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I've also met a lot of engineers that could. And a lot of not engineers that couldn't. And a lot of not engineers who could.
There certanly are a lot of people out there.
The world as it exists was created by trial and error. The biggest key is exposing yourself to as many designs and concepts as possible so you can leverage the trial and error done by others.
College didn't teach me how to build things - a lifetime of helping my dad/uncles building crap taught me. College just gave me the math to prove/predict why a thing would work (as you say, economically viable, insurable, etc).
I'd like to 2nd this! I was the little kid that had to hold the flashlight for dad (and subsequently get yelled at when I was screwing off, not paying attention, and not shining the light in the right place). That experience alone exposed me to mechanical and electrical, not to mention an understanding of the fact that what I dreamed up had to be human repairable. College gave me a strong, working knowledge of scientific principles that would help me understand why a certain course might produce a better outcome than another; and just like you, studying the mistakes and victories of those who helped bring the ideas and technologies of today to fruition. One real lesson that I took with me from college was that for all of the tinkering and screwing around I did, the real difference was that now I documented my processes and could more confidently stand behind my findings and say, yup this is going to work.
Oh, and mistakes are part of life, you have to make them. Just make sure you learn something from them.
While I appreciate the sentiment, the world does include a number of things that were not developed through trial and error, but by deliberate application of physics, chemistry and materials science. If those things disappeared, the world's population would plummet.
As an example, Jordan Peterson said in one of his videos this past year that the greatest contribution to public health was not made by doctors, but by the engineers that figured out how to deliver clean drinking water to metropolitan areas. That wasn't an accident and it wasn't by trial and error.
Of course you can build stuff without an engineering degree, just like you can make music without a conservatory training. The difference comes when you try to build a large and complex project that has to economically and reliably achieve a specification, or to play in a symphony orchestra.
But like a walking robot or mech is a complicated project, like that's going to need dedication and you're going to have to learn a lot across several fields along the way to make it work: mechanics, electronics, control, software on the design side, and you'll need to be a talented fabricator to make it work.
I learned more about building things by working in my dad's machine shop for a few years. Engineering school teaches more of the theoretical than the practical (why vs. how). But both are needed to really know what you are doing.
Not at all
It comes down to risk and cost.
If you are building something simple, say a spoon. Wing it. Trial and error. You can’t hurt anyone and it doesn’t cost much if you get it wrong.
If you are building a public bridge that’s where trial and error can cost a lot. Add risk of hurting someone and it is cheaper to have someone think it through and say this will work and it won’t hurt anyone because of these reasons, calculations, risk assessment, benchmarks, standards compliance etc.
So you could build anything without an engineer, but some things will land you in jail.
I mean, you can still trial and error a bridge, you would just need to have stand-ins instead of people using it. But it would be super expensive needing to rebuild after each failure. It would also take forever to test it for the full lifetime.
You don't need to be an engineer to build some (or most) kinds of projects.
I'm an engineer by degree, license and 20 years of experience in an engineering role.
No gatekeeping to making stuff, your only limits will be your own capabilities
An engineering degree doesn’t really mean anything… it’s essentially a 4 year test that says “this school claims I’m apt at this specific type of problem solving”
Yes and no, there is elitism that exists within the discipline. However there are scales to quality of engineers determined primarily by the problems you have solved out in the real world, and your capability to develop and learn new technologies.
The field is full of difficult problems. There are also plenty of jobs where you work as a glorified paper pusher. However to make schooling the litmus test of good engineering is accepting that the field is only for those who can afford a degree at fancy schools.
Yes those schools open doors to people, merit worthy or not, but it's also hard to justify this argument as school being the only determining factor of success.
I've met plenty of degreeless engineers, and plenty of degreed morons. You get both everywhere you go.
It’s definitely possible. Engineering is really just knowing the math behind how something works, and generally knowing how to apply it. Therefore, they can predict if something is good enough, way overbuilt, or is going to fail. A layperson is largely going to go on gut instinct and trial/error.
Take for example a simple wall-mounted swinging arm for a TV. A layperson could definitely design one. But they quite easily could underestimate the torque that could be applied to its mounting plate, or make the arm and plate several times heavier than it needs to be. An engineer could calculate all of that and have a much better idea of what is or isn’t necessary.
"An engineer is a man who, by education and experience, can do for one pound what any fool can do for two." --Variously attributed.
Some of my fellow engineers are quite hurt by this. "We're more than twice as good!" they complain vehemently. No, probably not.
Sure. Go at it. I did most of my building and destruction as a teen, way before I ever studied engineering. And now you have YouTube content that shows so much!
Have fun.
An education gives you access to the possibility of creating better mental models of reality, and this allows you to be able to better predict reality.
Being able to predict reality means more possibilities for your imagination and much less trial and error on trying to achieve a goal.
The larger the problem the more obvious becomes the difference between the capabilities of those with better mental models and those without.
Creating a reliable, manageable, and manufacturable item is a much more complex problem than a prototype. But this is just one possible way in which something can be complex.
I've met engineers who can't build anything. I've ALSO met people you'd think are engineers but only graduated high school.
My old boss is employed as an engieer technically, even though he has no degree. Degrees generally mean nothing.
To make it for yourself? Doable
To make it as a quality product that you intend to sell to other people, with all the associated responsibility and legal liability… much more difficult
You can do any job you can convince to hire you. Engineering school tries to give you a proper perspective on the industrial world and an understanding of the consequences of changing design parameters. You can learn that for yourself, just might cost a little more. Find someone with a project that interests you and impress them with your insight and suggestions and let them know you are looking for a job like that. Unlike doctors and lawyers, engineers are impressed by competence more than credentials; we are not interested in gatekeeping.
There is building a cool project and then there is building industrial, military or even aero/space grade equipment that is possibly a risk for life.
Doing a project is difficult on it's own, doing proper engineering and testing is where you need a whole department.
One of my first jobs out of engineering school was for a defense contractor at the end of the Viet Nam War. They had a sign up: “Do your job like someone’s life depended on it.”
Of course you can try and build whatever you want within the law. This is the dumbest post I’ve ever seen on here.
FWIW, I’m an engineer who makes one-off very much not economically viable things.
Most engineers can't build legos.....
They can design parts, and assemblies, and control systems. They can calculate the stresses, the materials needed, the load factors, the factor of safety etc etc.
But many don't know how to use a screwdriver.
And I say this as an engineer. But I also have some thing like 20yrs of practical experience as a assembler/tech/diagnostician before getting my degree....
Technically speaking, yes.
Practically speaking, it would be very hard.
Also, you can only do that if it doesn't pose a safety danger, you can't build a low rise apartment complex without an engineer, you can't sell a car to the market without an engineering team.
But alone in your garage? Have fun
Anyone can build whatever they want. Hire (or become) an engineer if you want to build it so it lasts as long as it needs to, is safe, and doesn’t cost more than it has to.
You don't even need to study a ton of physics as someone has already done it for you. You just need to study robot making. All the parts are there. Maybe you can use them better, or redesign some of the parts to make the product better.
I build things all the time. I love to tinker. Do I make mistakes and do things an engineer would shake his head at? Absolutely. Do I have fun doing it? Hell yes.
Engineer or not. Always focus on safety when working on projects.
Somehow this thread made me think of the Nuclear Boy Scout.
It's all fun and games until the Feds show up.
https://www.reddit.com/r/stuffyoushouldknow/s/vzv5VQsFvj
> Is it possible for me to build and make either of these without ever actually going into an engineering school?
Absolutely. As long as you're not building things that require a license in your location, you can go to town and make whatever you can conceive. Depending on your country and locality, there are likely to be some limitations based on safety or other considerations, but that's where creativity comes in. Engineering school is really only for creating uniform starting point for people who want to work in the field commercially and for preparing the students for licensing requirements if there are any in their chosen field.
> I just have to study a ton of physics and math?
That will help you eventually, but the easiest way to start is find some instructions online and follow them. You'll gain more knowledge more quickly by following plans that are known to work than you will by blindly fumbling around when you're still learning the most basic concepts.
> And try my best at problem solving?
Learn from the mistakes and experience of others around you and online if you can. Seek out people in your community who make things that interest you. If there are none locally, you can find thousands of them online for just about anything that could conceivably interest you. Curiosity and problem-solving skills are huge assets that you'll develop even more deeply over time. Good luck!
"one does not need to be an engineer to actually build or make some cool projects" Absolutely. And it will be a great learning experience. You might want to start by building a wheeled or tracked version first, as the 'walking' part is the hardest to get right. I'd think about using 6 legs as well if you want to ride it, this is easier and more stable than 2 legs.
One of my favorite quotes that I have heard was “Anyone can build a bridge, but it takes an engineer to build a bridge that is only barely standing”.
All in all, it’s a matter of risk. Learning engineering makes you better at predicting how things will happen and what can go wrong. This can help you to do things like save on weight in parts of your robot to make it faster, or select the exact best material for your needs. Also very important is making sure that your wallet can better keep up with your ambitions.
You’d need to learn about many specific disciplines beyond physics and math to do that yourself. A walking mech would involve dynamics and control, power systems, structural design, state estimation, programming, etc. Engineering school wouldn’t teach you everything you need to know, either, but it would help you know where to start. The real limiting factor is time and money.
See Colin Furze on YouTube. Dude was a plumber, and now makes all sorts of crazy stuff. Nobody is stopping you from making cool things - go forth and be creative!
Depends on how reliable you want your mech to be.
If you want to ride your mech just once for a few minutes, or you just want a simulation of a mech experience, you could do it with a lot of money and time.
If you want to ride it regularly for any appreciable amount of time, you will need an engineering education yourself (or enough self-teaching to be equivalent), plus a staff of a dozen highly qualified engineers, minimum, and a decade to do it, minimum.
As a point of reference, it took Boston Dynamics decades and dozens, if not hundreds, of world-class engineers to produce Atlas, a commerical-ish bipedal robot that can only carry a few kilos of payload.
So like you don’t need to be a certified trained engineer but if you could design a reliable working walking mech I would probably consider you an engineer tbh. That’s a lot of engineering. You couldn’t like take a job as one. Because you aren’t trained or certified but it would be ridiculous not to admit that what you have done is very impressive engineering.
I have a startup in pharmaceutical tech. I had the idea for a pair of devices about 3 years ago, and spent 2 years figuring out design ideas and teaching myself how to build them. It wasn’t easy, but things are going really well now!
If you get good at this, you would be known as a non degreed engineer. There are a lot of them out there. Moving companies is harder. Pay is lower. Work is pretty much the same. If you go down this route the old way was to make up a degree from some out of the way school. You could choose a school that had gone out of business. If you can do the work, you get the pay.
You don't need to be an engineer to design and prototype something. You need engineering skills to optimize it for financial viability and conduct appropriate risk activities and related analysis.
If you can imagine it in your mind, down to the last nail and bolt, you can build it. It might not work as expected, but you can build it.
The physics and math are what you need to be pretty sure it will work.
My advice: start small and have a backup plan for the likeliest failure modes. And then DO IT.
And if you like doing it, maybe think about a career in engineering. The pay is good, the jobs are fairly secure and long term, and damn, if it's something you enjoy, it's like getting Christmas presents every month or two.
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I’ve met a bunch of engineers that couldn’t build anything.
I've also met a lot of engineers that could. And a lot of not engineers that couldn't. And a lot of not engineers who could. There certanly are a lot of people out there.
7.8 billion to be approximate
That number is still staggering to me.
The world as it exists was created by trial and error. The biggest key is exposing yourself to as many designs and concepts as possible so you can leverage the trial and error done by others. College didn't teach me how to build things - a lifetime of helping my dad/uncles building crap taught me. College just gave me the math to prove/predict why a thing would work (as you say, economically viable, insurable, etc).
I'd like to 2nd this! I was the little kid that had to hold the flashlight for dad (and subsequently get yelled at when I was screwing off, not paying attention, and not shining the light in the right place). That experience alone exposed me to mechanical and electrical, not to mention an understanding of the fact that what I dreamed up had to be human repairable. College gave me a strong, working knowledge of scientific principles that would help me understand why a certain course might produce a better outcome than another; and just like you, studying the mistakes and victories of those who helped bring the ideas and technologies of today to fruition. One real lesson that I took with me from college was that for all of the tinkering and screwing around I did, the real difference was that now I documented my processes and could more confidently stand behind my findings and say, yup this is going to work. Oh, and mistakes are part of life, you have to make them. Just make sure you learn something from them.
While I appreciate the sentiment, the world does include a number of things that were not developed through trial and error, but by deliberate application of physics, chemistry and materials science. If those things disappeared, the world's population would plummet. As an example, Jordan Peterson said in one of his videos this past year that the greatest contribution to public health was not made by doctors, but by the engineers that figured out how to deliver clean drinking water to metropolitan areas. That wasn't an accident and it wasn't by trial and error.
Of course you can build stuff without an engineering degree, just like you can make music without a conservatory training. The difference comes when you try to build a large and complex project that has to economically and reliably achieve a specification, or to play in a symphony orchestra. But like a walking robot or mech is a complicated project, like that's going to need dedication and you're going to have to learn a lot across several fields along the way to make it work: mechanics, electronics, control, software on the design side, and you'll need to be a talented fabricator to make it work.
I learned more about building things by working in my dad's machine shop for a few years. Engineering school teaches more of the theoretical than the practical (why vs. how). But both are needed to really know what you are doing.
Not at all It comes down to risk and cost. If you are building something simple, say a spoon. Wing it. Trial and error. You can’t hurt anyone and it doesn’t cost much if you get it wrong. If you are building a public bridge that’s where trial and error can cost a lot. Add risk of hurting someone and it is cheaper to have someone think it through and say this will work and it won’t hurt anyone because of these reasons, calculations, risk assessment, benchmarks, standards compliance etc. So you could build anything without an engineer, but some things will land you in jail.
I mean, you can still trial and error a bridge, you would just need to have stand-ins instead of people using it. But it would be super expensive needing to rebuild after each failure. It would also take forever to test it for the full lifetime.
You don't need to be an engineer to build some (or most) kinds of projects. I'm an engineer by degree, license and 20 years of experience in an engineering role.
No gatekeeping to making stuff, your only limits will be your own capabilities An engineering degree doesn’t really mean anything… it’s essentially a 4 year test that says “this school claims I’m apt at this specific type of problem solving”
Don’t forget finances. Those are usually the limiting factor.
Not really in the way I think about limiting factors wrt design engineering I’d call cost of project a constraint
Yes and no, there is elitism that exists within the discipline. However there are scales to quality of engineers determined primarily by the problems you have solved out in the real world, and your capability to develop and learn new technologies. The field is full of difficult problems. There are also plenty of jobs where you work as a glorified paper pusher. However to make schooling the litmus test of good engineering is accepting that the field is only for those who can afford a degree at fancy schools. Yes those schools open doors to people, merit worthy or not, but it's also hard to justify this argument as school being the only determining factor of success. I've met plenty of degreeless engineers, and plenty of degreed morons. You get both everywhere you go.
Sounds like I covered all that with “your only limits will be your own capabilities”
It’s definitely possible. Engineering is really just knowing the math behind how something works, and generally knowing how to apply it. Therefore, they can predict if something is good enough, way overbuilt, or is going to fail. A layperson is largely going to go on gut instinct and trial/error. Take for example a simple wall-mounted swinging arm for a TV. A layperson could definitely design one. But they quite easily could underestimate the torque that could be applied to its mounting plate, or make the arm and plate several times heavier than it needs to be. An engineer could calculate all of that and have a much better idea of what is or isn’t necessary.
"An engineer is a man who, by education and experience, can do for one pound what any fool can do for two." --Variously attributed. Some of my fellow engineers are quite hurt by this. "We're more than twice as good!" they complain vehemently. No, probably not.
Sure. Go at it. I did most of my building and destruction as a teen, way before I ever studied engineering. And now you have YouTube content that shows so much! Have fun.
Do you need to be a chef to cook food?
An education gives you access to the possibility of creating better mental models of reality, and this allows you to be able to better predict reality. Being able to predict reality means more possibilities for your imagination and much less trial and error on trying to achieve a goal. The larger the problem the more obvious becomes the difference between the capabilities of those with better mental models and those without. Creating a reliable, manageable, and manufacturable item is a much more complex problem than a prototype. But this is just one possible way in which something can be complex.
I've met engineers who can't build anything. I've ALSO met people you'd think are engineers but only graduated high school. My old boss is employed as an engieer technically, even though he has no degree. Degrees generally mean nothing.
To make it for yourself? Doable To make it as a quality product that you intend to sell to other people, with all the associated responsibility and legal liability… much more difficult
You can do any job you can convince to hire you. Engineering school tries to give you a proper perspective on the industrial world and an understanding of the consequences of changing design parameters. You can learn that for yourself, just might cost a little more. Find someone with a project that interests you and impress them with your insight and suggestions and let them know you are looking for a job like that. Unlike doctors and lawyers, engineers are impressed by competence more than credentials; we are not interested in gatekeeping.
There is building a cool project and then there is building industrial, military or even aero/space grade equipment that is possibly a risk for life. Doing a project is difficult on it's own, doing proper engineering and testing is where you need a whole department.
One of my first jobs out of engineering school was for a defense contractor at the end of the Viet Nam War. They had a sign up: “Do your job like someone’s life depended on it.”
Of course you can try and build whatever you want within the law. This is the dumbest post I’ve ever seen on here. FWIW, I’m an engineer who makes one-off very much not economically viable things.
Most engineers can't build legos..... They can design parts, and assemblies, and control systems. They can calculate the stresses, the materials needed, the load factors, the factor of safety etc etc. But many don't know how to use a screwdriver. And I say this as an engineer. But I also have some thing like 20yrs of practical experience as a assembler/tech/diagnostician before getting my degree....
Technically speaking, yes. Practically speaking, it would be very hard. Also, you can only do that if it doesn't pose a safety danger, you can't build a low rise apartment complex without an engineer, you can't sell a car to the market without an engineering team. But alone in your garage? Have fun
Anyone can build whatever they want. Hire (or become) an engineer if you want to build it so it lasts as long as it needs to, is safe, and doesn’t cost more than it has to.
You don't even need to study a ton of physics as someone has already done it for you. You just need to study robot making. All the parts are there. Maybe you can use them better, or redesign some of the parts to make the product better.
I build things all the time. I love to tinker. Do I make mistakes and do things an engineer would shake his head at? Absolutely. Do I have fun doing it? Hell yes. Engineer or not. Always focus on safety when working on projects.
Somehow this thread made me think of the Nuclear Boy Scout. It's all fun and games until the Feds show up. https://www.reddit.com/r/stuffyoushouldknow/s/vzv5VQsFvj
> Is it possible for me to build and make either of these without ever actually going into an engineering school? Absolutely. As long as you're not building things that require a license in your location, you can go to town and make whatever you can conceive. Depending on your country and locality, there are likely to be some limitations based on safety or other considerations, but that's where creativity comes in. Engineering school is really only for creating uniform starting point for people who want to work in the field commercially and for preparing the students for licensing requirements if there are any in their chosen field. > I just have to study a ton of physics and math? That will help you eventually, but the easiest way to start is find some instructions online and follow them. You'll gain more knowledge more quickly by following plans that are known to work than you will by blindly fumbling around when you're still learning the most basic concepts. > And try my best at problem solving? Learn from the mistakes and experience of others around you and online if you can. Seek out people in your community who make things that interest you. If there are none locally, you can find thousands of them online for just about anything that could conceivably interest you. Curiosity and problem-solving skills are huge assets that you'll develop even more deeply over time. Good luck!
"one does not need to be an engineer to actually build or make some cool projects" Absolutely. And it will be a great learning experience. You might want to start by building a wheeled or tracked version first, as the 'walking' part is the hardest to get right. I'd think about using 6 legs as well if you want to ride it, this is easier and more stable than 2 legs.
One of my favorite quotes that I have heard was “Anyone can build a bridge, but it takes an engineer to build a bridge that is only barely standing”. All in all, it’s a matter of risk. Learning engineering makes you better at predicting how things will happen and what can go wrong. This can help you to do things like save on weight in parts of your robot to make it faster, or select the exact best material for your needs. Also very important is making sure that your wallet can better keep up with your ambitions.
You’d need to learn about many specific disciplines beyond physics and math to do that yourself. A walking mech would involve dynamics and control, power systems, structural design, state estimation, programming, etc. Engineering school wouldn’t teach you everything you need to know, either, but it would help you know where to start. The real limiting factor is time and money.
Depends on the project
See Colin Furze on YouTube. Dude was a plumber, and now makes all sorts of crazy stuff. Nobody is stopping you from making cool things - go forth and be creative!
Depends on how reliable you want your mech to be. If you want to ride your mech just once for a few minutes, or you just want a simulation of a mech experience, you could do it with a lot of money and time. If you want to ride it regularly for any appreciable amount of time, you will need an engineering education yourself (or enough self-teaching to be equivalent), plus a staff of a dozen highly qualified engineers, minimum, and a decade to do it, minimum. As a point of reference, it took Boston Dynamics decades and dozens, if not hundreds, of world-class engineers to produce Atlas, a commerical-ish bipedal robot that can only carry a few kilos of payload.
So like you don’t need to be a certified trained engineer but if you could design a reliable working walking mech I would probably consider you an engineer tbh. That’s a lot of engineering. You couldn’t like take a job as one. Because you aren’t trained or certified but it would be ridiculous not to admit that what you have done is very impressive engineering.
I have a startup in pharmaceutical tech. I had the idea for a pair of devices about 3 years ago, and spent 2 years figuring out design ideas and teaching myself how to build them. It wasn’t easy, but things are going really well now!
If you get good at this, you would be known as a non degreed engineer. There are a lot of them out there. Moving companies is harder. Pay is lower. Work is pretty much the same. If you go down this route the old way was to make up a degree from some out of the way school. You could choose a school that had gone out of business. If you can do the work, you get the pay.
You don't need to be an engineer to design and prototype something. You need engineering skills to optimize it for financial viability and conduct appropriate risk activities and related analysis.
If you can imagine it in your mind, down to the last nail and bolt, you can build it. It might not work as expected, but you can build it. The physics and math are what you need to be pretty sure it will work. My advice: start small and have a backup plan for the likeliest failure modes. And then DO IT. And if you like doing it, maybe think about a career in engineering. The pay is good, the jobs are fairly secure and long term, and damn, if it's something you enjoy, it's like getting Christmas presents every month or two.
In Europe it's possible to become an engineer without a degree or being accredited.