:24:22:

At MEX Mike Chrisp revealed that his first lathe was a Super Adept, bought out of his pocket money.

 

 

Does that prove anything? I wouldn't bet money on it.

Cheers,

Dave

 

Prooves it took a LONG time to save up his pocket money

Edited By JasonB on 23/09/2016 20:49:23

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

When comparing things like lathes, remember most of the Chinese kit today comes fully loaded often with electronic speed control, 3 jaw, 4 jaw, steadies tailstock chuck etc.

Back then motors were always extra. in 1967 I bought a brand new ML7 lathe for I think £95, reason I say I think was that by the time they had added a motor,3 jaw, 4 jaw and a tailstock chuck it came to £149

If I had just bought the basic lathe and thrown an old washing machine motor at it I would have been limited to faceplate work and machining between centres as this was all the kit it came with.

Also machines like Sooper Adapts, Zyto's etc never had steadies at any price.

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