Which is your strength? Electrical/Mechanical/Programming

I saw the other post about programming around poor mechanical designs, and it made me wonder what others in the field consider their strengths to be of the 3 in the title.

Specifically people who work in a role that sometimes requires all 3 disciplines.

For me personally mechanical has always been my strength, but at this stage in my career I am more often involved in programming/troubleshooting electrical issues.

Just curious what others have found.

Don't know if I submitted correctly, but all 3.

My degree is in Electrical Engineering.
Working with an oem, I was an electrician, panel designer/builder, controls engineer and programmer and ended up doing mechanical design work also.

The biggest problem I see is that mechanical / electrical / programmers don't work together.
When I worked for my first OEM, we had a mechanical designer that designed a machine and built it. He thought programmers could do anything. After two
designs, the owner sat down with us and we discussed the designs. He got a big surprise, the designer didn't know much about pneumatics and hydraulics.

We then started sitting down and discussing the machine concept, did the design and had another meeting. The programmers designed the controls and then we had another meeting to discuss the controls issues and work out the issues. Things went very well after we started working together.

I'm not saying there is no such thing as a bad design, but if mechanical, electrical, and programming worked together, machine design and electrical controls would work together a lot smoother. That's been my experience.

james

I agree completely with James!!

Well, it doesn't appear that the poll will let you select all 3, but it would not surprise me that many here, myself included, fall into that category. Over the course of my career, I have run into a mix of different skill sets, and found that some of the best programmers know absolutely noting about the processes they are trying to control. As a result, the equipment they have programmed may take a number of updates to the software before it is working well, or user/maintenance friendly.

On the other hand, a sloppy mechanical design will test the limits of many programmers, as Peter Nachtwey has pointed out; http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=111118

If you approach a system design with all 3 disciplines addressed, you will end up with a system that will work well, be user friendly, and straightforward to maintain. I may not be the best at mechanics, electrical systems, or programming, but I strive to have a firm grasp of all 3 to understand the how all of them work together for a functional system.

mbartoli said:

well, it doesn't appear that the poll will let you select all 3, but it would not surprise me that many here, myself included, fall into that category. Over the course of my career, i have run into a mix of different skill sets, and found that some of the best programmers know absolutely noting about the processes they are trying to control. As a result, the equipment they have programmed may take a number of updates to the software before it is working well, or user/maintenance friendly.

On the other hand, a sloppy mechanical design will test the limits of many programmers, as peter nachtwey has pointed out; http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=111118

if you approach a system design with all 3 disciplines addressed, you will end up with a system that will work well, be user friendly, and straightforward to maintain. I may not be the best at mechanics, electrical systems, or programming, but i strive to have a firm grasp of all 3 to understand the how all of them work together for a functional system.

Click to expand...

+1

I have a wicked smart mechanical/process engineer. thank god.
team w/ one of those, and we can do anything.

James Mcquade said:

He got a big surprise, the designer didn't know much about pneumatics and hydraulics.

Click to expand...

There aren't many that do. This is my field of expertise but I have an BS in EE and CE. ( computer engineering ). I have had to learn hydraulic control because no one else would.

In the magazine comments I ranted about kludged and evolved designs.

I sometimes get requests to model hydraulic systems to determine if and how they will work or what went wrong. I save customers money by telling people they should avoid trying to do the impossible or impractical.

I am still a big believer in learning physics and the required math.
Look at my 'Peter Ponders PID' channel on YouTube and you can see what I do.

Here is one of my hydraulic simulations. I simulate a disturbance at about 0.5 seconds. The bottom of the pdf has graphs of the different items being simulated.
http://deltamotion.com/peter/Mathcad/Mathcad - Hydraulic Cylinder.pdf
Page 3 has my FL function where I can model the load force as a function of time, angle, position or velocity. I just change the code inside.

Peter and Tom are in my opinion two of the most knowledgeable on here. but we can't all know it all. if we team up w/ the right people....

ganutenator is correct. It is the people around you and the questions you ask while programming makes the difference.
You can be an excellent programmer but without the input to other disciplines including the operators, the project may fail.

Here's how I learned my trade.

Details, Details, Details !
Lots of questions up front and get the details so you can submit a quote.
get the po
write the specifications to the customer and have him approve them.
get with mechanical, electrical, programming and agree on what everyone's responsibility is.
design the machine, electrics and meet with the customer for his approval (detailed in the po payment).
do your work and have the customer see the machine operate before the runoff, discuss changes. minor changes, no problem. big changes - change order required.
do the runoff, discuss with operators after the runoff, more changes?
deliver the machine.
runoff at the plant, more changes?

yes, lots of questions and details up front to avoid as many changes down the road in mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulics.
Makes the customers mad at times, then they learn why I ask so many questions. Now they don't mind the questions.

james

I have a degree in Electrical Engineering. Although I like the electrical side of things, the programming is where I think my strength is. Mechanically I must admit I'm not that great... although I improved a fair bit by sitting down with an hydraulic tech and putting electrical symbols on his hydraulic schematic (and vice versa for him).

James Mcquade said:

I'm not saying there is no such thing as a bad design, but if mechanical, electrical, and programming worked together, machine design and electrical controls would work together a lot smoother. That's been my experience.

Click to expand...

I find that if one of these three has worked in maintenance, you get an even better machine, although that is not usually addressed by the people buying a system. Sometimes the motor or probe has to be there... but little consideration is given as to the maintenance side of things.

Two somewhat basic examples, a few proximity switches are installed in a tower (45 and 50 meter high) to monitor the position of a travelling block and ensure it doesn't hit the crown block. No one thinks of putting an access walkway to inspect, replace or clean the proximity switches. The first time they go down, the cost of downtime is enough to buy the walkways in the first place. Bonus points if it's a re-occurring issue, as happens with P+F in tropical weather.

The other was the installation of a flowmeter for some really nasty stuff right on top of a tank from which there is no safe way to dispose of unless you use it for production. It's all fine and pretty until the day comes when someone wants to have it calibrated or verified.

I'm not saying that the people designing the systems are stupid or not competent, and a lot of times there's more politics than practicality in some decisions too, but anyone that has worked in maintenance will spot these immediately whilst people that never had to maintain anything won't.

Yes, in this game, you need to have a variety of skills...

Background with electrical, commissioned PLC systems in the late-80s with Gem80, wrote one for a MiniGEM, then moved elsewhere to program A-B PLC5 systems, but also design and commission production units in-house. Learnt a lot about PC memory as 386 PCs were lacking in memory...

But when SCADA all got Microsoft-based, I kept PLC work but ventured more into Electrical again, then maintenance, then got tricked into being a mechanical maintenance area engineer for a while (learnt a few lessons there too), then back to electrical and now PLC programming/supporting.

Now learning again about Microsoft, and Cisco/Networking, almost dabbling in the IT environment that I kept away from 10 or more years ago...

Strengths? Still electrical and programming, but most of all, interrogating existing control systems by looking at someone else's code and talking to production operators about how their system should work.

JohnCalderwood said:

and talking to production operators about how their system should work.

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This is a big one in my opinion as there will always be someone that wants to make a decision but not sit there operating the system they made a decision on.

mbartoli said:

well, it doesn't appear that the poll will let you select all 3, but it would not surprise me that many here, myself included, fall into that category. Over the course of my career, i have run into a mix of different skill sets, and found that some of the best programmers know absolutely noting about the processes they are trying to control. As a result, the equipment they have programmed may take a number of updates to the software before it is working well, or user/maintenance friendly.

On the other hand, a sloppy mechanical design will test the limits of many programmers, as peter nachtwey has pointed out; http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=111118

if you approach a system design with all 3 disciplines addressed, you will end up with a system that will work well, be user friendly, and straightforward to maintain. I may not be the best at mechanics, electrical systems, or programming, but i strive to have a firm grasp of all 3 to understand the how all of them work together for a functional system.

Click to expand...

+1

i've been programming since 1996. what is that? 21 years. still dumb.
never had a failed project. at least i got that going for me.
oh, and the head engineer at the oil company said, what is it like being the only engineer.
oh, and got called magic mike.
and was the cleaner for all projects that failed.
and the smartest person i ever met said i was wicked smart.

but my advice. break it down to its simplest parts. kiss

additionaly, don't become an alcoholic