Thread: question for mechanics about career

Im currently a mechanical engineering student at UNL and this is not looking like what i thought it was. Its just a whole bunch of math and random stuff and no hands-on anything. Im really not enjoying any engineering classes im taking and all the jobs at the career fair look boring. I'm looking at becoming an automotive technician instead. Whats a day on the job look like for a mechanic? when i did my top swap I worked 3 days 8 hours on it and i didnt like it because it hurt my back, but thats because I didnt have a lift. What do you guys think I should do?

Look into getting some sort of part time apprenticeship. See if you can live with coming home with grease soaked hands for a few months.

DONT DO IT...trust me, im in it about a year and hating it. im only 20 and if your thinking about it as a money maker your better off doing side work in your drive way..its so inconstant i cant stand it, its not a easy way to live bc your living paycheck to paycheck..if your young stop before you start and just do it on the side as a hobby

Well...there are various other things you can do with the automotive field, just do a little online research. Now if you are hell bent on the mechanic thing, I come from a family of mechanics. My dad currently is a full time solo mechanic for the city of southaven. I have a rough idea of what his day is like but I'd be happy to ask him anything you like.
I do know that he calls me quite frequently and has me google routing diagrams and trouble codes and crap that the internet's good for.

Also my uncle owns his own shop (has for years) and he seems to be doing alright. But we're not close sooo I can't get ya much info. I just know one of the mechanics he employs, me and him don't get along ever since he touched one of my cars. So yeah. I don't go there no moars.

EDIT: And btw my dad always told me to keep it as a hobby too

I've worked as a mechanic here and there and have a mechanic buddy who has said tons of times, "never do this for a living."

The basics
You'll get burned with hot exhaust, torches, welding
You'll get soaked the minute it rains or snows and there's no choice, you have to work under the car and fix it.
You better get good with that electrical etc, cause you'll have the oddest puzzles to solve.
Plan on scrapes, cuts and gashes, you'll get plenty of them
It's freezing cold crappy work in the winter
It's ball sweating hotter than hell in the summer around hot running cars with the fans blowing more heat your way.

Sound like fun so far?
Add that the lift wouldn't save your back, your back, back of your legs, etc etc are going to ache a lot of the time.
You'll spend a small fortune and owe tool guys for quite some time.
You'll likely get paid flat rate, which means if the job takes 10 hours...warranty pays 6.5 and it doesn't matter if it takes you 12 hours. You got 6.5 hours of pay.
Enjoy smelling the exhaust of cars running poorly, chemicals like brake cleaner etc etc...you'll be smelling them all day. It's only a set of lungs, no worries.
You'll blow black snot out of your nose all the time, cause you are around so much dirt and crud.

i can lay out my day at a bmw stealership if you would like

Look at the hands of a guy that has done mechanic work for 30+ years. If you can live with that then go for it.

Im also in college going for Mechanical Engineering. Ive thought the same thing about becoming a mechanic but ive heard lots of negative things about it.

Originally Posted by BillBoost37

I've worked as a mechanic here and there and have a mechanic buddy who has said tons of times, "never do this for a living."

The basics
You'll get burned with hot exhaust, torches, welding
You'll get soaked the minute it rains or snows and there's no choice, you have to work under the car and fix it.
You better get good with that electrical etc, cause you'll have the oddest puzzles to solve.
Plan on scrapes, cuts and gashes, you'll get plenty of them
It's freezing cold crappy work in the winter
It's ball sweating hotter than hell in the summer around hot running cars with the fans blowing more heat your way.

Sound like fun so far?
Add that the lift wouldn't save your back, your back, back of your legs, etc etc are going to ache a lot of the time.
You'll spend a small fortune and owe tool guys for quite some time.
You'll likely get paid flat rate, which means if the job takes 10 hours...warranty pays 6.5 and it doesn't matter if it takes you 12 hours. You got 6.5 hours of pay.
Enjoy smelling the exhaust of cars running poorly, chemicals like brake cleaner etc etc...you'll be smelling them all day. It's only a set of lungs, no worries.
You'll blow black snot out of your nose all the time, cause you are around so much dirt and crud.

story of my life

I have a buddy he's a senior mech engineer, I've seen the work he does and it's another language of ugliness. He's a frikken genius but... the things they do does not interest me at all.

I have a buddy who went mechanical engineer. He had some work that gave him a bit of hands on, the majority though...walked in the door making damn good money on a steady salary paycheck. Well worth continuing on.

Stay doing that, do dyno testing or somethin similar. I'd rather keep mechanic work as my hobby like it is now. My Primary is Recording Arts & Production.

Im taking the old advice of "do what you love". maybe its not a mechanic, but im 90% sure its not a mechanical engineer. I'd rather be a mechanic is some kind of performance shop or something. I'd honestly rather have all the bad things of a mechanic then sit at a desk and do equations for things ill never get to put together. I'd really like to do something hands on and this was the first thing that came to my mind.

And bill I do have a good idea of what you're talking about. I've worked on my car a good bit and its not the most comfortable thing ever. But id rather be out there doing that then doing my engineering homework.

I love what I do. With that being said I have just over 10yrs experience as an ASE and State Certified Automtovie Electrical Tech. I dont deal with getting greasy. I pretty much fix diagnose or install anything that has wires attached to it.

Worst part is winter like bill said. I do a lot of remote starts a dozen or more a week easy during the cold months. Getting wet is inevitable. Im very slim (170lbs) and flexible so being upside down under a dash isnt bad for me.

Its 40hrs a week and I still do my side jobs for some spending cash. Im 28. own my car and have a house mortgage. So for me it pays the bills.

Just an fyi I was also in college first sem. For mechanial engineering and didnt care for it. Also was a computer programmer in high school thought that was a good choice for a career but it dropped off when I started doing my electrical.

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you've got to realize that engineering fields are awfully broad. i have an electrical engineering degree and i could have split my career into like 75 different ways before i found something i liked. i've been out of school since 2008 and i went through a few ups and downs with jobs, but now i am going on 3 years with a company that has great benfits, culture, and the pay is pretty fair, too.

in otherwords: be a mechanic if you want to work hard and still be poor for the rest of your life.

<<<doesnt care about money

I feel like people going to work for GM as a Mech E. get their degrees form the michigan colleges where they teach them different things for that company. I know GM has some kind of special deal with them.

you will care about money at some point in your life. to a certain extent i can agree, but no grown man can make a living doing work for $15/hr.

Car payment
Mortgage/rent
Repairs

All cost money

I did the associates degree in automotive service at community college / state certs. I worked in my dads shop since I was like 14 anyway though, so half the time I ended up helping the instructors. Easy classes that didnt teach you much and no one took seriously. The people who were there to get their degrees already worked in the field and knew what they were doing. The people that were there to screw off because mommy and daddy said they had to do something after HS were never going finish the course or learn enough to be successful in the field anyway. One year of experience in a real shop is worth more than 10 years of classes. I dont know about other states but here in MI anyone can walk into a SOS and take the mechanic license tests so the degree doesnt mean much. Best advice, like someone else said, do a internship see if its your thing before you get too invested in it. Also I wouldnt count making a career out of doing high performance/tuning/fabricating/"dyno testing" those are all tiny niche markets and only the best of the best survive in that world.