It doesn’t seem to matter what the product is, a German, English and American good will all be designed in similar fashions.

(These days, at least in the US market, all built, poorly, by the ChiComs)

By definition, “German Engineering” would be bad engineering in the US. (Almost a perverse desire to complicate designs/use specialized parts/increased maintenance cycles, etc.)

But, the Germans still build/design at the Europeans scale market, and the US companies ignore anyone other than a megacorp.

Italians and the British are similar in that they both produce incredible craftsman, and engineer with the intent to either provide work for those craftsman, or with the presumption that the end user will hire a craftsman to maintain it.

I've thought about that from time to time from the perspective of an Electronic Engineer, which was my occupation until retirement.

Electronic Engineering is the opposite and I don't know why.

quote:

Originally posted by Aglifter:
(These days, at least in the US market, all built, poorly, by the ChiComs)

They figured out that their biggest customer (us) is a throw away and buy another kind of people. We want it quick and we want it now.

Unskilled and cheap labor pumping out volume and not quality is where the money is, and they want money.

It's a science but there's an art form to applying the science and that's passed on through the teaching and mentoring process. It's not that I knew this all along; it's what I concluded in considering the issue posed in the OP.

That's what I thought - my profs who taught me that the German solution is bad, because it wouldn't rely on standard components, was too complex, etc, must have had counterparts somewhere going on that the "beauty of design" or whatever some of the more arcane German solutions.

I'm not entirely certain there really are Italian and English engineers... I know English engineers built the world in the Industrial era - and given their names, that they were all born into families who...

Are most English engineers still named some form of "wright"?

If the Italians and the British engineers are still coming from a lineage of craftsmen, it would explain a great deal.

At least some of those assumptions or stereotypes are getting dated and a lot of completed products come from parts that are sourced from a variety of countries.
A lot of things have changed in the last 20 years or so.

People in all professions repeat what their schooling and mentors present.

I chose a BMW K1600GT motorcycle most recently. I decided to take a chance on German engineering. How this machine is designed and built goes beyond what is necessary. But, I put up with it quirks and foibles because of its performance. 165 hp. Six-cylinder inline engine. Take no prisoners mentality. What a machine.

I rode a Honda Interceptor motorycle before. Amazing. Complex. But, understandable. Worked without a fault for 18 years, until I sold it. No maintenance required. Fast, light, powerful, and got a thumbs up from anyone at a stoplight with its HRC paint job.

I rode a Suzuki SV650S motorcycle before. Competent. Inexpensive. Easy to modify. Easy to maintain.

Years ago, I rode a Honda Nighthawk. Truly universal. Optimized. Nothing more than I needed. Everything I had to have.

Point I’m trying to make, slowly, is that the same “culture” of Japan created three different motorcycles. I enjoyed each one, but for different reasons. And, the “culture” of Germany created “the ultimate driving machine.”

I think it is more than culture, and I would suggest that it is driven by the visionary leadership within a culture.

Similar but different: if you walk around our building and look at test stations, you can pretty quickly tell which of us built it. Each test engineer has his own style and method, and they seem to be similar in intent but way different in execution.

[Thread drift] 4MUL8R, what model was your Interceptor? [/thread drift]

good, cheap, fast

pick 2

American's are impatient, and want things yesterday

and are always looking for the lowest price on everything

Different cultures have different priorities. Engineers of all stripes design to meet the needs and desires of potential customers.

flashguy

In my opinion, the Germans build the best mass market cars by delivering the biggest engines with the best brakes and superior handling.

Unfortunately, they take the quest to the most ridiculous detail. Years ago, the bolt holding the idler pulley on my wifes BMW sheared off. It was made of aluminum. When I asked the (German) service advisor about it, he replied "It is a performance car....." When I asked him how much weight was saved by 1 aluminum bole vs steel he was shocked that anyone would ask.....

quote:

Originally posted by 220-9er:
A lot of things have changed in the last 20 years or so.

Yes... I'm sure they have... But I've also had a conversation w. a German engineer about why his product didn't work, and was informed "XYZ is too hot." He knew his product was to be installed in XYZ, before it was built, but he'd declare God wrong, before changing his design...

American-trained engineers do not think that way.

A lot of it are different philosophies of engineering design. Do you want it to be easy to repair, or not need to be repaired for a very long time? Do you want it to be as simple as possible, or do you want functions to be completely independent of each other? How about redundancies? A low cost approach or money is no object? Culture will affect all of these. Europeans have buildings older than countries, working mechanical devices hundreds of years old, that has to affect their mindset when approaching an engineering project.

And sometimes it is just a different approach. I distinctly remember being tasked with reviewing an engineering model, and my comment was “it isn’t how I would do it, but it will work”.

Why are nail salon predominantly vietnamese ?
Donut shops in L.A. Asian?

Around here there are 8 restaurants that operated by slavs of one type or another.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: bendable,

Who are slabs? Is that an Iowa thing?

It's not just mechanical folk.

Engineer: "There's my way, and the wrong way"

US Navy: "There's a right way, wrong way, and the Navy way"

I had a passing familiarity with Brit motor vehicles as younger guy, they more fiddly than they should be. As I encountered other Brit engineering over the years, things seemed more complicated and less effective than necessary. I passed it off to the product of nook and cranny minds coming from a nook and cranny country.

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:
I've thought about that from time to time from the perspective of an Electronic Engineer, which was my occupation until retirement.

Electronic Engineering is the opposite and I don't know why.

Opposite in what way? I'm not following.

quote:

Originally posted by radioman:

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:
I've thought about that from time to time from the perspective of an Electronic Engineer, which was my occupation until retirement.

Electronic Engineering is the opposite and I don't know why.

Opposite in what way? I'm not following.

We don't do bad engineering, live by good engineering practices and pursue state of the art passionately. What we do and use this year is absolutely nothing like what we will do and use next year.

OK. I get what you mean, in a way, but that’s technique, not process.

Might not translate outside of mechanical devices.

Germans might have an obsession with making things small?

Not sure. The device I mentioned would have needed to be a small amount larger - vast void left in the envelope. Definitely could have enlarged it. Making it compact didn’t really save any operating cost, but I supposed used a tiny bit less steel.