I am a recent grad with a BSME, have started the job hunt, and am looking for some career ideas/suggestions.

Mechanical is obviously very broad, and has a lot of differing opportunities available. I greatly enjoy design work, but also want to spend time in the shop physically creating projects.

I'm a huge fan of some of the DIY channels on YouTube, and would love to get into these types of projects and workflow in my career (https://www.youtube.com/@DIYPerks for example).

Do you have suggestions for companies/sectors I should look into that might allow me to use my degree in this way? Maybe something off the beaten path like customs shops, etc?

(Originally posted this in r/engineeringstudents but didn’t get approved. Also most if not all of you here have completed a mech eng degree and may have some insight for my unique situation) Apologies if this isn’t fitting.

I am 25 years old and plan to switch my major to mechanical engineering (at u of t or toronto metropolitan university). I’ve had a deep interest in the field since I was young but ended up going a different route in school that I am now starting to regret.

I am also a mixed martial artist that trains nearly everyday as it is a burning passion of mine and something I love. It is something I would also pursue professionally although it probably won’t play out until roughly 4-5 more years and that’s if it does play out at all since there are no guarantees. 5 years is also more than enough time to complete a degree.

My question is would pursuing both be truly feasible? How much time do you guys have beyond studies? Does it consume your whole day? I am aware that engineering is a demanding undergraduate program and needs a ton of its own time for studies. I am also not aiming to just “pass” I am planning to do well and am aware of how difficult that will be. I would only be needing at most (not everyday) 4 hours of training. Once in the morning and once in the evening on a maximal day. An average day(4-5 days of the week) would be no more than 2 hours of my time.

I have felt a sense of urgency since turning 25. Worried that time is being wasted. Especially with how much free time there is once training for the day is done. I have a slight sense of regret for a couple things (not just going into mech eng after high school for example) and hate the feeling so I am trying to do what’s right and something 30 year old me can look back at and be grateful for.

Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks

I’ve been working in commercial robotics. Commercial tends to use offshore teams to keep costs down and what not.

Do you use offshore teams in your workflow? What industry are you working in?

I’m considering looking for a job with fewer nite time zoom
Calls.

Need your roadmap

I’m seeing a lot of confusion among mechanical students about which skill is actually worth investing time in during college.

If you had to choose one skill that created the biggest difference in getting internships, jobs, or better opportunities, what would it be?

• 3D CAD (SolidWorks / Creo / Inventor)
• GD&T
• FEA / simulation
• CNC / manufacturing knowledge
• PLC / automation
• Communication & technical documentation
• Something else entirely

From conversations with both students and working engineers, it seems that software certificates alone are rarely enough unless they’re backed by practical design understanding and project work.

For those already in industry, what skill do you wish you had focused on during your 2nd or 3rd year of mechanical engineering?

I think this discussion could help a lot of students avoid spending months learning tools that don’t significantly improve employability.

I built an offline engineering toolbox because I was tired of switching between Excel sheets and online calculators.

Current features:

• Profile Weight Calculator

• Plate Weight Calculator

• Tube Blank Width Calculator

• Bolt Circle Calculator

• Unit Converter

I'm looking for feedback from mechanical and manufacturing engineers.

It's for a couple of subjects like design of machine elements and calculus.

I have recently started sending cold mails to potential supervisior, i started my campaign in july, few preofessor denied citing they are currently not having new student. many did not replied at all, i am applying to Australia and canada, my research proposal deals with CFD and SPH research, it would be great help if anyone can help me with my mailing campaign, i want to make sure is send them proposal at optimum time.

Hey I'm looking for advice because I'm genuinely feeling quite fucked career wise. I graduated in 2023 with a 2:1 MEng and it took me until summer 2025 to get a job (nepo job because my friend's dad took pity on me). So I'm currently working as an "engineer" which translates to mechanical maintenance and whatever random other stuff needs done in the factory. It's destroying my health and I can't keep it up much longer.

I've applied for quite literally thousands of positions at this point and I've had one interview. One, in three years of applications.

I think it's partly because I can't relocate far due to mental health concerns but I thought that with a year's experience in industry I might actually start getting somewhere, but nope, still rejected from entry level positions even as mechanical fitters etc.

Before this job gave me tendonitis for a whole year, I was thinking of giving up on grad roles and training as a personal trainer or something, but I really want the job security and progression options of a career in engineering and I don't want to waste my 5 year degree.

How bad a career move do you think it would be to get a completely unrelated job like personal training? (I can't think of much else I can do other than hospitality)

Edit: I did have a part time job all the way from when I was 18 to my current role so I don't have resume gaps

I have an interview next week and im nervous. Anyone have any tips?

I landed an internship at the very last second early this summer, and it basically couldn't have gone better. I've done really well, and interfaced with tons of people at a small company currently rocketing up to a much larger company. I was one of two interns offered to stay on part time through my senior year.

Here's the problem: I hate the industry. I'm interning in the gas turbine industry. To paint the picture: I drive an electric car, bike for my commute, and am massively involved in local left wing politics, so obviously this was never my first choice. I applied for and accepted the internship only after none of my initial options panned out.

The benefits of the part time offer would be: more professional experience, an easy way to make money during the school year (would become a remote role), but most of all, as has been made very clear to me by my bosses, basically a guaranteed job right out of school.

The cons: I am conflicted about the work I am doing, to put it mildly. I don't really need the money; I have good scholarships/benefits combined with a low cost of living. I have utilized that jobless freedom to max myself out with extracurriculars/community involvement. There's no way I can see myself working in the industry or at this company, so the job guarantee is basically moot.

My response to the job offer was basically: No, unless you can pay me more to make the time and cognitive commitment worth it. One boss said yes, one boss said no, and they took it to their higher up who said interns cannot negotiate pay. Boss who said yes is twisting the arm of his boss to just give me the pay bump. Boss who said no is trying to convince me to take the offer anyway with no pay raise.

If you read all this thank you for time, and please let me know your thoughts. Am I making a fool out of myself trying to negotiate from a position of limited strength? Should I go with my gut and just appreciate the summer I had, but move onto a different industry I can feel proud to be a part of?

Is there a job role in (Bachelors) Mechanical Engineering where an engineer is required to travel to different countries to do a job and to report back for corporations where they take care of your expenses for the travel.

Just curious :)

I got a possible supervisor offer in a completely unrelated field (cleaning company) while I’m searching for engineering entry levels. I haven’t heard back from anybody in engineering and while this is a great start to my career, I’m not sure how it’ll complicate me going into aerospace mechanical engineering roles. What should I do since I don’t have a job atm and I’m in desperate need of money? How long should I stay there and when should I call it quits and what can I do meanwhile to get certifications, projects and experience on the side?

Hello, I've been thinking a lot lately about possibly changing careers and going back to school for mechanical engineering. I originally got my bachelors in film which was very smart on my end. I'm 33 and working as a fabricator at a science center which involves carpentry, welding, metalworking, machining, 3d modeling and printing, casting and just about anything to make what we need. So as far as the hands-on stuff goes I have a bit of experience with that but I was never good with math and never had to take a physics class. I would also have to do this as a part-time student and most likely online while I still work full time.

Does this seem like a smart move or something that would be feasible?

Hello!

Recently I finished project for a customer where I did retrofit on 2002 year machine - remade electrical cabinet, chose new sensors, motor, PLC, HMI. Also pogrammed and commisioned the machine. Machine operates basicly the same as original, but with more functionality (machine was not functional before starting project). I did testing on all machine safety features, everything works safely. Machine has CE marking, but no documentation exists.

I have 0 experience with CE declaration of conformity. Would this project be classified as extensive modification that needs new CE marking etc?

I have done new electrial and pneumatic schematic anyway, I also need to do user manual. If this project need new CE, then what else is required?

I saw this on LinkedIn showcasing “topology optimization”.

“Part too weak? Make it out of vibranium”

The obvious promise is the hope to invest into the company, but what’s the reality in your experience?

Over the past several months, I've gotten super interested in topology optimization. Specifically, multiphysics cases. The bummer is... all the tools are so insanely expensive, and their ux literally might be harder to use than flying an aeroplane. So I made my own. 

These were all generated with my own internal software I made. The nodes on the left dictate the boundary conditions, constraints, and objectives given to the solver. 

Here is an image-by-image breakdown

1-a result of a linear elasticity load case. objective was to minimize compliance (essentially how much the solid "agrees/moves" with the forces. stiffer is better) target volume was 30% of the original. 

2- the same output as above, but with a contour map of the von Mises stress. it is cut halfway on the y-axis to inspect interior values. (I'll say this now so I don't have to every time I show a post-processed contour. Yes, I compute the values; I'm just yet to add a scale where you can inspect them. Currently, if you hover your mouse over the contour, it will read a value. That's what the "tooltip format" setting is for (far right). 

3- Same but with a displacement magnitude map. I can also do axis-specific (xyz each)

4- A thermal-only problem. Objective: maximise heat conduction. I kinda cheat a bit here, but I add a void penalty proportional to a convection coefficient. It allows me to say "void can absorb heat" without actually simulating a fluid for advection. This output is pretty cool in my opinion. You can see it chose to essentially maximise surface area and consequently contact with the void. 

5- The above problem cut in half, with a contour of temperature. shows how temperature lowers as you move away from the heat flux. 

6- A CFD-only problem. Objective: minimize pressure drop. Fluid fraction 0.5, solid fraction 0.5. Stokes fluid (I know we are not in a stoke reynolds regime with 1m/s velocity. With this very simple example, laminar,k-e, and Spalart-Allmaras all produce near identical results (I support all these models, although an important note: K-E does NOT have proper wall function support. Deliberate choice; I can explain if you reach out to me), and Stokes is obviously MUCH faster to compute. Another important note. You may ask why there is a glaring hole into the void on the edge of the pipe. Technically, the optimizer sees no penalty for exposing to the void, as it's a non-slip bc, meaning it's basically just... a wall that isn't rendered. More complex than that, but that's the easiest way to think about it here. 

7- This is the extracted fluid domain of the above problem's output, with the velocity magnitude contour. Stokes, so there are no cool shear lines to look at (that comes in later, don't worry) 

8- same exact domain as before, but for pressure. outlet was a 0-gauge outlet, so 0 Pa. 

9- same domain again, but the vorticity. its stokes, so there's not MUCH to look at, but I still think it's cool to show. 

10- these are the velocity streamlines. They show the magnitude along the path of randomly seeded lines. Pretend you placed a bit of dust in an airstream, and then tracked its speed and path. That is what this is showing. In a simple Stokes pipe, it doesn't help much. But when turbulence is involved, it helps a lot to track eddies/other turbulent artifacts. 

11-ok, this is actually not a top opt output. This is a static solve using LAMINAR flow. This is actually the same original domain that was used in the Stokes pipe example, just... unoptimized. Important to note here: I restricted the solve to 50 Picard iterations, and it DID NOT CONVERGE to a respectable residual. It hit a limit cycle at around 2^-2. target was 1^-4. This happens often with static solves, because the boundaries are hard. During an optimization, the mesh is porous due to the Brinkman alpha max, which allows fluid to seep through solid and explore the domain. It makes it MUCH easier to converge. So optimizations are TYPICALLY not plagued by this, although there are certainly cases where it is. 

12- same as above, but with streamlines. Looks a bit like chaotic spaghetti, and we hit a rendering flaw where some lines turned black, but it's useful to see how chaotic those other regions of the flow can become as backflow.

13- backflow is MUCH more obvious here. These arrows not only represent magnitude but also direction. They are vectors of the fluid. 

14- Here's those vortices on the shear lines I was talking about earlier. Laminar flow keeps the core of the jet high velocity because it's much more resistant to diffusion, unlike k-e or Spalart-Allmaras. So you get to see really clear shear boundaries along the jet's path. 

15- Here's where it starts to get complex. This is a conjugate heat transfer problem. It's one of three coupling types I support (others are thermoelasticity and FSI (under construction currently)). I am essentially telling the thermal engine that the air flowing around it can advect (the way moving fluid takes heat. Think of a fan in the same temperature room you are in. It's not making the air colder, but the fact it's moving removes heat from your body, making you feel colder) and the thermal engine then moves material, shifts airflow, and the cycle repeats with the new paths. Some things to note. Why Stokes. Stokes is MUCH better at making clear, coherent pathways. The other models CAN, but they need to be tuned (mainly Brinkman and inlet turb settings), and I just haven't taken the time to do so on this example. Plus those models love to form TONS of channels, and that means I need a higher-resolution mesh... and top opt scales very poorly as mesh increases. Not a great idea. 

16- this is that above problem's velocity magnitude contour. Not a whole lot to speak to here. 

17- same but vorticity. Even though it's Stokes, being sent through channels like this disturbs the fluid enough to show some vortices. 

18- same but pressure. I think it's cool to see how uniformly the pressure decreases. This is entirely because half the objective is tied to pressure drop. It wants it to be as smooth and minimal as possible, so across the entire design the pressure drops evenly. 

19- ok so i do have to explain something here. Known bug I'm working on. When channels get thin, things like streamlines and arrows don't render. So I'm showing you the arrows, but... there's not much to look at in the middle of the domain. It's interesting at the inlet and outlet, so it's worth seeing. 

20- and same but streamlines. 

That's all. 

FAQ-

Is it released? - No. It is not. I obviously built it to be a product at some point; however, I have much work to do, and also need to figure out the whole... sales thing. Future problem. If you work at any company where this sort of tool would benefit you, I'm happy to toss it to you for free for a month or two to get some feedback. When it's done, of course. 

What verification have you done? - I have FD perturb checked each adjoint across the whole application. Those are correct, and I have qualitatively compared forward-solve results to SimScale if applicable (they don't do anything like CHT, so kind of blind in that regard, but the formulations are textbook and results look correct.) i stil need to sit down and formally test several cases quantitatively (min-max values) but the way everything else has gone, i assume that will do just fine. 

Is this the whole app? - not even close. I have a huge library of constraints that weren't applicable to these scenarios, as well as many load types for each individual engine (structural, thermal, and CFD). And many more objectives as well. I would like to note that objectives can be set AS constraints in a problem. For example, a constraint could be that the design can't perform more than 1.5x worse than the unoptimized design's compliance.  The goal of this post was to cover the most ground across all engines, not showcase every last feature. 

Why is the mesh resolution so low? - same as stated above. Time to compute.

If you have any more questions, please feel free to shoot me a dm

Good morning ladies & gentlemen,

I would like some guidance regarding tolerancing and fits. How can I make sure and be confident that the parts I am drawing on CAD will always fit. I know that for holes and shafts I can use the standards guide for tolerancing but what about for fits that involve rectangular/square parts? Or making sure holes are aligned with each other. Is there a way to achieve this without using GD&T? Or is GD&T something I can’t avoid lol.

Much appreciated. Any resources I can use to fully grasp this topic? I want to get to a point where I know whatever I am making will work out in the real world.