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5 hours ago, AJ_Engineer said:

I'm a structural engineer working for a large contractor currently building a major highway. I've worked on large infrastructure projects, energy, oil & gas, hydro, water and wastewater jobs.

Would that be the Stoney Trail project? It certainly is a big one.

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18 hours ago, AJ_Engineer said:

Yep, messing up traffic for now!

Those projects are always a mystery to me. It just looks like they go in & build a bunch of bridges & ramps with no apparent order & then have to figure out how to join them up with roads :)  Hard to comprehend the amount of work that goes into it before any dirt even gets turned.

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Electronics engineering technician, retired December 2017.

Enlisted in the Navy for a 6 year hitch after HS as an electronics technician, used that training to get a job at Texas Instruments in the defense electronics division.  Raytheon bought that business about 20 years ago.  While I do not miss the grind of the job I was blessed to mostly work with brilliant engineers that shared their knowledge with me and allowed me great freedom to work at my maximum potential.   

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Great thread.  All I have to offer is I did Roofing, Siding and light carpentry for many years. Had a furniture store for over 10 years and now I do custom woodworking for work witch means making what ever pays the bills so its not often I have interesting jobs. I do enjoy seeing the fine woodworking here. 

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3 hours ago, mat60 said:

Great thread.  All I have to offer is I did Roofing, Siding and light carpentry for many years. Had a furniture store for over 10 years and now I do custom woodworking for work witch means making what ever pays the bills so its not often I have interesting jobs. I do enjoy seeing the fine woodworking here. 

I'm impressed with those of you who do woodworking for a living.  I'm so slow and clumsy at it that I can't imagine working under time pressure to get projects done.

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10 hours ago, Pondhockey said:

I'm impressed with those of you who do woodworking for a living.  I'm so slow and clumsy at it that I can't imagine working under time pressure to get projects done.

^^^^^^^    Me too.  

I gets lots of compliments on my boxes and am told I should sell them all the time.   I just laugh because there's so many hours in each box I would have to charge a stupid amount of money to make selling them worthwhile.

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Started out working for my Dad.  He owned a petroleum lab and did testing on JP4 for Barksdale AFB and others along with all the gasoline and diesel from the refineries in the region.  I could run all the tests but he wanted me to get a chemistry degree to take over the lab and I wanted to be an Electrical Engineer.

Worked as the machinist for a small well logging company and then got into plastics - injection, blow, and rotational molding.  I did the hydraulics, pneumatics, and electronics troubleshooting and repairs. 

Went back to school for the EE degree while working full time and then life got in the way and I stopped somewhere in my junior year.

Worked for and took over ownership for a furniture design and restoration business for about 6 years, then got into sales management and IT manager for an environmental service company.  About 27 years ago I switched to full time Technology Sales and have been there until about 2 years ago when the company I worked for pulled out of Louisiana. 

We didn't want to move so I built a CNC router and started looking for work to do out of the shop (garage).  So that's what I do now; we've opened an Etsy shop, I do contract work for local trophy shops, and I have begun marketing my work to local interior designers. 

We're waiting until I turn 66 next year to draw SS, if there's any money left in the SS bucket.  My goal is to build guitars.  The first one came out pretty good and I have a dozen people wanting a custom build so I guess it's more than a pipe dream. Fun stuff, though!! :)

David

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13 hours ago, chashint said:

^^^^^^^    Me too.  

I gets lots of compliments on my boxes and am told I should sell them all the time.   I just laugh because there's so many hours in each box I would have to charge a stupid amount of money to make selling them worthwhile.

I agree. Boxes are just ... neat and fun to build but not profitable. My grandkids love them and that’s what’s important. Doug Stowe has done well making them for a living. And there is a lady out of NOLA that shows and sells them at our semiannual art show here in Houston that demands and gets big bucks for hers. 

Those of you, young and old that served in the military and our defense program, thank you for your service. 

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I have been working as a mechanical engineer for a large construction equipment company for 14 years now.  Hired in here right out of college.  

 

Treeslayer - I have a pretty good guess of who/where you worked, if you are talking construction equipment in Northeast Iowa and that big of a factory it narrows it down pretty quick!

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On 8/4/2018 at 11:28 PM, K Cooper said:

I’m surprised to see that so far, there are no legal ( attorneys, judges etc. ) or medical folks on here that seek woodworking as a stress relief. Thanks to everyone for responding. I expect to hear from many more of you. 

I started out in the USAF in the 70's as a medical corpsman, used the (Old) GI Bill to return to college and get an RN, then a B school degree. Worked as a RN until 5 years ago when I retired, wife followed shortly after  (she was an elementary school teacher).

When I was in nthe USAF, was stationed at a small base, but had a great wood hobby shop. I spent my time between restoring  cars in the auto hobby shop and the wood shop building a few pieces of furniture. The majority of the guys in both the fore mentioned shops were in fields that their hands were clean, (Dentistry and Medical)

USAF1.jpg

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3 hours ago, danbell78 said:

I have been working as a mechanical engineer for a large construction equipment company for 14 years now.  Hired in here right out of college.  

 

Treeslayer - I have a pretty good guess of who/where you worked, if you are talking construction equipment in Northeast Iowa and that big of a factory it narrows it down pretty quick!

Yep, construction, forestry, yellow or green, sent you a PM

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  • 1 month later...

I do software design/development for a small company that makes extremely specialized, customizable accounting software for grain/feed/fertilizer companies. Been here my whole career- 16 years now- an eternity in the software world! Woodworking is the latest in a long line of hobbies that I've undertaken to help scratch the "I need to make some non-virtual things" itch. I'm hoping it sticks for a good long while. I could see this making a good "retirement career" - something that I'm (hopefully) not depending on to pay the bills and support a family, but could slow the draw on retirement accounts, and be a fun way to occupy some of the free time I'll have. We'll see. That's probably still a few decades off, unfortunately!

PS - if you work for a grain company, and your current accounting package sucks... hit me up! :D

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4 hours ago, TerryMcK said:

I'm a computer systems specialist. I just took voluntary redundancy from my previous employer,  a big multinational computer company, a few weeks back and was expecting it to be a few months before I got another position. However I went for an interview at another huge multinational last week and got notification I got the job Friday night B). I have a few weeks until I start so am going to do some more work in the shop. I'm also going on vacation to Croatia (part of the former Yugoslavia) next week for about 10 days so expect the feetup thread will be populated again. BTW where has the original feet up thread gone?

It let with the origional creator but there is a Feet Up v2

 

Edited by Chestnut
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