Mechanical Design Engineer vs. Technical Support Engineer

[MrJohnnyPrice]

This is my first post. My name is John. I'm an undergraduate Physics and Mechanical Engineering student and I'm still unsure of the types of jobs that could be available for me once I graduate. Particularly jobs prior to grad school. After graduating I'll have a Bachelor's degree in Physics from West Chester University of PA and in Mechanical Engineering from Philadelphia University.

I'm currently importing helium fridge parts into Solidworks for the Atacama Cosmology Telescope as a TA. I'm very interested in Astronomy and Cosmology, and might pursue something along those lines for grad school.

Cheers.

 

[JDH51086]

Hi all, I'm 23 year old Mechanical Engineering student working on my first year after spending a few years after high school working in various technician positions. If anyone's got the time to answer a few questions, I would appreciate your input.

For those of you working in HVAC/MEP design, what caused you to take this route as opposed to other career paths? How did you come to be in your position?

Do you find your work to be fulfilling, what are some of the advantages/disadvantages to this line of work in relationship to some of the others in the field?

Did you take any specific HVAC courses or did you find that the Mechanical Engineering curriculum provided you with the base knowledge you needed to find entry-level work and were able to perform it successfully?

What other advice would you give someone looking to enter the field?

This isn't for a school paper or project or anything, just a few questions to satisfy my curiousity. Thanks everyone!

 

[EdgarB]

Greetings,

I recently graduated Mechanical Engineering and just received two job offers. One is Technical Support Engineer – supports sales team and customers with technical expertise; the other is Mechanical Engineer I – mechanical engineering design for the petro-chemical industry.

The Technical Support position pays more but I am concerned that there is not a lot of engineering involved in it and it might be harder to use the experience later in life when I look for another engineering position. What is your opinion about Sales/ Technical Support Engineering in general – is it a good direction to take as far as advancement, opportunities and compensation go?

Thank you,
Edgar B.

 

[timsea81]

In college I majored in Math and had little to no idea what I was going to do with it. I ended up getting a job doing CAD design for an electrical engineering firm where I worked for 1.5 years. There was a lot that I liked about electrical engineering, but the company I worked for was in dire straights and the president was a complete and total lunatic, so I abandoned ship and got another job as a CAD designer at a different firm, this time in the mechanical department. I've been with this company 3 years now. I started out being really involved in the 3D BIM technology that the company was just starting to embrace, and then moved on to HVAC design working under a sr engineer at the company. About a year ago I started taking engineering classes at night, working towards and degree in mechanical engineering.

Now I'm trying to figure out what I should really be working towards, and what type of position I ultimately want. I wan't attracted to mechanical over electrical because I liked the engineering more, it was more of a short-sighted decision based on my 3D CAD skills, but there are some things that I like about it a lot more than electrical; mechanical systems are more integrated into the way the building as a whole operates, so in a certain sense it's more important.

However neither of these options are really all that related to what I first got into, which was Math. If I could do it all over again I think I might be happier as a computer programmer. I've only dabbled recreationaly with writing code but I think I'd be good at it.

Anyway, I have only a vague and potentially ignorant impression on what controls engineering actually is, but I am curious if it is in fact a combination of electrical and mechanical engineering, and computer science, in a proportion that I may find agreeable to how I want to spend my working hours. The way things work at the company I work for now, the mechanical engineer that I work for will write a sequence of operations: a document along the lines of "if the temperature of the space rises above 75 degrees and the outside air temperature is between 65 and 70 the outside air dampers will open and the fan shall increase to maximum speed until the temperature of the space is 73 degrees". How those instructions are carried out in the actual operations of the constructed building is a mystery to me, but it is something that interests me.

So I have 2 dilemmas:
1) What exactly is controls engineering? What types of companies do people with this sort of specialty work for and where can I go to learn more about it and figure out if I would like it more than mechanical design?
2) If I decide I want out of the mechanical world to get into controls, am I better off with an EE degree rather than doing ME? And along those lines, what is the best way to break into the industry given my experience and credentials before finishing the engineering degree? It'll be a good 3 years before I finish school, would I be better positioned if I spent that time at a company that does PLC programming, or would the only positions available to me at those firms be relying strictly on my CAD skills?

 

[tj00343]

i'm currently in the middle of my mechanical engineering degree , but I'm accually getting more and more interested in environmental engineering , can i work as an environmental engineer after graduation, is there relations between the two ...i'd really like to work in an outdoor setting and am very interested in the environment but i feel that mechanical engineering curriculum are a bit deficient in biology compared to environmental, can I maybe go to grad school in environmental with my mechanical degree ,and if I do would I be at a disadvantage to those who studied environmental or maybe, civil or chemical engineering, What advice would you give me in this situation ,thank you for your time .

 

[Aron:]

Hi, I recently graduated with a Bachelors of Science in Civil Engineering and now I want to move to the Mechanical engineering field. To the people out there; what is more convinient for me, a second bachelors or a Masters in mechanical engineering? Most companies that offer internships want undergrad students not graduate students. So if I go for Masters in mechanical it would be much harder to get professional experience.
I would really appreciate an advice from people in the mechanical engineering industry.

 

[Seb7721]

Hi everyone

I am thinking of studying a bachelor of engineering at the University of Adelaide. I have thought about the different options for what discipline to major in, and I think I have decided on Mechanical.

However, the University also offers a Mechatronics course, and making robots, UAVs, etc. sounds awesome. I would love to do a degree like this but i have read lots of threads on here saying that it is hard to get jobs as a Mechatronic engineer, and when you do, you will most likely be working as either a Mechanical or Electrical engineer anyway.

I thought a good compromise on this would be to become a fully qualified Mechanical engineer, but do a double degree with Mathmatical and Computer Sciences, where I could learn about programming. I would also take electives in things like Robotics. This way, I could always fall back on my Mechanical engineering degree, especially in the early years, but later on my Computer Science degree would help me get into working in the robotics, mechatronics side of things.

Does anyone know anything about these degrees, and what they translate to in getting actual jobs? Would I be wasting my time doing the Computer Science degree when I would still be lacking in the electronics side of things? Finally, would the double degree in Mathematical and Computer Science help me get regular mechanical engineering jobs, even if they don't involve things like robotics?

Thanks

 

[tpcgreg]

I am a civil engineering student and am about to choose a concentration. I really like both civil and mechanical engineering and it was hard to choose between them at the beginning of college. Therefore, I think structural engineering might be the best choice for me. I have been told that structural engineering incorporates both civil and mechanical engineering under one umbrella. I know if you are designing a bridge, there is obviously a lot of static analysis involved (civil engineering) and also a lot of dynamic vibration analysis (mechanical) when it comes to the seismic design aspects of it. What do you guys think?

Thanks!

Greg

 

[Saketh#]

Hello everyone,
I am currently studying 3rd year B.tech in mechanical engineering.I have a confusion in selecting a departmental elective.The 2 courses offered are CFD and Mechanical vibrations.I get to choose one of these.
My interest is to do higher studies in aerospace engineering.So can you please recommend which one is going to help me in the further run.One more piece of info,the faculty for cfd is new and the faculty fpr mecahnical vibrations is very good.So i don't want to ruin my subject(as i heard CFD is a difficult subject and we would need good professors to learn it).

Thank you